Next up is an enchantingly odd 2016 Danish effort, originally titled Finding Santa or Julius in Winterland, depending on who you believe, but somewhat slyly retitled as A Christmas Story for streaming in America and the UK. It has little in common with Bob Clark’s beloved ‘80s film and was likely given this moniker in order to snare viewers through Amazon Video’s search engine. Sneaky.
Directed by Jacob Ley this is the story of 8 year old outsider Julius who lives at an orphanage. He secretly still believes in Santa, but his faith is starting to slip after some cruel bullying from the other boys. After discovering a mysterious box in the shed, he is transported off on a magical journey to save the real Santa.
Everything in this film looks gorgeous, with some pretty CGI and an unusual, slightly eerie baroque look, like a 17th Century painting brought to life. As is quite standard in these foreign imports, the dubbing is pretty poor, with some robotic pronunciation at times that take me out of it a bit. But it’s a very distinctive little film and fairly compelling.
Julius’ tale is pleasantly old-fashioned, seemingly set in a time where children were happy to receive toys whittled from old wood and bullies used weird regional put-downs, like calling him a ‘little marzipan pig.’
It’s a story very specifically about being at that age when you start to realise that the world isn’t all fairytales and magic, that people can be willfully cruel, and having to deal with that. Julius’ torment is pretty grim, but then things turn magical and the animation kicks up a notch. He finds himself in a snow-covered fantasy land filled with fairies, talking pigs and his own toys brought to life. It’s wisely kept ambiguous whether this is real or all in his head and soon Julius is off to save Santa from the devilish Krampus – sort of a Scandinavian anti-Santa.
It's really cool to see how some other cultures treat Christmas and delve into their own bizarre yuletide mythology. The Krampus is a horrible, hideous goat-horned little mofo, angry at Santa for no longer giving out lumps of coal to naughty children, meaning he’s out of a job. He acts like a sugared-up three-year-old having a tantrum (trust me, I would know), screaming and shouting to get his way, and I can’t wait for him to get his comeuppance.
The Winterland world looks amazing and it’s all reasonably jolly, though apparently this film had a number of cuts due to ‘fantasy violence.’ The film seems purposefully ugly in bits, especially Krampus and his creepy gnome-like minions, and it’s probably not quite cute enough to become a firm family favourite, though the animation is impressive throughout. It follows the distinctive style used by Laika Studios, looking like a blend of stop-motion and CGI to create a distinctive look that feels simultaneously old-fashioned and progressive. The characters all look and move like wooden marionettes, so it takes the eyes a wee while to adjust, but it’s certainly different and intriguing.
It's a sweet tale with a universal message about Christmas being a time for people to come together and leave squabbles in the past. Julius’ bullies get pulled into Winterland too and, of course, learn lessons about not being so bloody horrible. It’s a lesson we could all learn from and this is a pleasing little oddity with a charm all of its own. It’s just a shame it seems to have been tucked away on Amazon Prime with this title, denying it an identity of its own. Hopefully people will stumble across it and give it a go – I’m glad I did.
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