User Reviews

There's lots of magical visuals and exposition of how Santa got his start before the plot begins, but that's okay in this underrated Christmas spectacle. David Huddleston is really good as Santa, reminding me a bit of Grandpa Walton with his devil may care attitude, except when he hears "The Nigh Before Christmas" and has to go on a diet because of the bowl full of jelly reference.

He's a lover of the struggling children in his regular human life, and through a heavenly miracle given eternal life to bring joy to children everywhere for centuries before he finds conflict. The only progression comes through feisty elf Dudley Moore who wants to move into the 20th Century by speeding things up a little Henry Ford style.

A magical ride through Manhattan on Christmas Eve had Santa befriending an urchin and nearly flying into the world trade center. I've never seen the New York City skyline surrounded by so much blue screen, and it's gorgeous. This sequence must have seemed like a rollercoaster ride in the theater and for that alone should have attracted a bigger audience.

The trip to the current day leads to the modern commercialism of the holiday with the introduction of John Lithgow's manufacturer character, a classic Christmas villain with a coal stocking for a heart. He looks even more malevolent than he did in "Buckaroo Banzai". Teeth extensions make him appear really creepy. Moore decides that he's had enough of Santa's old fashioned ideas and decides to branch out by meeting up with the snarling Lithgow.

Probably one of the few movies dealing with Santa to have a bit of a spiritual context with the sudden appearance of a heavenly light that indicates that God has chosen the jolly man to be his liasion to children, and ultimately, a test of human greed. Judy Cornwell is sly in her quiet smirking as she keeps Santa in line, while Burgess Meredith is very regal as an aging elf who is sent down to give Santa his powers. Having never seen this before (and watched as a double bill with the even better "Elf"), I was pleasantly surprised how touched I was as well as entertained. The film seems to be ahead of its time in several ways which could be why audiences didn't get it at the time.

There are mixed reviews out there on this movie, and the reason being is, this movie starts out very good (not excellent, but very good) as it attempts to tell the story of how Santa Claus got started and established, to his first flight, and a few scenes down through the ages. But when it gets to our own time, the hero elf, Patch, turns against Santa and one of the corniest movie plots ever takes over.

This movie is NOT pure garbage, or bad on all levels. It is actually quite good. The cast selection and costumes are excellent (The inside of Santa's home may have a few too many garish toylike colours for adult tastes). The first part of the movie (all the sets, really) are beautiful, and especially the flight scenes, star scenes, our first glimpse of the magic city/kingdom/castle of the elves. But, if you watch this movie, let me warn you to turn it off as soon as it starts getting too stupid for you. Because, whether you hate it from the beginning or like it to the end, it definitely declines in plot, storyline, and standability. I saw most of the way to the end, and it may have had an ending worth seeing. But by that point, I was waaayyy too sick of it to watch any more.

Worth seeing is the beginning -- a family in a northern, Germanic/Teutonic house in the forest on a blizzardly-cold winter's night is telling the legend of the elves, little people who live at the north pole beneath the 'north star' (a huge, but beautiful phenomenon, nothing like tiny little Polaris as we know it) -- when Santa Claus (a mere man, but much loved) arrives.

The excited children delight at his gifts, and he departs to give gifts to children on the other side of the forest. But the blizzard picks up, and he can go no further. The reindeer halt and lie down in the blizzard, as Santa tries to coerce them to go on. The blizzard nears white-out conditions, when Santa gives up to help his all-but-dead wife. The two seem to freeze to death in the blizzard.

Then, Santa and his wife and two reindeer seem to wake up, with the gleam of the North Star, in a magical world concealed by the North Star's magic. An amazingly huge, snow-covered Nordic castle/town, home of the elves, proves to be the thousands-of-years-in-the-making place where the elves had prophesied their 'chosen one' would come to. Santa is given immortality, and soon sets about settling in and preparing for his fist flight, his first WORLDWIDE mission.

All is OK to this point.

A few scenes down through the ages are revealed, but ultimately, when Santa needs an assistant, the 'loser' of the the top two candidates strikes out on his own, goes to New York, and lands a multimillion dollar contract to produce a magic lollipop that makes people fly. Patch, the elf, usurps Santa in worldwide popularity , whom he has a grudge against. Soon, everyone loves Patch the Elf and Santa is forsaken, in the public's eye.

Patch seems to repent a little and want to go home, but is too wrought up in the fame and fortune and pressure of staying in the limelight, and his human agents have a plan to 'do away with Santa' once and for all, and become the new kings of Christmas gifts and commerce.

By this point, the movie had gotten so dull and monotonous and un-Santa like that I quit watching. I just cannot fathom the whole world hating Santa Claus over a lollipop by Patch the Elf.

There are many breathtakingly beautiful Christmas scenes in this movie: the stars, the North star, reindeer flight, New York, etc. But this movie was made in 1985, and while still very pretty, much of the eye-candy is VERY dated by today's standards. The Santa Clause, for instance, has MUCH better flight scenes. Polar Express is more credible, and Santa Claus is Commin' to town has a MUCH more moving Christmas message and theme.

My advice is, watch it for the pretty stuff at the beginning and for the novelty and the history. But once the movie gets too corny for you, (cornification is gradual, but it gets worse in definite stages) you might as well turn it off because it will only get stupider and stupider until it's an absolute headache-inducing bore -- like the stupid films your librarian showed the children at a birthday party (e.g. it gets like Santa Claus Conquers the Martians).

It was NOT AS GOOD AS I HOPED, but mildly worth watching for the pretty stuff and attempt at writing a faux history of Santa's mission.

As a genre Christmas movies are probably most hit or miss, for every Miracle on 34th Street you have a dozen more like Santa Clause Conquerors the Martians. Now in 1985 the Salkinds decided to take a stabbed at it and with Supergirl director Jeannot Szwarc at the helm that's exactly what we got….stabbed.

The movie starts our promising enough as we pan down from a starry sky to a snowy Scandinavian landscape and wood cottage full of people. They are all waiting for their beloved friend Uncle Clause (David Huddleston) to bring toys for all the children as he does every year. Many are impressed that Clause can cut wood for the whole village and still have time to carve all the wooden toys he provides each year, but it is his love of children that makes it possible. After giving out wonderfully hand carved toys to the children he and his wife Anya (Judy Cornwell) bid their friends goodbye as they have more stops to make, and even though the weather is getting bad they can't think of disappointing the children who live on the other side of the forest. The storm intensifies and soon their reindeer collapse in exhaustion as the snow whips around them. Clause embraces his wife as the winter storm takes their lives.

The Northern Star appears and a cone of light descends on the frozen countryside and out of it steps a large contingent of elves. Clause, his wife, and reindeer all wake up as the group of colorfully dressed little people approach. They are led to their new home at the North Pole where they are informed by the Ancient Elf (Burgess Meredith) that Clause is The Chosen One and will fulfill the duties of the prophecy. That is live forever and give out toys to all the children of the world. And this is where the film runs of the rails and into a morass of boring maudlin scenes coated with syrupy crap.

At 108 minutes the film really drags with overlong montages of the elves making toys, endless shots of Santa flying around with his reindeer pulled sled, and it's not until about the 40 minute mark that the real plot of the movie starts to rear its ugly head. A seemingly overworked Santa Clause promotes an elf named Patch (Dudley Moore) to assistant, but his radical ideas of mass production results in shoddily made toys and unhappy children on Christmas morning. A now disgraced Patch runs away to prove he is useful. Of course he ends up hooking up with the films villain B.Z. (John Lithgow) an evil toy manufacturer who is being investigated by a Senate committee for producing dangerous products. Throw in a poor little boy who lives on the street and the rich girl (also stepdaughter of B.Z) who befriends him and you may need to take a couple of insulin shots to survive a viewing of this film.

About the only real enjoyment I got out of this film was watching Lithgow hamming it up with the evil cranked up to eleven, but as his character doesn't show up until the hour mark it's really not worth the wait. Like Supergirl this Christmas disaster just seemed to meander around without purpose, now Jeannot Szwarc pretty much stopped directing movies after Santa Clause: The Movie but has made a decent mark for himself in episodic television (he even directed an episode of the excellent show Heroes). So if you're looking good Santa Clause movie keep on moving as this one is not going to fill the bill.

A family, fantasy, adventure, Christmas film from 1985 - which has been repeated nearly every year that I can remember on commercial TV.

To summarize it, the film can broken down into two parts. The first part of the film shows how a poor toymaker from a Scandinavian village gains immortality and becomes Santa Claus. He then spreads joy and happiness to all deserving children over the centuries. The second part of the film is definitely stuck in the 80's with its product placement and mass produced commercial existence. In part two, one of Santa's Elves, Patch, leaves the North Pole to make a living for himself. His aim is to prove to Santa that his new mass produced ideas are as good as the ways or hand made toys. In the mortal realm of reality - well, America and not the North Pole - a toy manufacturing big-wig soon enticed Patch into working for him, just so he can make his next fortune by exploiting the Elf. Santa is forced into action, out of season, to save the day.

I remember watching this film as a 5 year old. I didn't like it much as a child, but as I've got older it offends me less - maybe its nostalgia or maybe I grew up and got emotions and a fondness for Christmas. Originally though, this felt to sickly sweet in places; and too cheesy, corny and camp in other places. The film smacks of formulaic 80's movies; it actually tried to make Santa cool - like he's a year-long hero who can save people and not just deliver presents and good tidings of joy. Maybe that's what made me dislike it as a child, my hero's worse cape's or iron body suits, they had gamma poisoning or wielded might hammers - they didn't dress in red and fly on magical sleighs pulled through the air by reindeers. The other thing that bothered me was the Elves - their production never really moved with the times, granted there's Patch and his mass production techniques, but it isn't as much the scale of the operation that bothered me, it was more the output - as child of the 80's watching a film about children of the 80's - I found it difficult to believe that hand carved wooden toys were still being made by the Elves and distributed by Santa. Hence, the Elves never moved with the times and their produce was probably outdated and irrelevant. But hey, listen to me, I'm ranting now.

All in all this is actually a harmless film. It doesn't deliver as much of Christmas message as say "Miracle on 34th Street" or "It's a Wonderful Life", what it does more so is try to use Christmas as a way of commentating on how the consumerism of the 80's isn't all that good. It's still a harmless family movie that you could enjoy with kids if required. Unfortunately the film does look extremely dated by today's standards, so I am not sure how long this may be repeated before its updated or rebooted - but for the time being it's not the worst, or best film, you are likely to watch that has a Christmas theme. 4 out of 10.

I don't think you would be able to find a more colorful Christmas movie to watch for the holidays. The scenes of Santa's wondrous home and workshop with the elves in their vibrant costumes are radiant and impart a joyous feeling to the film. I thought it was kind of funny when Santa Claus took exception to the line in the Clement Moore Christmas poem comparing his girth to a 'bowl full of jelly'. David Huddleston and Judy Cornwell couldn't have been better cast as Mr. and Mrs. Claus, they both had just the right look and temperament for their roles. Huddleston might have been a little jollier in retrospect, but he did have a lot on his mind with all those toys to get delivered on time.

The most glaring thing that bothered me however was when young Cornelia (Carrie Kei Heim) placed some food outside for her street urchin friend Joe (Christian Fitzpatrick) to eat, and right there next to the dish she placed a can of Coke. Talk about crass commercialism in a movie that attempted to put the whammy on crass commercialism. Later on there was a scene of Santa's warehouse with a Coke vending machine at the bottom of the stairwell, and I had to wonder how much Coca-Cola paid for the product placement in the picture. Lest you think I'm going overboard with the Coke comments, I happened to notice many years ago how many movies actually do have some mention of that product, and made a game out of it with my family to shout out 'Coca-Cola' whenever a scene came into view on screen. If you make a mental note, it will seem like you'll catch a Coke reference in every movie you watch from now on.

Well, excuse my little rant there. As far as Christmas movies go, this one is probably a whole lot better suited for youngsters than adults, but Christmas being family time, it couldn't hurt to watch it as a unit. John Lithgow makes for an effective Scrooge-like villain attempting to corner the global toy market, but with a name like BZ, I don't think he ever had a chance. Dudley Moore being top billed, I thought he would have had more of a presence in the story, and he did in the latter half of the picture when his character Patch goes commercial, but you knew it was only a matter of time before his true Christmas spirit would shine through.

When the chauffeur is carrying Joe out of Cornelia's house, Joe's cries are muffled because his mouth is covered. But when the chauffeur removes his hand from Joe's mouth to open the limo door, Joe's cries are still muffled.

I don't care how many goofs are found in the movie, I still enjoy watching it every year. My children are now in their 40's and they still quote many of the lines from the movie. Our absolute favorite is "Christmas TWOOOOOO!" John Lithgow could not have been a better villain. B. Z. Is despicable.

Fix yourself a cup of cocoa, and sit down to watch a true Christmas classic.

A big budget story about the traditional idea of Santa Claus seems like a good idea. I actually think I can pinpoint where the film sort of falls apart. While the film starts as this captivating fairy tale it quickly turns into a original version of Will Ferrell's "Elf." The film suddenly focuses nearly entirely on Dudley Moore's character because he was the big "star" of the time. The problem is his character has very little depth and you feel no attachment to him whatsoever. The characters are good but don't have enough depth whether it be Moore's character or the villain or the two children, they feel underdeveloped. And the focal point of the story should be Santa because they set up a very interesting beautiful story about this man and then it all falls apart. There are some stunning special effects, the animatronic deer are incredible (although some real deer were used) and the scenery is beautiful. It would have been very impressive for its time. It just feels like they had a great idea but when it came to writing the story it didn't fill out properly.

Dudley Moore was a comedy icon in the eighties. He had Arthur under his belt and I'm sure he seemed like the right person for this role. The problem is that the character is underdeveloped as I mention and Moore puts in no personality at all into the character. He isn't fun or easy to watch and brings no life to the elf. David Huddleston is brilliant as Santa Claus. He is shot larger than life, with the giant beard and he just looks regal and commands screen presence. If only the film had focused on him. John Lithgow is decent as our villain B.Z. Lithgow is a fantastic actor, comedic or otherwise, but this role is pretty straight forward for him. He pulls it off flawlessly but had to bored by the simplicity of the character. He gets no chance to really stand out which he easily could have. He plays the character very campy which he does well and it was the only way he could have played it. Christian Fitzpatrick and Carrie Kei Heim play the two youngsters who get themselves into danger. Somehow they should have been the focus of the antagonists story but they aren't and the kids are way underdeveloped as characters and basically just background characters.

The biggest disappointment for me is that the film shows some potential. The sheer idea of an epic Santa Claus story that incorporates all the traditional legend and lore with big special effects seems like a sure fire hit. And it wouldn't be a comedy but a sweet family drama. I think that was the idea here but it falls apart in a big way. Poor Jeannot Szwarc who has spent years and years in Television but in the eighties was the name behind Jaws 2, and then back to back this film and Supergirl (both big flops.) You can even see a similar style between this and Supergirl (a film I appreciate as a campy fun classic.) Santa Claus unfortunately just feels flat from every angle. I don't think it even sits in the Christmas classic genre. It is underwhelming in many, many ways. 5.5/10