Small Town Santa

The Christmas movie blogs continue this month with today’s entry for Small Town Santa (trailer) from 2014. In the previous Christmas movie blog for Die Hard, I referenced how that was the film that finished off a Christmas movie marathon gathering I had last weekend. Small Town Santa was the film I decided to start it off with since it is more of an all ages family film ideal for earlier in the day.

I first saw Small Town Santa last year at my sister’s household on Christmas weekend off Netflix and there was something about its earnest plot and sheer heart that won me over and convinced me to get the DVD. The man I will forever associate as the Superman of the 1990s, Dean Cain, leads up a low-budget cast of unknowns in this unorthodox Christmas film. Cain portrays local town sheriff, Rick Langston. He is winding down his time as the local sheriff as he awaits his big-city promotion, but a twisting Christmas Eve night like no other changes Rick’s life when he arrests an intruder in his home who bears a striking resemblance to good ‘ol St. Nick (Paul Hopper). This Santa shows Rick the error of his ways and how to overcome his strained relationship with his daughter Kara (Mandalynn Carlson) and find new love in newcomer to town, Lucy (Christine Lakin).

In the initial scenes Sheriff Langston does not appear to be all that terrible of an individual as he helps put up a homeless person in jail so he does not freeze overnight, and gets local kids to shovel for an elderly person for the winter after he catches the kids egging a house. He appears good-hearted and then does a sudden shift in attitude when his ex-wife will not let him spend Christmas Eve with his daughter and he finds out last minute his promotion got denied. That is when Rick bumps into Santa, and despite Santa’s best intentions, I could not get over how inadvertently creepy this Santa comes off on screen. Santa’s tone of his voice is a bit too nice, he is dressed in untraditional Santa attire, he has this mischievous look in his eyes and has a presence on him that looks like he is about to con you out of something throughout the entire film. I do not blame Rick for mistaking him for an intruder at all!

It is worth noting the two main acting veterans here are Cain and Lakin as nearly the rest of the remaining cast gives the impression that this is one of their first roles which likely explains why Santa does not sound as well-intentioned as his dialogue indicates. Somehow, I find this oddly endearing. A lot of town locals reach out to help Rick regain his Christmas spirit throughout, and it was amusing watching Rick give them all the cold shoulder and chastise a group of brazen carolers who chuck snowballs at his vehicle. Once Rick admits his wrongdoings Santa grants him some Christmas wishes to have custody of Kara for Christmas, hit it off with Lucy and make it over to a Christmas party that night the movie was building up to throughout for the closing scene of the film where everyone takes in some good ‘ol fashioned Christmas cheer.

Aside from a trailer, there are no other extra features on the DVD, not even subtitles! That is when you know a film is low-budget is when they cannot set aside some resources for the subtitles. Shame! For what it is worth the menus do have some slick snow globe-esque animations to them.

Small Town Santa sounds like a traditional family Christmas film that hits the right notes on paper, and in a way it is by how I earlier mentioned this movie has tons of heart and tries its best with its limited funding. I want to once again re-emphasize that Small Town Santa wears its small budget and inexperienced cast on its sleeve and that results in some scenes falling flat and at least a handful of the lesser cast members who had no right to be there. However, like I said before, it kind of gives this unintentional endearing effect where I found myself patting the cast and crew on its back for trying to make a Christmas movie like no other which faults aside, ultimately has a good message in the end! It is like Small Town Santa is kind of like the Birdemic/The Room of Christmas movies….maybe not that drastic but kind of in that direction.

Other Random Backlog Movie Blogs

3
12 Angry Men (1957)
12 Rounds 3: Lockdown
21 Jump Street
Angry Video Game Nerd: The Movie
Atari: Game Over
The Avengers: Age of Ultron
Batman: The Killing Joke
Batman: Mask of the Phantasm
Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice
Bounty Hunters
Cabin in the Woods
Captain America: Civil War
Captain America: The First Avenger
Captain America: The Winter Soldier
Christmas Eve
Clash of the Titans (1981)
Clint Eastwood 11-pack Special
The Condemned 2
Countdown
Creed
Deck the Halls
Die Hard
Dredd
The Eliminators
The Equalizer
Dirty Work
Faster
Fast and Furious I-VIII
Field of Dreams
Fight Club
The Fighter
For Love of the Game
Good Will Hunting
Gravity
Guardians of the Galaxy
Hercules: Reborn
Hitman
Indiana Jones 1-4
Ink
The Interrogation
Interstellar
Jobs
Joy Ride 1-3
Man of Steel
Man on the Moon
Marine 3-6
Metallica: Some Kind of Monster
Mortal Kombat
National Treasure
National Treasure: Book of Secrets
The Replacements
Reservoir Dogs
Rocky I-VII
Running Films Part 1
Running Films Part 2
San Andreas
ScoobyDoo Wrestlemania Mystery
The Secret Life of Walter Mitty
Shoot em Up
Steve Jobs
Source Code
Star Trek I-XIII
Take Me Home Tonight
TMNT
The Tooth Fairy 1 & 2
UHF
Veronica Mars
Vision Quest
The War
Wild
Wonder Woman
The Wrestler (2008)
X-Men: Days of Future Past