$9.00 wasted

Rating: 3/10 (27 January 2006)

I bought this one for the child in my life and we watched it together tonight. This one breaks all the boundaries of what a child's movie should be about. I could not find a moral lesson if there was one for it feeds into the materialistic wants of the season which is exactly what Christmas has come to mean to many of us. Believe in your presents, folks, it is all, it is everything. I couldn't find a story anywhere and the beginning has to be one of the creepiest ever. This weird conductor wheedling children on to a train. Right, when every child that is streetproofed would run and scream loudly if such a conductor even beckoned from a distance. The computer animation is extraordinary but wears out quickly as the characters are so downright odd. Huge eyes, dark lips and unemotional and eerily plastic hair. Ugh. Frightening scenes of heads exploding, trains out of control with children screaming in terror, a nazi-like Santa Claus surrounded by mini-Nazis all doing and running frantically, only stopping to sing a Christmas version of "Hail to the Chief" as he emerges from his hibernation. Singing and dancing out of nowhere with no purpose, a funny old odd fellow sitting with a fire on the roof of the train drinking his sockwater. A travesty. Avoid. 3 out of 10.