What an awful children's Christmas movie!

Rating: 2/10 (24 November 2007)

I just watched this with my kids last night. I'm sorry, but I just can't square this Santa and North Pole with a standard like that of "Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer." In "Rudolph" it was full of love and humor, forgiveness and humility. This Polar Express version is dark, authoritarian, and punitive. I also can't believe it earned a "G" rating with so much excessive danger and stressful suspense (train on the ice, Christmas star nearly killing an elf, etc) - my three-year old got scared and had to turn her head six times! How awful! (She kept coming back because her 6-year old brother was still watching.)
In "Polar Express" the conductor, Santa and the elves are humorless and of a "law and order" mentality that is prim and schoolmarmish - this is Christmas Eve, guys! Loosen up! And what is with Santa, anyway? He clearly has a messianic complex that is fed by the uniformed cheers of thousands of sycophantic elves at the Nazi rally - er, midnight takeoff of the sleigh - when he makes his appearance. And when Santa confronts the kid who picks up the lost reindeer bell, why so impolite? The boy picks up the bell and then Santa appears out of nowhere and towers over him, and the kid turns around and is obviously scared - c'mon, it's SANTA, people! - and what does Santa do? No introductions, or "Hello, I'm Santa, what's your name?" Instead, he says, "What did you say?" in a very accusatory manner. What a jerk! But then, he runs a Bushian North Pole that has secret video monitors on every kid alive, conveniently priming tomorrow's kids for a future with no privacy. From saintly divine judgment to a petty spy: that's this Santa. Imagine Soup Nazi mates with Santa (woah), and you have this guy.
So I give this 2 stars because there IS some lip service to the real message of Christmas (what, it's not about just getting stuff?) and the graphics of the train (especially the hot chocolate sequence - that is actually excellent) are good in a Fritz Lang sort of way. But if you want the spirit of Christmas, this is NOT the movie.