Santa Clause 2 - Eine noch schönere Bescherung

It's been quite a while since I've seen the first Santa Clause movie, but I remember being quite surprised by it. It was a unique twist on the beloved Santa character with great comic timing by Tim Allen. But that was a while ago, and I didn't really know what to expect from The Santa Clause 2.

The movie started off kind of slow when everything is going smoothly. Everybody's happy and Santa's meeting with his fellow "legendary figures," which I admit was a fairly funny scene, but this movie just started off kind of boring. Of course this is normal with any movie until we're presented with a conflict. Santa is reverting back to his civilian self and must find a Mrs. Clause to fulfill the contract and continue being Santa. So to watch over the North Pole, a duplicate, plastic Santa clone is made, and slowly turns to a maniacal boss over his elves. I thought this was pretty funny, especially with me being a business major. I wonder if I'll act like that after school!

Anyways, back to the story, Santa goes back to his hometown with limited magic. We're introduced to a frigid principal that has punished Santa's son for displaying some Christmas spirit. More fun ensues as Santa tries to find and woo the next Mrs. Clause. To seal the deal, his Santa magic gives him the edge and results in some very nice scenes of the movie.

I won't go any further as you get the idea. Overall, The Santa Clause 2 is a nice, snuggly movie that will keep you in the holiday spirit. It's not groundbreaking material, but it has a nice message and should put a smile on anyone's face.

My IMDb Rating: 7/10. My Yahoo! Grade: B (Good)

Now, I cannot really describe what sort of expectations I had coming into this movie. I barely remember the first Santa Clause, which came out over six years ago, so the idea of a sequel after such a long break made me rethink its possibilities. Then my family and I went to go see it today, and for what it is worth, SC2 is pretty decent. Okay, so there isn't a lot of humor that will appeal to the older siblings or parents in the audience, but the colorful sets, simple story, and a good cast make it worth the trip. Tim Allen is just fine as Santa, although for such a good comedian I was hoping he would improvise some more sly humor or gags into the role. One wonders what Robin Williams or, heck, Chris Rock could do with the role of the big guy. The woman who plays Allen's possible love interest was also pretty good, but her character fell in love with Scott Calvin so fast it seemed like the script was forcing the relationship. Pretty much everyone from 1996's Santa Clause is back, including Charlie, who is now all grown up and as cute as a button. They try to present him as somehwhat of a delinquent, but considering all he does is throw snowballs and do a little light grafitti work, it seems like he's more of a Disney thug than anything you would see on the streets of reality. The only actor I could have nixed from the film and not missed was the chubby kid who was also in Bruce Willis' The Kid and provided voicework for the Peter Pan sequel. It just feels like Disney is recycling him into every movie they have, and he isn't even that good of a child actor. Oh, and did anyone catch the insanely obvious product placement for McDonald's? Sheesh, I have a problem with such blatant advertising like this, but at the same time it is kind of funny to watch the Marketing Gears groan and grind (look, Charlie is having a BIG MAC). Oh, and the reindeer character eats a lot of brand name candy (including a yummy CRUNCH BAR). I liked Comet, even if he is an obvious animatronic creation, and appreciated the fact that the filmakers didn't get lazy and just use CGI, but what if he had just spoken English? Why the weird reindeer language? Tim Allen had to repeat everything Comet said just so we could understand, and that got a little old. What's that Comet? You can't fly? You say Timmy is at the bottom of the well and he is hemmoraging? Hee hee...sorry, I couldn't resist. Anyway, this review is getting kind of long, so I'll wrap it up by saying that The Santa Clause 2 is a great movie to take the family to, but don't expect long-lasting memories. It certainly looks better than Adam Sandler's animated PG-13 movie. What was that man thinking? I give SC2 3/4 stars.

OK so I admit I thought this was going to be a dud. The first one was sorta clever but a sequel... oh dear. I ended up going to watch it anyway, not entirely by choice.

Well, actually it was pretty good. There were several intertwining plot lines, lots of laughs that weren't all about Tim Allen being fat and falling down, and the kids in the theatre seemed to enjoy it too. So, for what it is (clean family entertainment), it's actually pretty good.

OK, so it's not quite as good as the first, but this really captures the Christmas spirit...I saw it in a theatre with a load of little kids who laughed and cheered right through. Everyone who came out of the theatre had a big smile on their face at the end, even the Mums, Dads, and GrandParents!

Tim Allen does a good job (again) as Santa, and there are plenty of nice in-jokes in there - Allen wearing a flannel shirt (remind anyone of Al Borland), and of course all the car references...and there are also some movie homages in there - did the duplicator machine remind anyone else of Bride Of Frankenstein!?

The first 15-20 minutes are a little slow but once Allen returns to America the film really begins to pick up. Good support cast too - Elizabeth Mitchell is beautiful! Reinhold does well but does not have quite enough screen time.

Some of the scenes really do capture the magic of Christmas - witness the Teacher's Xmas party for example.

Basically, if you want a good family film to put you in the Christmas spirit, you could do far worse than see this. 8/10.

This was much better than I anticipated. It made me laugh a few times. In the sequel, Santa Claus (Allen) is losing his magical powers. There was a hidden clause in his contract that he had to marry by a certain time or he would lose them all. So, he goes back home to date and help straighten his son out who was on the naughty list. While away, Santa's lead elves make a plastic replica Santa so the other elves won't worry. And a lot of the funny parts have to do with plastic Santa as he learns the enjoyment of cocoa and goes on a power trip.

I wish the movie would have shown more than one dating disaster with Santa. Molly Shannon does a cameo as his date and loudly sings this funny song in a restaurant. And the flying reindeer and tooth fairy bring even more cuteness to the film. The principle was so annoying and you knew she was going to be the one. But it felt so fairy tale like because Santa knows her like a week and he's saying, "I'm so in love" and all they did was go to a faculty Christmas party. Does Santa stop the evil plastic Santa and save Christmas? What do you think? Duh!

FINAL VERDICT: It was pretty good for a kid's film. I recommended it if you don't think movies like this are too childish.