'Clause-3': It's Cheesy
But Delightfully So
© By Kevin Paquet, 2006

Now entering my third year as a movie critic, I suppose it’s not such a poor coincidence that I’m watching the third "Santa Clause" movie. Featuring the charismatic stylings of Tim Allen (as Santa Claus—real name, Scott Calvin), "The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause" details a rocky point in Santa’s life as he and Mrs. Claus brace themselves for a visit from the in-laws. Regardless whatever Movie X is about, its sequels always tend to be one or more of the following:

• Family or marriage (ex: "The Santa Clause 2");

• The in-laws ("Meet the Fockers");

• Father-son bonding ("Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade"; "Goldmember");

• Another fight with …

• The horror you thought you killed (The "Halloween" movies);

• The son of the horror you killed

So Mrs. Claus’s mother and father (who believe her to be the wife of a Canadian toy-maker) come up to visit. Also coming up are Santa’s ex-wife Laura Miller (Wendy Crewson) her new husband Neil Miller (Judge Reinhold), and their Charlie (Eric Lloyd) and Lucy (Liliana Mumy). They actually know the truth about Scott Calvin.

In a delightfully hackneyed attempt to maintain the charade for parents Sylvia and Bud Newman (Ann-Margret and Alan Arkin), Santa’s village is poorly wallpapered over as a Canadian town. Helping in this endeavor is Jack Frost (Martin Short). He is trying to make good after getting a dressing-down from the Board of Legendary Figures for upstaging Santa Claus by distributing "Merry Frostmas!" signs. Less-than-secretly, he harbors dreams of being Santa Claus.

This turns out to be possible. In the Escape Clause of the contract that made Scott Calvin into Santa Claus when he accidentally killed the previous one 12 years earlier, Scott can give it all up. All he has to do is hold his snow globe (all Santas have their own snow globes) and say "I wish I’d never become Santa Claus at all." He is then sent back in time to when he became Santa and allowed to let history move forward differently.

Jack Frost manages to trick his way into the snow globe room. When Lucy finds out and calls her parents, Jack freezes them and locks them and Lucy into a closet while he moves forward in what can only be called the most transparent evil plan in living memory.

All in all, the entire movie—the "Canadian" village, the parents, Martin Short—blend together into something that is cheesy on delightfully epic proportions. Original it is not, but somehow watching established actors make a decent stab at a fun family movie is itself uplifting.

The acting is solid, if not great, and deliberately blinding myself to the improbabilities of the plot—the "Canadian" town is located under an ice shelf, for instance—wasn’t too hard.

Bonus points for the blooper reel, Alan Arkin and Lucy warming Jack’s heart, causing him to melt and turn into Martin Short in the least magical Magical Transformation ever. Kevin gives it three stars out of five.