Movie Info
Movie Name: The Santa Incident
Studio: RHI Enterainment/Parallel Film Productions/MNG Films
Genre(s): Comedy/Seasonal/Family
Release Date(s): December 9, 2010
MPAA Rating: Not Rated
I found him, I get to keep him!
Santa Claus (James Cosmo) is shot down by the Air Force and found by Daniel (Scott Graham) and his sister Sophia (Ali Lyons) at the dockyards. With federal agents Erickson (Greg Germann) and Cunningham (Sean McConaghy) tracking his every move, “Nick” must continue to work on his toy supply while awaiting rescue from his team of elves. Nick discovers Sophia and Daniel had their father leave them, and their mother Joanna (Ione Skye) has yet to move on despite feelings for the local sheriff Hank (Jonathan Kerrigan). Santa must get back to the North Pole before Christmas Eve if he hopes to get the toys to the boys and girls of the world by Christmas morning.
Santa…I don’t think of you this way!
Directed by Yelena Lanskaya, The Santa Incident was a Made-for-TV holiday movie which originally aired December 9, 2010 on the Hallmark Channel. The movie has been released on DVD.
With the expansion of cable television, there has naturally been an expansion of TV films…catering to each channel’s strengths and weaknesses. A sappy channel like the Hallmark Channel needs sappy family friendly movies…The Santa Incident succeeds in this.
Safe-crackin’ elf!
The story of The Santa Incident is standard holiday mush. You have kids missing their father, a mother who is lonely, a single man who’d be a good match, bumbling detectives, elves, and Santa Claus. It isn’t original, and the story meanders around as you await something to happen. Despite being pursued by the authorities, Santa never seems in danger and if it is borrowing from something like Miracle on 34th Street, it loses the surprisingly dark tone that that film’s script took.
The acting for the movie is also subpar. Most of the actors don’t seem to have any director for their characters and people like Greg Germann don’t know how humorous to play their characters. You have a number of kid actors (both as the main leads and the children cast as elves), and they are kid actor who aren’t very skilled. A strange character named Ross who plays the pilot who shot down Santa Claus and he might as well be an alien in his performance which is kind of a Leslie Nielsen straight man.
In a year Daniel…I’ll forget you.
The movie at least casts a reasonably decent Santa Claus. James Cosmo is big and has a lot of presence in the role, but he is hurt by the poor script. Cosmo has proven himself as Santa Claus before in both a short called Santa/Claws in 1997 and The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe in 2005.
If you set out to make a cheap holiday movie, you generally get a cheap holiday movie. The Santa Incident isn’t a very good film, and I don’t know if kids would even enjoy the predictable and saccharine sweet plot. There are plenty of good holiday movies…The Santa Incident isn’t one of them.
