In Noelle, Bill Hader and Anna Kendrick play Santa Claus's children, Nick and Noelle. When they're father dies, Nick reluctantly takes the family job of Santa, and yet ...
If you don't know where this movie is going in the first 10 minutes then you've never watched a movie before. The whole thing is a predictable mash-up of previous Christmas movies, taking elements of Elf's fish-out-of-water concept and mixing it in with a standard "save Christmas" plot.
So yeah, it's easy to criticize. And honestly, when a friend recommended it I only watched it begrudgingly. But it's actually tremendously fun.
Kendrick is adorable as the wide-eyed innocent, Hader is excellent as the freaked-out son, and there's a hilarious bit about the problems of using predictive analytics to determine whether children are naughty or nice.
The main issue with the movie is a certain laziness, with plot points thrown in and then ignored and with Shirley MacLaine's character never quite coming to life. It's a shame, because with a somewhat tighter, more thoughtful script this could have been every bit as good as Elf.
Anyway, ignore the haters, this is a solid Xmas movie.
