Everybody has their specific Christmas classic that they watch over and over again around the special time of year, and usually there’s a common acceptance of said movie among others even if they themselves don’t particularly fancy it. While there’s definitely been films that have divided people like the overly commercialized Christmas rom-coms or movies that become Christmas classic by a select element or taste (people definitely see Die Hard and Batman Returns as Christmas movies despite the subject matter), but one that weirdly was a significantly successful Christmas classic was a little live-action Disney film released in 1994 titled simply, The Santa Clause. Around the Christmas session, a successful toy salesman named Scott Calvin (played by Tim Allen) is a typical ‘’money all, fun never’’ type of businessman, which makes him a pretty awful father to his son, Charlie (played by Eric Llyod). Looking after him for Christmas while his ex-wife and new partner are away, Scott finds one night that literal Santa Clause is on his room. After spooking him and causing him to fall to his death (yeah, its that kind of movie), Scott puts the Santa suit on for his son and unknowingly accepts the role of Santa through the ‘Santa Clause’ (because puns are fun). This slowly starts to alter his look into something more akin to Santa; including a heavier build, white hair and also gives him a nicer attitude, but the situation proves dire when people don’t believe Charlie when he says his dad is Santa. So, Scott needs to decide if he can fully adopt the title of Father Christmas and deliver presents all over the world, or keep waiting long enough for people to deem him insane and lock him away for good. Doing moderately well critically and even producing two sequels in the future, The Santa Clause still remains to this day a re-watched Christmas classic, as its still being shown in selected cinema screenings to this day and is still earning money back. But due to a lot of the film’s shortcomings, what is the specific aspect that draws people back in?

From a starting point, the concept of a man being turned into Santa after unwittingly getting stuck in a magical contract is a fun and quirky enough idea that it could work for a simple kids Christmas movie like one that would be shown on the Disney channel. The film also seems to adopt a bit of a meaner edge to it that adds at least a twinge more intrigue than probably would be expected from a live-action Disney Christmas film. It definitely doesn’t reach Christmas films of old, but having Santa actually die and even including a moment where the main character seems mentally deranged to everybody around to the point where it looks like he kidnaps his own son is definitely going an extra mile that makes it a little more interesting. Honestly the best stuff is about the main character’s transformation into Santa; the physical change is nothing that different for the time and even the emotional change isn’t really felt, but journeying to the north pole and realizing the situation is honestly very light-hearted and enjoyable. It’s everything else about the movie that really drags it down and keeps it from really working as a concept. For a movie about becoming Santa Clause, there’s a lot of time spent away from the North Pole and in basic looking locations with basic characters and basic situations. Outside of just looking weird and stating the obvious, no-good comedy comes from this premise in this environment, and the driving force behind this dilemma of ‘’nobody believing that I’m Santa Clause’’ is a really lazy and annoying trope that doesn’t provide for anything humorous or original. For its short length and repetitive formula, it feels more like a stretched-out sitcom sketch as opposed to a full-length movie, which makes sense as the director for this movie, John Pasquin, has been attached to several TV projects and far less movies.

One of the things Pasquin was heavily associated with was the sitcom, Home Improvement, where Tim Allen gained a lot of his fame from. People forget it now, but Tim Allen was not a well-known name outside of that series at that point, so putting him at the centre of this film (one of his first films in general) was a risky assessment, especially because he would be playing a role as iconic as Santa Clause and many people didn’t believe he could do it. From watching the performance, the stuff where he actually acts like Santa honestly feels pretty genuine and distinct. He does bring a nice quiet fatherly attitude to the role that allows him to be his own creation and it does work out, whenever he gets the chance too. The problem is that he doesn’t really have too much of a chance to show that side off as he’s mostly just a regular jerky businessman for a majority of the film, and that is also a really lazy old cliché. It feels like a role meant for comedians like Bill Murray and Chevy Chase (probably because they were the first options for the movie), but even they didn’t always work in that set-up. Most of the other adult actors like Wendy Crewson, Judge Reinhold and Peter Boyle don’t have anything funny to say and therefore don’t offer much worth remembering, whereas a lot of the child-actors are actually pretty good (being a nice twist for a movie like this). While the main kid is passably enough, the real talent are the kids playing the elves; the manner in which the kids portray a lot of these elves who are a lot older than they look comes across really well because of how they portray them, it never feels phoney or fake, they all do surprisingly well and even David Krumholtz as the character of Bernard proves to be pretty likeable for a relatively minor role.

For a lot of the movie, it follows some basic shots of American suburbia and that feels pretty standard, even with some nice Christmas lighting and colors thrown in occasionally, but where the real visual candy is happens to be (unfortunately) where a lot of the movie isn’t spend, the North Pole. Santa’s Workshop actually looks really nice, lively and inviting to be around in this movie; it has that great Christmas energy and atmosphere to it helped out by having it feel like a larger-than-life toy store with kids running around it, the outside has a set feel to it, but in a nice way thanks to the talent of production designer Carol Spier, set decorator Elinor Rose Galbraith and some of the environment shots from the balcony done by cinematographer Walt Llyod also look really nice, it’s a location that really could have been utilized more than just regular households all the time. It probably makes sense that it wouldn’t want to go overboard with showing off the flashy visuals, as the computer effects in this movie are disgusting; (even for the time, these are PS1 levels of unwatchable effects), but thankfully those moments are rare and short, so it doesn’t ruin anything. The comedy in the movie is very ineffective and doesn’t reach that niche adult aspect that could have come from this type of narrative (probably because of Disney’s hold on the project), but even with that taken out, there isn’t anything verbally or physically creative going on here, it really is a pretty laugh-less movie (probably because both of the writers, Leo Benvenuti and Steven Rudnick, would later go on to work on both Space Jam movies).

As a Christmas classic, The Santa Clause doesn’t really make a lot of sense as one. Its not like the movie is anything awful and it has moments of likability and pleasantness to it, but it doesn’t leave much of a memorable impression because it trades away its creative fun ideas for a bland, predictable formulaic story. Most likely, it comes down to the simplicity of the set-up and the heart that comes from it and even Tim Allen that makes people truly see it as a classic; something that doesn’t have to be grand, impactful, and deep, but rather something small, cozy and light-hearted (pretty ironic in the film where Santa gets killed). Whether as a beloved childhood favorite or as a newcomer wanting to see with fresh eyes, The Santa Clause is a simple, but harmless movie that might hit you in the right spot for this special time of year. Check it out for yourself and see whether Tim really made his film debut work or not.

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