Arthur Christmas

Whereas the vast majority of Christmas films are utter balderdash and deserve to be ignored, there are two in particular that are required viewing over the Christmas period, in my humble opinion.

The first is Scrooged which is possibly Bill Murray's best ever film. The second is the very schmaltzy and horribly saccharin-sweet Santa Claus: The Movie starring Dudley Moore and John Lithgow. Before you judge me on my latter choice, I can happily justify it by saying that it was in actual fact the first film I ever saw at the cinema, so it will always be special to me.

I was looking forward to seeing Arthur Christmas as I am a huge fan of Aardman and was keen to see their interpretation of a Christmas film.

The story is based around the Christmas family which comprises of Arthur (James McAvoy), his father Santa (Jim Broadbent), his brother Steve (Hugh Laurie), his mother Mrs Santa (Imelda Staunton) and Grandsanta (Bill Nighy).

Each year the Santa family and thousands of elves work to ensure that every child receives a present. The operation is run in a military style by Steve who secretly harbours an ambition to be the next Santa. The current Santa is very much the figurehead and does not contribute a great deal to the procedures. Arthur is entrusted with responding to the letters from children, a job that he takes great pride in. He is particularly taken by a letter from Gwen.

At the end of the mission, it transpires that the only child in the world not to have received a present from Santa was Gwen. Despite Steve claiming that it can't be done, Arthur and Grandsanta try to get the present to Gwen before sunrise on Christmas morning.

The film is a lovely modern take on the Santa story. I particularly liked the Santa title being a hereditary one which did make for some amusing moments. The animation was clean and effective, I cannot comment on how it looks in 3D as I refuse to watch a film in 3D, but I liked the visual style of the film and cannot imagine that 3D would have added anything to it.

The main issue was that there simply wasn't enough laughs in this film. The screening I was in was dominated by children and I didn't hear them laugh too often either.

Verdict: Lovely story with some nice animation, but let down by the distinct lack of laughs. I doubt that any of the kids in the screening will remember this film for long.