The Christmas Movie Challenge: Fred Claus (2007)

One man, 52 Christmas movies, one must be watched every week or the challenge is lost. Welcome to The Christmas Movie Challenge.

I was in a difficult mood this week; none of the Christmas titles were that appealing to me. Had I lost the Christmas spirit I was trying to gather during this yearlong challenge, the trouble with watching seasonal movies in May is YOU ARE WATCHING SEASONAL MOVIES IN MAY!

There was a moment when I believed I would fail the task; I had plenty of choices but nothing I wanted to watch at that given moment.

I almost used the “TV Seasonal Specials count” loophole, but I had gone over 4 months without needing to and I wasn’t going to start now.

So, I found something I had been putting off from watching. Worse than the Unwatched pile of DVDs are the random Christmas DVDs bought just after the festive period, I’m prone to buying these as they are reduced and I’m usually missing Christmas.

Against my better judgment, at some point in the last 5 years I bought Fred Claus. Vince Vaughn stars as Santa’s older brother and Paul Giamatti is the big man himself.

Fred gets in some trouble with the law and it’s up to Santa to try and set him straight. Fred needs to earn some big money, and fast so he soon finds himself working in the North Pole and learning valuable life lessons along the way.

There is no escaping it’s a family movie, there are times it feels as though Vince Vaughn is being held back as his brand of comedy isn’t usually family friendly.

The supporting cast is filled with actors you wouldn’t expect to be in this sort of film, Kevin Spacey, Rachel Weisz, Kathy Bates, Miranda Richardson and Elizabeth Banks. None of them are served well by the script and all have limited screen time.

Fred Claus isn’t a great Christmas movie, it’s predictable and there’s no laugh out loud moments but a few chuckles and some slapstick raises a couple of smiles.

I almost wish this was a grown up comedy as it had the scope to be funnier, but Paul Giamatti manages to save the entire film by being such a warm and dare I say lovable, yes I do, he was lovable as Santa. That said the cameo of Frank Stallone as himself was just plain weird.

Fred Claus is instantly forgettable and you can’t help but feel the great cast is wasted on such by the numbers filmmaking.