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(Director: Michael Lembeck, 105 min, Rating: G)
You better watch out. Santa Claus (Tim Allen) is coming to town - again! Only this time, everybody is not so jolly up at the North Pole. Santa's son, Charlie (Eric Lloyd), gets his name on the Naughty list (not a sugarplums-dancing kind of thing, but not exactly a crisis either - at least, not yet). Then Santa's Number Two Elf, Curtis (Spencer Breslin), discovers the fine print in Santa's contract - he must get married or he'll stop being Santa. The de-Santafication process begins, he loses weight (faster than a supermodel on the Hollywood grapefruit diet after a baby), loses his beard, and has a limited amount of magic left before he's back to being an ordinary guy, and it's only 28 days until Christmas.
Santa returns home as Scott Calvin and goes to see his ex-wife, Laura (Wendy
Crewson), to figure out what to do with Charlie and maybe get her to help
find a Mrs. Claus. They meet with the principal at Charlie's school, Ms.
Newman (Elizabeth Mitchell), who's more like Ms. Scrooge when it comes
to getting into the holiday spirit.
Meanwhile, back at the North Pole, Head Elf, Bernard (David Krumholtz)
is left in charge with the help of a "Toy Santa" that's pretending
to run the show to keep the elves from getting concerned. The plan works
fine, until Toy Santa starts changing the naughty/nice guidelines - maybe
it's not just the Grinch who wants to stop Christmas from coming. Can a
little Santa magic, some snow on a sleigh ride, a reindeer-in-training,
and the Tooth Fairy (or The Molanator as he prefers to be called) be enough
to save the day?
There are an awful lot of "ah" moments, but the best scene (to
us) is the faculty Christmas party where Tim Allen plays "Secret-Santa".
The set-up for this is perfect - a room full of people who just want to
go home are transformed in an instant to a whole group of grown-up kids
that are going to stay up all night playing. The vintage toys will bring
a smile to every parent's face in the theatre (cool, it's Rock-Em, Sock-Em
Robots and an Easy-Bake Oven).
Tim Allen makes a wonderful Santa, and it's nice to see the cast remained
mostly intact (even after 8 years). Judge Reinhold is funny and Molly Shannon
steals the show in her cameo as one of the dates Scott goes on to find
a wife. It's a good thing that there aren't a lot of dates, but if you're
going to show one, it's an excellent choice.
The movie's not perfect - Toy Santa starts out funny, but goes on too long,
the reindeer are lame, and a couple of the kids are on the verge of being
annoying (but don't quite cross the line). Still, this movie has an awful
lot going for it - just ask the group of kids that were at the screening
we saw (they left the theatre singing "Santa Claus Is Coming To Town").
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