Fred Claus

Fred Claus (Vince Vaughn) has lived his entire life in his brother’s very large shadow. Fred tried, but could hardly live up to the example set by the younger Nicholas (Paul Giamatti), who was just a perfect. True to form, Nicholas grew up to be the model of giving, while Fred became the polar opposite. Over Mrs. Claus’ objections, Nicholas agrees to help his brother on one condition: that he come to the North Pole and earn the money he needs by working in Santa’s workshop. The trouble is that Fred isn’t exactly elf material and, with Christmas fast approaching, Fred could jeopardize the jolliest holiday of the year.

 

Another Christmas, another mediocre yuletide themed film.  I hate reviewing average films as its hard to find much to say about them but I’ll give it a go.  

Fred Claus is quite jam packed with a stella cast but I can’t help but feel the talent was wasted, Vince Vaughn is like-able enough but his charm can’t carry the movie, I find John Michael Higgins is quite a comic talent who is often underused but he pretty much just phones his performance in and even the theatrical heavy weights, Kevin Spacey and Rachel Weisz can’t get the comedic tone right for this Christmas caper.

I think the issue is they weren’t really sure what they were going for, is it a nice jolly family film with some sentiment or is it a laugh out loud slapstick comedy?  They just couldn’t get the balance between the two right.

The only thing they got right was casting the gorgeous Elizabeth Banks as Santa’s little helper.

So overall a very very average Xmas outing, you’re better off watching Elf again.

~Review By Lee

                                                                                                                                                       

Alex’s take on it

So now it’s time to add my opinion. I know it is late but by the time Christmas rolls again in a few month it will be relevant. Sometimes when you review a film you have a totally different appraisal. Fred Clause however is just how the other review says, and I wish I read it before I bought it.

They basically took the story of elf and thought, hold up, what about instead of an elf going to the real world, then send a real world guy to the North Pole. The casting of Santa was not the best choice either, Paul Giamatti just looked like a old drunk whose voice did not sound like good old St. Nick. Silly thing to think about but it did not just make you believe, and with films like this, that’s a little bit of what you need.
All in all a disappointment. Spacey plays the bad guy, but then we know that he is one of the only actors in the world who can play a loveable rouge so well. Elizabeth Banks warms the Christmas spirit right back up inside you when you see here in her Christmas outfit, and by far the best part is the North Pole DJ, Ludicrous makes a great midget.

The more we see Vaughn in comedy roles the more we learn about the guy. Formally I would buy any of his movies before they even came to a cinema, but his quick talking straight man act is wearing thin. Maybe he should have another crack at serious, as we all know how well that went with psycho.

All in all, not what it cracked up to be, and there is a lot more Christmas disaster movies ahead of this one.

 

DVD Extras:

-Directors commentary

-25 minutes of deleted/extended scenes