Father Xmas (2001)

On Christmas Eve in 1968 six-year-old army brat Clairee simultaneously learns the hard truth about Santa Claus and the realities of war. Her bullying older brother Mickey informs her that ... See full summary »

Director:

Marie Rose

Writer:

Marie Rose

Stars:

Dakota Fanning, Stephen Fanning, Christopher Lohr

Cast

Credited cast:
Dakota Fanning	...	Clairee
Stephen Fanning	...	Mickey
Christopher Lohr	...	Father
Rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Gina Marie	...	Hippie chic

Storyline

On Christmas Eve in 1968 six-year-old army brat Clairee simultaneously learns the hard truth about Santa Claus and the realities of war. Her bullying older brother Mickey informs her that Santa insn't real and that their absent father is actually far away, serving his country in the Vietnam War.

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Plot Keywords:

father christmas

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Genres:

Comedy | Drama | Family | Short

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Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Company Credits

Technical Specs

Runtime:

20 min

Color:

Color

Did You Know?

Trivia

Dakota Fanning's film debut.

User Reviews

Not bad for 20 minutes*SPOILERS*

First you just have to understand that this movie is nearly 20 minutes long. You can't do a whole lot in 20 minutes, but the length isn't the point of it. For Dakota's first film appearance, she was incredibly cute and captured my heart.

*SPOILER WARNING!* The movie is set in Christmas time during Vietnam, as the war unfolds on television, Dakota(Clairee) is being babysat by her older brother, Mickey. Mickey plays the stereotypical bully older brother that ties her up in a net and hangs her, so that he can go hang out with his friends.

So what else can Clairee do? She watches the war going on television, the images of people dying frighten her so much she has a hallucination that she is in the middle of the war. She is then interrupted by a phone call from Santa and Clairee, knowing her father is serving in the war, asks Santa that her one present is for her dad to come home. Santa is reluctant about making the promise, because Clairee demanded that if he doesn't come home safe, she'll stop believing in him! So the soldiers are returning, Clairee, Mickey and their mother is waiting for the father to arrive from the airplane, the suspense builds up. Clairee looks around the see the faces of happy and angry people, which I found accurate considering there were a lot of angry people when the soldiers returned in real life. Clairee was so excited to see her dad, they show a coffin being carried by, implying that her father was killed in battle. Does Clairee and her family unite with the dad? Indeed she does. The ending put a tear in my eye, and definitely deserves to be a Christmas classic, even though there's not very much reference to Christmas except the title, Christmas tree and Santa.