A rarity for the holidays and for Ferrell

Rating: 8/10 (18 December 2011)

Elf has the premise and the look of a badly made Christmas special made solely for network TV. Going into this with mediocre expectations, it only took about ten minutes of seeing Will Ferrell in an elf costume to know that my predictions were dreadfully wrong. This wasn't a case of holiday dreck, but a case of the Christmas film that combined heart, soul, wit, and laughs into a beautiful holiday parable.
The story is about Buddy the Elf (Ferrell) who accidentally crawled into Santa's sack at the orphanage when he was an infant and gets taken back to the North Pole. Santa Claus and the elves choose to raise him and train him to become an elf. Buddy is of course a human so he grows a lot faster than the average elf. In fact, he towers over every other elf he works with, and this leads to problems when he is older.
Buddy then learns he is a human, which causes confusion and sadness. It is told that he was placed in that orphanage as an infant because his father fell in love with a woman who gave birth to him then gave him up unbeknownst to him. Buddy then decides he will go to New York City to try and find his dad and reconnect with him.
His goal is to also spread Christmas cheer far and wide because Santa's sleigh is almost forced to operate with an engine. In the olden days, Santa's sleigh could fly because of mass amounts of Christmas spirit and children believing in Santa Claus. Now, he has to resort to heavy machinery to do that job.
Will Ferrell hasn't sat right with me for the longest time, but as I see more of his movies I begin to like the guy in a sense where I'd like to see him do one of two movies; (a) heartfelt children's' films or (2) very serious dramas in the vein of his 2011 film Everything Must Go. He doesn't have the talents to pull off incredibly funny slapstick because his schtick is usually composed of running around like a towering dork or just screaming. Elf shows his ability to incorporate his persona in a character you can't help but love.
We also see Zooey Deschannel, one of my favorite females in the business today, as Jovie, a woman who works at a mall as Santa's little helpers. Buddy falls for Jovie in a sort of non-conventional way, but he winds up getting conventional help from his younger brother Michael (Tay).
Elf is more than holiday fluff, it's a successful romp of Christmas spirit sealed inside a good family film. The cast is lively, the antics aren't over the top, and the storyline unique and film sustainable. This also shows immensely that director Jon Favreau can be handed a script for a thriller, a comedy, a romantic comedy, a superhero film, or a drama and still be able to create on screen magic. I'm also sure this beats a movie about elves working in a tree during the dry season.
Starring: Will Ferrell, James Cann, Zooey Deschannel, and Daniel Tay. Directed by: Jon Favreau.