Arthur Christmas

First ever post dedicated to a movie review! Finally got the time to do something like this, so lets start off with a review of Arthur Christmas, one of many family/Christmas movies for December 2011.

*Few spoilers alert*

Cool story, bro.

So, the movie starts off with a panning shot of the Santa's gallery, apparently the Santa Clause persona is hereditary, passed down from father to son for centuries. Though I wonder how the Santas ever found their wives...do they go out into the towns the rest of the non-Christmas months and get jiggy with it?

Then, it jumps into a kick-ass scene with a million elves in high tech gear, performing military-precision operations deliving GIFTS to children in a metropolis, along with Santa, dressed in a military commanding officers garb, but in the traditional colors (his beret is bright red!!)

Hey, he looks like Bill from Left 4 Dead.
Just you know, fatter, jollier, and not dead.

And thus, Santa has gone high-tech, aided by his son, Steve who is in command of the whole operation from the North Pole mission control center (with another million more elves), and his other son, Arthur, who is in the mail department handling children's letters.

Inevitably, something goes wrong, and Arthur has to save Christmas (kinda) by teaming up with Grand-santa for a mission before sunrise. The premise is simple, there are no backstabbing attempts or villainy twists, which seems to be more prevalent nowadays in (of all things) animated children films.

Some of the themes explored in the movie will no doubt be more noticeable by the adults, such as modernization, fear of retirement, ego etc etc.

Part of the opening scene, conveys more emotions than an entire Twilight movie.

This film is a simple, feel good animation for the whole family. The jokes are absolutely hilarious and unpredictable, personally I feel that most of the jokes will appeal to both adults and children. There are one or two jokes that only grownups will get, but it does not spoil the movie nor break the flow in any way.

It helps that the are plenty of big names in the movie, and their voice acting is top-notch: James McAvoy (Professor X!!), Jim Broadbent (WHOA!!), Bill Nighy (I love this guy!), and last but not least, Hugh Laurie (House!!).

Yup...big names abound in this movie.

But, in my opinion, this elf steals the show.

I <3 Bryony

Now, all the elves in the movie are damn bloody adorable, in a fanatical soldier, Christmas-loving, children-loving (not like that, *smack*) sorta way. But, by far, I absolutely adore Bryony of the Giftwrap Battalion.

Like the rest of the elves in the movie, she's more militaristic than the usual ones that we've seen, but she's just so damn endearing and cute, especially with the way she tackles giftwrapping like a combat skill. I applaud Ashley Jensen, her voice actress, for her fantastic work in bringing life to this character, it would only be half as effective without her.

She deserves a spin-off short film. Hmmm...


_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Arthur Christmas is wonderful, delightful, funny and heartwarming movie. It's easily one of the best Christmas movies and one of the top animated movies of the year. The trailer really does not do it justice. The film is far better than what the trailer suggests.

The rest of the Christmas season movies have a really high bar to surpass.

My recommendations: watch this movie. You won't regret it one bit.

POLAR BEARS!!