Not excellent, but a wonderful Christmas comedy nonetheless

Rating: 7/10 (20 December 2011)

Before his first debut in the superhero genre starting with the first two Iron Man films, he directs a Christmas comedy known as "Elf" starring Will Ferrell and James Caan.
It's about one of Santa's elves named Buddy who learns of his identity as a human and goes to New York City to find/meet his father and teach him the true meaning of Christmas in world of wacky cynics.
As far as Christmas movies go, this one successfully details the Christmas feeling quite perfectly. The actors are brilliant. James Caan did a good job as Buddy's father, but I think that the best performance goes to Will Ferrell for his portrayal as Buddy and successfully gives out his hilarious comedic moments. The rest weren't that bad either especially Bob Newhart, Mary Steenburgen and Ed Asner. The jokes in this movie are hilarious including the "He's an angry elf" part and the directing from Jon Favreau was surprisingly good.
My biggest complaint about this movie was the ending which felt too cheesy for my taste and in the third act, there were barely any jokes near the end of the film including it's atrocious dialogue, but I think the story was wonderful that boosts up the character development and it's not a complaint.
Elf may not be excellent, but I'm sure it would be known to fans of Jon Favreau as a Christmas classic for children young and old.
7.6/10