My good cheer carries over as I get stuck into 2010’s enchanting Australian-French co-produced animated feature Santa’s Apprentice. This one follows Nicholas (Cole Sand), a young lad in a Sydney orphanage who is chosen to take over as the new Santa Claus when the current guy (prolific voice actor Michael Sorich) retires.
This is a wondrous, impressive piece of hand-drawn/painted animation with a charm you don’t tend to find in modern CGI stuff. The plot is certainly original with Santa suffering a mid-life crisis and worrying he can’t cut it anymore. In the world of this movie, every 175 years Claus must choose an apprentice, though Santa, who comes across as an insecure dummy, is worried about becoming obsolete. He reluctantly liberates little Nicholas from the orphanage and shows him his cool mystical tricks, like his magic globe that locates all the nice children and his special, physics-defying bottomless toy sack.
There’s loads of little, original, inspired ideas, like when Santa loses his temper his beard starts to fall out, or his ‘ho ho ho’ sense of humour actually being a crucial source of his powers. Nicholas hangs out with Santa’s cute little elves at his workshop which is a huge, eye-pleasing, candy-striped factory filled with gadgets, robots and slides and stuff. It’s all very imaginative and looks fantastic.
A stand-out moment that sees Santa’s sleigh fly through snowy mountains in a blizzard features delicious painted animation that’s reminiscent of the unforgettable flying scenes in The Snowman. That’s no small compliment and this one leaves a real impression.
Yorumlar