Merry Christmas, people! I’ve been trying to diversify my Netflix watchlist recently to include more than the three sitcoms I watch on a loop, a few romantic comedies, and the four Marvel movies that Netflix has available. I had been seeing a lot of ads for The Christmas Chronicles on social media and Netflix was showing the trailer on its homepage, so I decided to give it a shot. I didn’t know it at the time, but I was about to embark on one of the strangest cinematic journeys of my life.
This movie was like if you took certain elements from a bunch of famous Christmas movies, put them in a blender, poured in a healthy scoop of absurdity, and sprinkled in the fact that Santa is basically a God who can fly and make anything appear out of thin air. It was like Christmas on acid. It was like the creators of this movie went to Netflix, said, “hey, what if we make a regular Christmas movie?” and Netflix was like “Eh, boring, no thanks,” so the creators decided to just make it as ridiculous as possible, and Netflix was like “YES YES PLEASE YES.”
When I first started watching this movie, I was turned off by all of the ridiculousness. It felt like a weird knockoff blend of Elf and The Santa Clause. I wasn’t really sure if the movie was self-aware, and I think one of the worst things a movie can do is lack self-awareness. However, there was a turning point where I realized that the movie was in on the joke: a jailhouse blues rock scene, with Santa as the lead singer and a bunch of convicts as his band.
How do we get to that point, you ask? Well, the two main characters of the movie, Teddy and Kate, sneak onto Santa’s sleigh and surprise him to the point where Santa crashes the sleigh in the middle of Chicago and loses his hat, bag, and reindeer. Santa is played by Kurt Russell, who is annoyed that Santa is portrayed as a fat, jolly guy instead of looking like Kurt Russell with a beard. Without all of the stuff they lost in the crash, Christmas will be lost, and the world will go back into the Dark Ages. That’s not an exaggeration either; Santa explicitly says that would happen.
(Side note: Teddy and Kate are a pair of squabbling siblings from Lowell, Massachusetts. Their dad recently died in a fire, which is discussed almost constantly throughout the movie. Teddy plays the role of teenage brother who’s too cool for Christmas, while Kate is the younger sister who believes in Santa. Teddy is also getting into some bad habits like STEALING CARS with his friends. This movie decided there was no way to portray him as a troubled teenager than by having him jimmy locks and hotwire cars at the local deli.)
Anyway, Santa, Teddy, and Kate decide to steal a car from a local bar’s valet, which leads to a car chase with the police. At this point, Santa sends Kate off to run through Chicago, a city where she’s never been before (and a city that Santa makes fun of for its high crime rate), to find his reindeer. As Santa is being arrested, Kate comes back with the reindeer and she and Teddy escape. Santa is interrogated by his arresting officer and decides to taunt the guy with jokes about his ex-wife. He’s put into a holding cell with the E Street Band’s Steven Van Zant, magically pulls instruments out for all of the convicts, and gives everyone musical ability for a minutes-long blues rock number, all in the name of increasing Christmas spirit. I’m not kidding at all. I thought this would serve as a distraction for Santa to bust out of jail, but he literally just did it to boost Christmas spirit.
(SPOILER ALERT) Because of this boost, the gang is able to save Christmas and everyone lives happily ever after (at least until Teddy gets sentenced to several years in prison for grand theft auto, but the movie ends before we get to see that happen).
The jailhouse rock scene told me that the movie was aware of its own absurdity, and they really decided to lean into it. This made me enjoy it a whole lot more. That’s not to say I don’t have my gripes with this movie: it often felt like it couldn’t decide between being a children’s movie or a movie made more for adults, and it sometimes seemed like Kate’s character was only there to fall out of or into things (see: Santa’s sleigh/reindeer/bag). Also, I don’t want to spoil the end for anyone who hasn’t seen this movie yet, but let’s just say there’s a fairly large plot hole at the end that kind of negates a good deal of the movie and cheapened the film for me.
I have so many more thoughts about this movie, but I’m approaching 900 words, so I’ll cut myself off here. In short: The Christmas Chronicles is an enjoyable watch, but not exactly a cinematic masterpiece. It’s a good movie to throw on for some background noise while you’re doing a task like decorating for the holidays, or to watch with your friends and point out all of the weird things going on. On a five-star scale, I give it a two; on a letter-grade scale, I give it a C+.
ReJoyce 