[Movie 312 / Day 333]
Christmas comedy with Will Ferrell in one of his most enjoyable movies to date. He plays Buddy, a human raised in the North Pole as an elf after he managed to stow away on board Santa’s sleigh one year during the big man’s trip to the orphanage.
After years of trying to keep up with the other elves in making toys and wondering why he was so freakishly tall, Buddy comes to realise that he is as different as he’d feared and so strikes out into the big wild world to find his real father – a businessman that is so ruthless that he’s been put on Santa’s naughty list.
Once Buddy makes it to New York and starts hunting down his father, Christmas related gags abound, mainly revolving around him being mistaken as an employee of Macy’s as well as his attempts to bond with his new family.
In typical Ferrell style, Buddy is a character caricature – but rather than grating, his over the top performance seems to work in the confines of the schmaltzy Christmas movie. Indeed, the movie succeeds at delivering enough Hollywood sentimentality to make this a slightly saccharine-sweet but mostly fun feel-good trip.
OK, so it’s strictly a Christmas movie and won’t work at any other time of the year, but when you’re overflowing with the milk of human kindness, there’s something right about watching a slightly gawky Zooey Deschanel awkwardly singing Christmas songs while Will Ferrell is helping Santa to get his sleigh airborne again. The kids will like it but there’s plenty to enjoy for the adults too.
Rating: 
[ IMDB rating: 6.8 / 10 | IMDB link | Running time: 97 mins | Buy it! ]