Yep, jumping right to Christmas again, people certainly favor a biblical holiday over a holiday marked by blood... also the fact that few obscure Thanksgiving specials are out there. The day I cover the Peanuts is the day I sell out.
What'll make this special? My... penchant for detail?
Background
Longtime viewers of Phelous will know the name Golden Films, or Goodtimes Entertainment, or both essentially. If you don't, Golden Films was one of multiple producers of films meant to cash in on the success of more popular ones, in this case, Disney. Though I hate the company and enjoy anyone sticking it to them... they're not that interesting, and it shows that mockbusters aren't just a thing of the 2010s.
You see, what they would do is release their films on VHS around the time Disney did the same for their movies, with the intent of fooling buyers who wouldn't know the difference. There was an attempt at sticking a fork in that practice, but it ended with Disney realizing that they don't own the rights to the fairy tales they base their films on, which is the basis for Golden Films' adaptations.
It's almost as if Disney's entitled or something.
However, while Golden Films is on a pretty low ebb, only technically being within the right to make what they did, they aren't the worst company of the lot, that honor goes to UAV Corporation, their adaptation of Mulan stands as one of my most hated movies of all time.
Any discussions on Golden Films tend to only go as far as their filmography and status quo, as if the company successfully buried any clues to their foundation. A key figure to the company is Diane Eskenazi, who founded it around 1992.
Their earliest production seems to be King Arthur and the Knights of Justice, a television series that ran in 1992 and has her credited as a producer, so it checks out. What tended to confuse people was that Golden Films was often credited under the American Film Investment Corporation label, whether it acted as a pseudonym or low profile subdivision that got done in after Golden Films reconsidered their business model.
Eskenazi's latest production, and one prominently touted on her more up to date summations is One World, a show so successful... it doesn't even have any ratings or reviews on IMDb. Now that's what I call success.
Golden Films rarely credited their actors, or at the very least they aren't covered on IMDb, but it can be inferred that they hired union actors like Cam Clarke, Debbi Derryberry, Darren Norris (who interestingly starred in a B family movie covered by Brutalmoose), or whoever was looking to be hired.
For anyone curious, the voice of Phelous mainstay Old Man is supposedly Jan Rabson.
The film was released around the time Golden Films sought to produce, supposedly, more original titles. These were executive produced by Robert Halmi Jr., of RHI (acquired Little Rascals and produced Secret World of Alex Mack) fame, but that company wasn't involved in any of these. Would've made things more interesting or gave them more money to work with.
Personally, I would've preferred to cover Little Angels: The Brightest Christmas, but apparently it's not on YouTube, which is why this is on the chopping block.
I may be accused of aping off Phelous, but this is more like me aping off Bobsheaux who aped off Phelous. At least you won't be charged two bucks just to read this review. I'd just charge you for a request.
And finally, on with the show
We begin with a first, a Christmas film that starts with a war. This is meant to establish the main character Jessie Justice (and that's silly even by cheap family movie standards) and his dynamic with his general...? father. I get the idea, but I feel this overstays its welcome, and as this is the first thing we see in the movie, it's bound to lead to some serious whiplash. We do get an otherwise okay opening song, okay as in nothing special and barely blending well with the ongoing action.
All I can say about this is that apparently Clark Kent is in the army, and they had a passive aggressive response to having a female in their troop (yeah we'll take women, but just one.) I'd kill to see an animated movie centered on a female soldier fighting in the army that doesn't involve Chinese mythology otherwise I'd be getting Mulan recommendations up the ass.
By the way, the soldiers are mutually exclusive to this dream, yes this is a dream. At least 15% probably established what Jessie is like and what his conflict was, but we'd get more important details later on. Stop me if you heard this before, a child tries to prove their worth to their father, but the father prioritizes their work over their child.
Never heard that one before.
Anyhow, we get our secondary protagonist, of sorts, at best she's around to establish the conflict. Jessie's cousin Gabriella. Now, I was willing to give it the benefit of the doubt that Phelous was exaggerating their relationship for laughs, but thanks to Folgers I understand implications go a very long way. It's normal for cousins to hold hands... when they're young...er than they are here. Also any hands on action that'd look fine when it's between kids that don't know any better, but incredibly awkward when they're older.
It's family values that make this country creepy. Anyhow, I don't know how old these kids are supposed to be, one of them still enjoys getting toys... hey, my interest goes as far as coin collecting and logos.
I'll go into the animation issues later on.
Here, we see just what Jessie's problem is, his desire to be the best and disregarding others. This shown at a soccer game (even though Gabriella said they were heading to school the first few minutes we saw her.) Would've been a good opportunity to better establish the characters, but that would mean adding more time than.... 50 minutes?
At best, the odds for this are better in favor than those in Little Angels. It's... believable for now. Anyhow, this leads to Jessie breaking all the rules in front of a referee who's either blind or bored out of his skull just to score the winning goal.
So he disregards others out of insecurity for his own self and desire to please his father. Never heard that one before. Neither have I heard about a father having to work on Christmas. I mean this is the same company that made cash-ins on popular Disney titles, not so much the stories but what they include, should I really be surprised they'd use existing ideas here?
Anyhow, he says Jessie will stay at Gabriella's house, but it seems she's just staying with him, as if her parents were scared straight by a coffee commercial, yeah I made the Folgers joke twice.
So, to lift Jessie's spirits, the two go to a toy store, who's perspectives would be gone into in another section. He not only pisses Gabriella off after making her carsick in a go-kart race, but apparently lost the only person that tolerates him. This might be a good time to introduce some fantasy elements, in the form of magical toys. I mean it's implied in the title.
Of our roster we have Super Duper Guy, the five seconds it took to come up with that... a buff dolt, army douche, a pirate, Pochahontas (yeah I couldn't come up with anything else), and something for the men, an elf that doesn't hide much. So what happens next? I'll tell you if I can find a way to sum up nonsense in the form of a long song, a rescue mission that goes nowhere and an incredibly lucky guess on what a Christmas Tree star contained. Also Jessie leaves a toy soldier to die, but you telling me there are no medical doctors in the line of toys? Rather than stay with the man, Jessie could've taken him back to base camp. Just saying.
So, dream ends, if it was one, Gabriella is still present by the store, whether or not her abandonment was just a test, best possible guess. Also apparently Jessie's dad's plane was downed. If there was anything more to it that wasn't covered by Phelous... and nobody else, would mentioning them make any difference? At least I can't make a reference to The Room through text.
Now then, the idea of the toys only existing in Jessie's imagination would be enough to get him in tune with a happier self. This might've been done before, but it's better than just having the toys actually be real living things that ultimately save Jessie's dad and convince him to be a better father.
Did I just discuss the key points to the plot all the way to the end? Whoops... guess that means I gotta wrap things up soon.
Animation (and other stuff)
Let's be real, Golden Films were never known for quality animation, and the low quality is especially noticeable in this, and just as inexcusable for something made in the year 2000. On the surface it looks okay, but it's when you look at the finer details that things are seriously wrong. First up, the scene continuity, like characters just warp into place, scenes are often reused, whole lotta corner cutting. For a good example, the scene at the soccer field had them walk off of it then cut to them back on it somehow.
The audio overlays are also an issue, where the soundtrack tends to drown out the dialog, as well as dialog overlapping on scene transitions. Also the standard and always hilarious outfit swaps, where one scene had Jessie in his PJs and then cut to him with his outfit already on.
At the soccer-field again, I would say they fucked up by using the wrong character model for when Jessie goes to approach a teammate he knocked down, but it could've just been another he hit. But one thing is for sure, they got lazy and reused a model of a character in an opposing team.
Jessie is standing up crying in one scene, to establish the proper introduction between him and the toys then the next time we cut to him he is asleep.
The toystore is the hardest to ignore, thanks to its ridiculous size proportions, giant toys on shelves towering over the customers. Was this meant to capture a child's imagination and wonderment in a toy shop? I could use an answer here.
I won't go into Jessie's supposed bipolarism since that could've been owed to Phelous missing continuity cues, but I will question how Jessie knew about the rules of a go-kart challenge even though it's within the first minute he got into one. An overlong gospel leads to a sudden segue into a conflict that goes nowhere.
I question if the music was made before the animation given how it only barely fits what's going on in its scenes.
I will give it this, the one thing that kept me from shutting this off was keeping an eye out for continuity errors, so I'll give them that. It's a nitpicker's dream.
Final Thoughts
Whether I consider this the worst or just not very good is inconsequential. The film is kept alive only by those who cover it, and it seems even contemporary viewers weren't that fond of it...
Nothing... I have nothing. Bye
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