The Night They Saved Christmas
The Night They Saved Christmas
| 13 December 1984 (USA)
The Night They Saved Christmas Trailers

An oil company is exploring two Arctic sites for oil. The needed blasting at the first site rocks Santa Claus' North Pole village. He realizes that any blasting at the second site will destroy his home. He enlists the aid of a woman and her children to convince her husband (who works for the company) that the first site is where the oil they want is. Along the way, Santa explains all his secrets in delivering presents all around the world.

Reviews
Inclubabu Plot so thin, it passes unnoticed.
SoftInloveRox Horrible, fascist and poorly acted
Brendon Jones It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.
Kien Navarro Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.
Rand King Science takes on a big one here: Santa Claus. How does he deliver customized presents to all the good little boys and girls all in one night? You'll finally get precise, detailed explanations for it all. Thus and forever taking all the fun and magic out of Christmas.You won't get this knowledge, however, without paying a price. A scary guy in women's makeup with a sandpaper voice guides you to Santa's secret lair, which seems to be backdrops created by sixth graders. When you get there, Santa won't have trouble hearing you, 'cuz his hearing aid is huge. After you meet Martha, his wife, you'll listen to Santa explain all the magic away. Then Santa sends you back to where you came from, a land of wood-paneling and trailers, where your husband and a man named Gaylord accuse you of ingesting hallucinogens. You've gotta stop this Gaylord, 'cuz he's got scientific plans of his own - to get crude oil. Santa forgot to file mineral rights claims on his property, so maybe he's not so smart after all. But he seems like a nice guy, even though he's got some sort of little-person enslavement camp going on, so you save him from the evil energy consortium. The End.
grizzledgeezer This review contains a major spoiler... to wit... It's a /terrible/ movie, MST3K fodder all the way.To call this exercise in "Christmas warmth" irritating is to horribly understate its appalling ickiness. Not surprisingly, it's from Robert Halmi, who's done for live-action TV films what Hanna-Barbera did for TV animation (ie, churned out a huge pile of crap).The script is dreadful ("You're just going to have to forge ahead at the other site!"), and Jackie Cooper's (!!!) direction is even worse. He evokes loud and/or unconvincing performances from just about everyone, especially Mason Adams. June Lockhart comes off as a chunk of animated cardboard. Art Carney seems annoyed beyond belief, anxious to collect his paycheck and getouttahere. When the badly-made-up-as-an-elf Paul Williams gazes at Jaclyn Smith and emits an intended-to-be-overwhelmingly-winsome grin, make sure you're not standing near the TV, or your last meal will land on it. Only Smith, who has little more to do than strike a pose of "I really don't believe this", more or less survives. A pall of "We're only doing this for the money" hangs over the proceedings.The "special effects" are miserable. Smith & her kids are taken to Santa's place in a sleigh decorated in such poor taste it's obvious none of Santa's elves is gay. Even a 3-year-old can see it's a badly made miniature being pulled through a thoroughly unconvincing model landscape. (The last American film with such awful miniatures was 1940's "Rebecca".) And the matte paintings are incredibly amateurish.Ick. Phooey. Patooey. The perfect film for Christmas Eve -- if you want to get your friends laughing. It's thoroughly deserving of a Golden Turkey. There's not one thing in the film -- not even Paul LeMat's beard (which ought to be thicker and fuzzier for someone working in the Arctic) -- to mitigate my 1-star "awful" rating."Santa's factory?! Are we going to see that, too?""Oh, yes. And as a special Christmas treat -- for us -- you'll all be gutted -- while alive -- then ground up and made into Soylent products."PS: Slowing time is /not/ "a scientific impossibility". The writers obviously know nothing about Special or General Relativity.
disabledvetmemph I recorded this movie off Television many years ago. My entire family watches it each year (several times). My kids are now 17 and 19 and still watch this MUST SEE movie. We all still believe, after watching this movie how can you not believe. We have watched it so very many times our copy is now dragging and the sound is just awful. I would very much like to surprise my family by ordering a copy either VHS or DVD, because I am afraid my copy will soon be useless. If any one knows of where I could buy a copy of this movie, please let me know. Jaclyn Smith is my favorite actress of all times and she continues to show her talent in "The Night They Saved Christmas".
Budjieboo I disagree with Mr. Brasher because it must be taken in its fun context. Of course it isn't major drama and I didn't take it that way but in a fanciful fun way to make my holidays sweet. This movie is about a family(dad, mom, and 3 kids) that live in the cold Artic. Dad works for a drilling company trying to get oil out of 2 different places there. Mom is trying to hold family life together and it is set around Christmas time. Dad's boss wants results "yesterday"(so to speak) and dad is trying to balance boss with family. Family wants him for Christmas. When dad seems to hold job over family and Christmas spirit--Santa's elf comes to call. He takes mom and kids to North pole and they get visit of lives. Returning home, they try and tell dad stop drilling at one of the sites you are killing Santa's home. Undaunted and continuing the drill, dad ignores them. Mom and 2 older kids return to Santa and tell him of the news. C.B. -youngest and dad have to get together if possible to save family and Christmas. Will they? and How do they solve it? To figure out check out the movie.