The Year Without A Santa Claus

The more I analyze it, Christmas movie titles are such liars! It's A Wonderful Life is not wonderful, How The Grinch Stole Christmas is not an instructional video on how to steal Christmas, and The Year Without A Santa Claus has Santa Claus delivering presents! What even in the coldest depths of hell??

As our final nod to the Rankin/Bass Christmas specials I decided to do this movie, and it's not half bad so we ran the full gambit of, not that good to excellent to okay. And so the story goes that Santa woke up one day before Christmas and through quite honestly the rudest and most likely to be terminated elf decides that his days of nightly adventure to bring gifts to kind and good children must come to an end, but the missus won't be having none of that talk and sets out with two elfs to find the Christmas spirit that Santa doesn't believe exists anymore. Now I for one would think that would be an incredible Christmas movie, to have Santa Claus himself doubt his abilities and intentions in a world that doesn't believe in him and the Christmas spirit has disappeared leading to a very reflective, dark, and downright depressing movie where Santa has to come to terms with the world and come out on top. And you get hints of that here, I mean obviously they have to keep it upbeat and not childhood scarring but come on! How great would that be to see a character study of quite possibly the most beloved man in history? But it's more subtext than actual text I grant you that, with Mickey Rooney returning as Santa giving a very good performance juggling doubt and sadness with hope and kindness, and the cool thing is it ties with Santa Claus Is Coming To Town! Santa is still voiced by Mickey, Mrs. Claus has red highlights so clearly she's Jessica, and even some artwork survived to this movie. It's a shame we couldn't have Winter back but we kinda make up for it with the addition of Snow Miser and Heat Miser which are very brief characters in an already brief special, but my lord did they leave an impression. Everyone knows or has at least heard I'm Mr. White Christmas, I'm Mr. Snow once in their life, and it is a very catchy and fun tune. The music quality is sort of in the middle this time around, not as great as Santa Claus but not as forgettable as Rudolph, I Believe In Santa Claus and Blue Christmas are highlights for me and they are very nice and sweet. So if you're in the mood for more after the first two Rankin/Bass specials check this one out, it's an alright movie with some highlights though Santa Claus will always be the best in my eyes. I always heard very mixed opinions about the Rankin/Bass stuff ranging from absolute Christmas classics to just being weird and kind of nonsensical so I wanted to bring up a few examples and judge for myself and let you do the same. Personally, they are a mixed bag but I don't hate them, I'm a fan of stopmotion and true it's no Harryhausen but they did good work. I guess it depends on what you like, which I can understand. And next week, we look at some well known, something new, and something I'm....less than looking forward to. Until next time.

Santa Claus Is Coming To Town

Bet you didn't know Santa was a total ginger!

You'd think after the near merciless beating I delivered to Rudolph, I'd be ready to take out old Saint Nick as well but I think you'll be surprised how much I enjoy this special. This was the one along with Rudolph that I watched many a time when I was very young regardless of the time of year, and it's aged very well in my memory. Though I doubt it's the first, I do say this is the best Christmas special that tells the story of how Santa Claus came to be. The story takes every pre-known fact about Santa and interweaves it into a lovely little story, starting when he was just a wee baby and adopted by a family of elfs who parent him and teach them their ways of toymaking. As he grows up he decides to take the toys he and his family made to the children of a small and rather quite depressing looking town, which brands him as an outlaw and forces him to be more elusive in his delivering of toys to the good kids. There he meets a schoolteacher named Jessica and a very sweet relationship starts between them, and they continue on with their lives while still delivering gifts. Unlike the Rudolph special that took barely a darn thing from the actual song it was based on, this special covers just about everything with hardly anything added on besides a penguin in a scarf and a warlock turned babyface but even then it works very well. Mickey Rooney is our Santa and honestly I never realized how absolutely southern he sounds in this special, and it is glorious. It's just a cherry on top of an already very good performance where most of the story focuses on when Kris Kringle was still a young man and he brings such a legitimate joy and niceness to a world known and beloved person. Robie Lester is such a sweetie in this movie as Jessica and quite possibly has the best song in the whole special, in fact the songs are quite sparse compared to the last special but are done way better. They're more memorable, fun to listen to, and are even songs I wouldn't mind hearing on the radio this time of year. One Foot In Front Of The Other is an incredibly upbeat and catchy tune, and serves basically as an inspirational song while My World Is Beginning Today is a slow little ballad that's quite lovely to listen to and Robie Lester slays the singing. The more I think about it, just the entire quality of the production is improved since Rudolph, the animation while still stopmotion is more fluid and looks nicer, the songs are definitely a gigantic improvement, the story and characters feel natural, and it can have it's sweet moments that make you feel warm and fuzzy inside. And again my favorite character is the warlock who Kris meets and convinces him to be a friend to his journey, I don't know if it's Keenan Wynn's voice or what but he's a joy to watch and it's funny to think he legitimately scared me when I was younger before he became a good guy but honestly I was one step above being afraid of my own shadow at that point so I'll give myself some credit. And we even have Fred Astaire as the narrator and it's always nice to see him in a movie. So yeah, kinda surprising that I love this special so much but it's hard to argue with decent material and fine actors that make it all work so well. Now this is a definite recommendation for the holidays with your youngins' or just if you're curious from how much praise I showered it with. No wonder I used to watch it a lot as a kid.

Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer

Okay. This is gonna suck either way so let's get this over with.

You know waaaay back when, when I was but a lad I used to watch this and our next movie this week even if it wasn't Christmas time. In fact I watched tons of Christmas movies long before or after (depending on your point of view of time) December. And I have not watched this special in years. And boy howdy, is it much much weirder than I remember. You all know the story of Rudolph, the young reindeer who is born with a neon red nosed who is shunned by his parents, friends, Santa and just about everybody except for a nice elf who breaks conformity and ventures to be a dentist, before saying "Peace bitch!" to the North Pole and travel the wastelands of the arctic evading a genuinely unsettling snow monster while meeting a prospector who soon find themselves on an island of odd and yet somehow really friggin' awesome toys led by a winged lion whose title is King Moonraiser, before returning to Christmas Town to save Christmas when a devastating snowstorm blows in. It's just like the song! So yeah....a touch different than most people would remember this special, but I take ever so slight issue with this than just story. Mainly the fact that everyone in the North Pole aside from one elf, a girl reindeer, and a enthusiastic prospector are a bunch of jackasses! This is a very mean spirited movie, not quite as abusive as Chicken Little, but when the message of a movie is if you're born different you will not be accepted by society unless your unique trait is useful, is kinda f***ed up! But is there more than just general disdain for the story in this special? Actually yes. Burl Ives is a nice narrator, he has a warm and inviting voice and can sing incredibly well, the animation though far from Kubo And The Two Strings quality has a charm and style all it's own (and surprisingly was done in Japan), some of the backgrounds with certain effects and lighting can look very moody and pretty, and my favorite character is the Abominable Snowmonster. This guy makes the movie for me, not only is the design and how he moves and react strange but effective, the fact that they pose him as a threat and he kinda works as a threat is something you rarely see. He's no moustache twirling villain who wants to destroy Christmas, he wants to wreck your stuff and eat your girlfriend because he's a terrifying beast. Perfect. This creature is known for being a force to be reckoned with and should be stayed away from and you feel that, his roar is actually unsettling, and I wouldn't wish meeting such a beast on even my worst enemy. You want to know the best part of the movie? Him. But gah, I just can't get over just the cruel and unusual punishment Rudolph has to take from these people! He's a good kid and despite clearly being segregated and ostrecized still tries to do the right thing so I think the special is trying to impart, don't be a part of society if they judge you and don't want to be around you and look for a group of people who respect and appreciate you as yourself, and to not settle for anything less. Which is commendable but that took some inference on my part to come to that conclusion so the special tells it very sloppily if that was the intended subtext. Geez I guess it just shows what America in the mid-60s viewpoint was on people who were a bit different huh? And this never bothered me as a kid...much, it still pissed me off that they treated Rudolph and Hermie the elf so poorly when they were perfectly fine folk, but everything else I took at face value. So do I recommend this movie? I'm not entirely sure I can. I don't even think it's a Christmas classic, though tons of people watch it every year. Now I know the Rankin/Bass specials have a place around this time of year, but this one tries to fly and lands face first into the ice for me. I sense this is just the beginning for a month of, less than great shall we say, movies to talk about. Better than It's A Wonderful Life. But only by a smidge.