Father Christmas

Watching Father Christmas is a tradition for my brother and I, we also watch it before Christmas Day, ever since we were young kids. It is a sweet natured cartoon based on a illustrated book by Raymond Briggs.

This version of Father Christmas lives in an English suburb, in a ordinary terrace house with his pet dog and cat, and of course his reindeers. He is kind hearted, but grumpy, who moans about the image his has. He has to focus on daily chorus that are related to Christmas. He decides to spend his time for once on holiday, going to France, Scotland and Las Vegas, before having to get everything ready for Christmas.

The animation is simple, and old fashioned and wonderful to watch. There is good designs and art direction throughout and the style is very close to the book. The plot is different to the traditional Father Christmas story where he is a not a jolly man living at the North Pole with a lot of elves, but a old man living a normal live, except on Christmas Eve. The story itself is simple and sweet natured, perfect for children, young and old. There is good comedy, some physical, but mostly based on Father Christmas' attitude and view of live. Mel Smith voice was perfect for this version of the legend.

One of the best Christmas based films.

One of films keeping the spirit of Christmas in high manner. Beautiful, amusing, seductive and..perfect. Because it is more than an inspired adaptation but a pure and generous lovely gem of animation.

I absolutely loved Father Christmas when I was a kid, and I still love it now. It is something I watch as a tradition every Christmas, along with the Snowman and the Tailor of Gloucester. I do not it is quite as good as the Snowman, which is for me a genuine Christmas treasure. And let me tell you, this is just superb. The animation is very fine, smooth and sophisticated-looking, and the music is beautiful. What I loved most though about Father Christmas was its humour. A vast majority of it is uproariously funny, namely anything Father Christmas says. Not only that, but kids and adults can understand it. Another winner was the portrayal of Father Christmas himself, voiced with real enthusiasm by comedian Mel Smith. While he is in some ways benevolent, Father Christmas is also gruff and rather humorous, particularly the use of "bloomin'" before every word or so he says. There are some truly memorable parts to this Christmas masterpiece, namely the Snowman party where the two main characters from the Snowman make an appearance, the running to and fro from the lavatory and when Father Christmas is delivering the presents. The parts where he is taking a vacation are pretty funny as well. The story is clever and original, and I think interesting as well. In short, Father Christmas is magical. If you love the Snowman, you will absolutely love this. It should be part of your Christmas tradition if not so already. 10/10 Bethany Cox

A very different kind of mood from its companion piece, THE SNOWMAN, FATHER Christmas is a comic story about the real life of Santa Claus and what he gets up to on the 364 days of the year when he's not at work. Mel Smith has a ball voicing somebody who turns out to be completely irascible and bad tempered, yet endearing at the same time.

The same qualities that apply to the other Raymond Briggs classics are present here; namely, fine animation and a dual appeal to both children and adult viewers alike. Yet the subject matter isn't as sentimental as THE BEAR or THE SNOWMAN and that stops it from being a heartwarming classic like those productions; nevertheless it still makes for an entirely watchable little half hour.

One of the very best of all Christmas films, notwithstanding, if I may say so under IMDb guidelines, a misjudged return to SNOWMANland and some sovereign-directed sycophancy. The whole idea of Santa Claus - one man delivering presents to all the millions of children in one night; flying reindeers; fat man fitting through chimney - is so full of magic, fantasy, and the sublime: this is a typically English vision, deliberately secular and iconoclastic, that makes the great man understandable and recognisable, a grumbling, narrow-minded worker like the rest of us, a little suburban man, and yet manages to still evoke a considerable sense of wonder.

The film begins rather startlingly, as Father Christmas, voiced by the similarly statured ex-comedian Mel Smith, breaks the air of gentle fantasy conjured up by the title and opening credits, to attack the viewer. He is on the defensive, assuming we judge him a workshy fop who only has to work one night in the year. His life, he assures us, is one of high, banal, dudgeon, and the one time he tried to take a break ended in failure.

This sequence is a brilliantly satiric portrait of the English abroad, parochial, suspicious but essentially up-for-it. First he goes to France, where, to fit in with the locals, he dresses in stereotypical garb (beret, striped pullover etc), and eats to bowel-troubling excess. In permanently lashing Scotland, where the locals are friendly, and the drink flows as freely as the rain, he is attacked by a shark in an isolated tarn. In Las Vegas, a vulgar neo-Roman travesty, Father seems most at home, breakfast in bed, afternoons and cocktails in the pool, until he loses all his money gambling. On each occasion he is forced to leave, not just because of touristy zeal, but because he is recognised as Father Christmas, one stereotype (Father Christmas) displacing the pleasure of another (the Englishman abroad).

The portrait of Father Christmas here is extremely winning, a gruff, whining man in his pleasant terraced house, with his cat and frisky dog, with earthy views and a frank way of expressing himself. You would think that the demythologising of Father Christmas would be complete when we see him deshabille in the bath, running to the toilet after overeating (in a brilliant, disturbing sequence, he passes his own self in the rushes to and fro from camper to lavatory), or shouting 'blooming' all the time.

And when Christmas finally arrives, with the millions of letters blocking up his doorstep, the sled a bit creaky, and weighed down by the amount of presents, the grumbling continues. But the real Father Christmas cannot escape the magic of his calling, and the animation, which had been as smartly inventive and sassily ironic as an American short, takes on a shimmering, ethereal quality, juxtaposed with our hero's very real difficulties with chimnies, and you find yourself gasping at how they achieved such a smooth change of tone.