JTA The Film Passionator’s review published on Letterboxd:
The Santa Clause - Hilarious and Entertaining!
The Santa Clause (1994) is a Christmas fantasy comedy movie directed by John Pasquin and written by Leo Benvenuti and Steve Rudnick. The movie features Tim Allen, Eric Lloyd, Judge Reinhold, Wendy Crewson, David Krumholtz, and Peter Boyle.
The movie focuses on Scott Calvin (Tim Allen) living in an ordinary yet brilliant life as a marketing director for his toy company and wants to spend Christmas Eve with his son Charlie (Eric Lloyd). Suddenly, Scott accidently causes the real Santa to fall off the roof and become the next Santa Claus with his sons support. After learning about his new job at the North Pole, will Scott convince his family that he truly is Santa Claus?
The story was hilarious and had a unique concept that adds something special to the generic "Save Christmas" storyline. With its great plot structure, the story offers some heartwarming moments, splendid humour, engaging character development, and a light tone that stays true to the Christmas spirit. Family, Responsibility, and Believing were key themes that the movie explored. These were shown through Scott Calvin's character arc where he wants to look after his son and despised taking the Santa Claus role. However, he soon learns that becoming Santa requires important responsibility and believing that he can save Christmas.
Tim Allen's performance as Scott Calvin/Santa Claus was brilliant because he was well experienced in comedy movies and brought his hilarious acting skills to portray the funny transformation from Scott to Santa.
In my opinion, Scott Calvin was the best character in the film since he had a beautiful father-son chemistry with his son Charlie, which made him relatable to the viewers. Additionally, he had fabulous character development because he started as a grumpy man who did not care about Santa into a nicer person that is willing to care about Christmas as a whole with Charlie's support.
The jokes were amusing with the reason being that they succeeded in making the viewers laugh for their wacky visuals. For example, when Scott got the Santa job, he started to change physically in a comical way by showing a white full-grown beard and a larger body. Even when he tries to dispose them, they continuously return.
The production design was mesmerising as each element brought the story to life with the designers' amazing creativity, in addition to them matching the movie's light Christmas atmosphere. A good example of this was the beautiful North Pole set design because it matches Santa' busy and jolly personality by making it massive, full of toys, and having bright colours. Another good example was the impressive costume design for the Santa Claus outfit with its iconic red colour that stayed true to Santa's spirit and appeals to the target audience.
Michael Convertino's music score was charming because he used a calming tone to suit the movie's emotional moments that strongly connect with Scott and Charlie's positive father-son chemistry. Additionally, Michael included fast-paced music in some scenes to establish the comedic atmosphere by making them exciting and entertaining, such as Scott's first sleigh ride.
However, one of the film's bad features was the special effects since they came off as laughable and did not age well to today's standards. For example, when Scott goes down some of the chimneys, the CGI looked like it was taken out of a computer animated movie.
The last bad quality of the movie was that it contained two fart jokes, which would gross out the viewers for their disgusting and juvenille nature as they were not amusing.
The movie's target audience are children and families because of the lighthearted tone that suits the Christmas mood and important messages in the film. However, there were some adult jokes that only the parents would understand, which makes this movie an enjoyable viewing for all the family.
In conclusion, The Santa Clause (1994) was an amazing Christmas movie that succeeded in spread joy and cheer to the viewers with its great sense of humour, memorable story, brilliant character arcs, and splendid music. In my opinion, this is worth the watch. This will make you believe in Santa Claus.
