This is brilliant! Guess what message the Walt Disney company is trying to spread with the latest instalment of a fat-suited Tim Allen getting the quibbles about being Santa? That’s right: the commercialisation of Christmas is bad. Family is what’s important, not toys. Really?
Hypocrisy aside (come on, this is a Big Christmas Movie), Santa Clause 3 is a fine example of a franchise long out of steam. The only bright spot in this cold soup of bland gags and lame, schmaltzy efforts at cockle-warming is Martin Short, subsisting on a diet of prime ham and scenery to play a Jack Frost seething with jealousy, camp gusto and snide asides as he tries to usurp Father Christmas’ throne.
Drop off the kids, then go and do something less painful instead. Such as buying up the latest toy sensation to plonk under your over-decorated tree.
