Stocking Stuffer 10.7 The Case For Christmas with Emily Menez

A Hallmark Channel movie. Your name is Chris Kringle. Who in Santa is sued. He wants to prove that I don't exist. A lawyer must take a leap of faith.

Is he worth throwing away you're. Futured for and make an entire town believe you can do this you were born for. Have you find him guilty? You are condemning the very best that the human spirit has to offer. This Walt Dean Gaine the Case for Christmas Tomorrow night at eight, part of Christmas Keepsake Week on Hallmark Channel, the.

Heart of TV. Welcome to another stalking stuffer, a super stalking stuffer, because obviously we've got a Superman connection. We've got a lot going on here. This movie is bonkers and I in no way can one brain work through it. One Emily cannot dive into this movie and do enough in terms of analyzing what went on here.

So I have not just brought on a incredible guest who is a wonderful comedy comedy writer who has done work for many a thing, including Funnier Die and The New Yorker. But also very importantly, she has the best name of anyone I know. This is the one and only, Emily Minez. Welcome to the Feminine Critique Stocking Stuffers. Emily.

Hi, Emily, it's an honor to be here. I am thrilled to have you, not just because your name is Emily, but because you are an expert now in many things, including Christmas law. Yes, that's true. I do get a lot of calls from else who have been arraigned. Yeah.

Is it a year round thing or do the calls like really get busy in December or is it like the legal stuff starts happening early, like or are you know there's a whole timing issue. I feel like if you're gonna sue Santa Claus, like, oh, yeah, you do it at Christmas, but also like it's kind of a shit move because he doesn't have time to defend himself that time. Year. Well, there's a revival pursuing Santa in July. It just feels kind of fun and different.

I like it. I like it so Emily. Before we dive into the insanity of the case for Christmas, what is your experience relationship with these kinds of movies? Now, this is a Hallmark movie twenty eleven for anybody who is going to seek it out. It is streaming on Hoopla, which is one of the library services.

It's available through most libraries, so you should. Everybody should sign up for it. We are going to go through the details of this movie and spoil it, although I don't know that we can because I don't think a human being can unravel what happened here. But is this now something you watch this time of year or is this kind of new to you? So I've never sought out a Hallmark Channel movie, but the thing is they find you.

Growing up, my mom was into Lifetime movies, which are sort of the deranged cousin I would say to Hallmark movies. Whereas Hallmark tends to go for the more puritanical angle, Lifetime is all about the salacious but not too salacious side of it. So I did see a good amount of Hallmark movies growing up, but I feel like it was always like prairie focused. And I don't know if that's because we were in Kansas and they gave us all of the valley, the sort of like you're in a field of brain. But when it comes to the Christmas side of it, there's really nothing more relaxing than watching actors drink out of empty cups of coffee, So it really does do something for me.

Yeah, Like you're never worried about them spilling anything, you know, No. They're safe. I'm safe. Nothing's going to get too crazy. And with what everything going on in the world, we need a little bit of mild mannered life.

Well. And yet today's movie goes in a lot of places, and you have a theory that we'll get to that takes us to a very dark place and I appreciate that a lot. So I am excited to dive in. Can you tell everyone what happens in the case for Christmas? Now, this is twenty eleven, so it's really early in the Hallmark years.

They hadn't quite nailed down the formula. It is not fully a Christmas romance, right. There is a romance, but it's kind of a secondary plotline. But this is still well within the Hallmark rules, and it is a Hallmark movie. It's directed by Timothy Bond, who is a Canadian.

You know he's Canadian because all of his credits are for Canadian TV shows, including Friday of the Thirteenth, the series. Nothing more Canadian than that. The premiere episode of that star Sarah poly So that's how you know how Canadian it is. But this is Hallmark, the Case for Christmas. Tell everybody what goes on here.

So first of all, we've got Dean Kine and starring, I mean the legend Superman himself. He is starring as a recently graduated Bernie. So he's looking for his first big case. Also, he's a widow. His wife died of I don't know if we say what disease, but it seems like it's cancer.

It felt cancery. I don't think they come out and say it, but it was definitely like she was sick, and there are medical bills, which leads you to believe it's got to be cancer. It's probably canser. So he's he's got a young daughter. She's probably about ten years old, and as per any Hallmark movie, she's wise beyond her years.

Yes, so they're you know, they're a struggling family. He also has a best friend who's a mechanic and is traditionally beautiful, but is completely unaware of this. Well, she's not very girly, you know, she says this, and yet she's wearing floral prints. The entire movie and yet she's played by the actress who played Share on the Glueless TV Showy but not feminine at. All, notes not feminine at all.

So Dan Kine gets his first big break when he meets Santa Claus because Santa is being sued by this greedy uh he's what is it a sports empire? He's like, got Dick's sporting goods. Basically, I'm just saying we can just call him Dick Sporting Goods. Yeah, yeah, he's so this Braxton guy is suing Santa Claus for emotional damage, but really, spoiler, it's because he is trying to create a toy that will replace Santa Claus. So of course Santa has to get an attorney, and why not hire.

Dean Kane, right because Dean Kane happens to be there, and he has a daughter who is charming and believes in Santa Claus. So it's a natural marriage right there. And now, so then it becomes like a kind of stirring courtroom drama. Wouldn't you say. I think a third of the budget went to the courtroom scenes, because Emily, you're an expert at this.

Would you say that this set is more like I would say, more elaborate than most Hallmark movies. I mean to get a courtroom with the a jury and with all those people and to have some of extras. Yeah, yeah, I mean this is a good set. I have to say, yeah, when you really step back, and maybe part of it is that the last few years of COVID production has really meant that, Like you could see the lack of people in these movies where when you'd have crowd scenes, like the crowd has just gotten smaller and smaller and smaller. So when you're watching this and like you're you know, especially because we have been our binging as of late, has been Law and Order SVU from the beginning, so like within I think like two weeks we're at like season six already, and you know, so you're constantly watching that and then just shift gears to this.

First of all, it's a very darring experience, but also like, oh no, that's a that's a law set, right, that is a judge's bench and a jury, and there are twelve people sitting in there, and those extras had to like and they're I mean they're not just like like those extras had to NodD along and look like all occasionally, So yeah, this had some kind of budget behind it. We even get a like Santa north Pole set. It's not elaborate, but it's there. It was probably used in eight more movies that week. But yeah, in a way, the scope of this movie is a little bigger than you might expect.

And I had a lot of comments about the production design. I think they really did their best with a limited budget. Of course, I do have some nitpicks on the Sea Real brand, which we'll get too late. We'll get there. There is some bizarre branding choices in this movie.

Yes, and now let's in case we don't. We don't get there in full. First of all, how does Santa Claus get sued? Is Christmas saved? How does that happen?

So Santa gets sued because this rich kid, essentially this grown up ridge kid, feels like he never got the toys he wanted growing up. That's the that's the sort of impetus behind it. Of course we don't know at the time that it's because he's trying to market this new doll to replace Santa. So he does get sued. There's a very dramatic moment at the beginning where a process.

Server comes to the North Pole, and this is like such a wacky performance by this character who's in one scene, he's like he makes some big choices. I like, look this guy up, because I'm like, where is he going with this? He's anyway, he comes in and serves Santa, and then there's this sort of I Am Spartacus moment where Santa says I am Santa and he declares who he is. So now he has to come down to I assume New York City, but they never say I. It was definitely establishing shots of New York City, but now as you're saying that, I don't know that they ever come out and directly say it.

But it feels like it is supposed to be some form of New York City by way of Canada. Yes, I mean Dean Kane lives in a very big house, so I don't know that he could afford it with one income and also no income because he has no cases, so I don't know how he did. I had a lot of questions about that, and then I kind of sat back and said, well, maybe he's like somewhere in Long Island or Westchester, somewhere like sutwor Jersey even like suburbs outside of Manhattan, and it's like a house. He's paying the tack like his dead wife left him the house. I was able to like justify it, but I was mad at myself for doing that, because I'm like, yeah, if he's got all these bills, he could downside and be you know, he just needs a two bedroom apartment and he'd be fine.

The movie makes a point to say many times how broke he is because he had to accept this case, but yet he can still afford this house. But that's all besides the point. Yes, Santa does get sued, uh, and he steps up to the plate. That's why he gets Sean Kane as an attorney. Yeah, we'll talk about the legal maneuvering of the You know, is this a movie that you could recommend to a law school?

Like do you learn things from it? Uh? There's there's questionable I think law practice going on here. I have so many new Let's get to that at the end, because I have a whole page of good legal bad. Oh, excellent, excellent, Okay, so do Why don't we dive then into the kind of tropes of this movie and to see how this fits into the bigger Hallmark cannon.

Again, it isn't a love story, so some of the kind of key things don't quite work the way they do, but it also fits everything like this actually knocks off I think all ten. So the first thing is our lead in need of a lesson. Now in this case, it's really a male lead, right, so Michael is our lead. Now is there something he needs to learn? Does he grow from scene A to the end credits?

He does. The movie kind of shoehorns this in in the last three quarters that he needs to learn about, Like it's sort of vaguely going for about faith and having belief in people and good and then it turns to love at the end. So he does need to learn something. Yeah, Like there's and he also like there's early parts of it where it seems like, Okay, he's sad because he has a dead wife and he doesn't believe in Christmas because like you know, he's a grown man and that. But he kind of gives into Santa pretty quickly.

He does right now, part of it is like a Santa tries to is like ready to challenge him on it and kind of or does like does Dean Kin believe he's Santa. Do you think because the Legal Beagle, we need to talk about Legal Beagle? Okay, I'm glad you brought that up because Okay, so for those of you who haven't seen and who are you, because you need to see this movie, watch it immediately. Dean Kane, they keep having monologues about this toy that we never see are I was so mad and okay, this is what didn't make sense to me. Santa and Dean Kane discuss this toy that inspired Dean Kane to become a lawyer.

Now, the Legal Beagle. All of the catchphrases we learn are not puns, and it's so upsetting because you're like, there's so many good dog on puns with the law. Let me see if I can pull up my I had some pitches for them because it made me so angry that. Like missed opportunity. I think we're led to believe that it's like a toy that you pull a string.

And he talks like, yes, it's like a little just stuffed dog or like stuff dog with that like hard plastic body that isn't actually comfortable to hug. That's exactly what Santa says. There's like it's like I've got a snake in my boot. But there's none of that. It's all this normal legal phrases like I object.

It's yeah, it's like I object, or approach the bench and it's like, wait, that's the sidebar. The sidebar. There's no pun. So I pitched three better phrases. The dog could say, are you ready?

Okay, okay, I think I am, I think I am. Hang on, I have to the other thing I just did, now, was I just Google image search legal Beagle. Uh, oh my god, so much came up. Now, nothing like no version of this toy game up. But that being said, there's like a snoopy holding like a what looks like a law book, but more importantly like there are you're seeing it now to you right.

There are at least two books called legal Beagle. One is a diary of a canine counselor. So I need to go on Amazon and find that. Uh, there is a website that gives that legal advice called legal Beagle. But the best one they're oh my god, there's a few where it's where it is a Beagle.

One it's a bagele lit Little judges robe at a at a thing, but even better, there is a beagle just with the the the British judges, just the little shops on top of his head. So I'm looking at him and I am hearing, now your revised, your revised pull strings for legal Beagle. Go for it, Okay, and I'm gonna say it in the voice of what legal beagles should be. Okay, Okay, here's the first one. I'm an attorney.

It all. This case is pro bono and finally we've got to take your deep position. I did use but also like they didn't do it eight times? Come on? Yeah, Like I just I really feel that I was such a mission.

Was there no joke punch on this? There was? There was one surprising joke that accompanied Legal Beagle. Did you catch it? What was it?

So? I don't remember it? No? Oh oh, it's it's like one of those things that is very like jarring and it reminds you like, oh right, Hallmark hadn't figured out that they had to be completely neutral in everything and twenty eleven. So when Dean Kane says, like legal Beagle, I loved that dog, Santa says you and Johnny Cochrane, that's right.

I felt like it was a throwaway line and now I'm clicking what that means. Yeah, wow, Legal. Beagle changing the future of law in the United States. Wow. I completely didn't even catch that.

That's really good. Yeah, oh it's glorious. So I maybe Dean Kane believes he's Santa because he knew this history of Legal Beagle, or maybe he just like, I mean, he needs a job, right, he needs any client, and Santa does pay him, right, I think, like he actually does write him a check. He does, So this is this was on my good list of legal stuff because I was okay. I watched this with my mom and husband and both of them fell asleep and I was kind of yelling.

I was kind of yelling at the screen like that doesn't make sense, and it was for nobody because no one was listening. But they have. So Dean Kine does have a retainer with very very like. I was like, yes, good job, uh Hallmark, And we see the annoying el what's his name? I wrote it down, Charlie, Charlie.

When he first appears to eat all that spaghetti, he brings the retainer check with him. So this is good. This is a valid point in the movie. Yeah, there is some you know, their research was done, perhaps, I mean Dean Kane went to Princeton, like surely he was, you know, yes, he that's do you not know the history of Dan Kane and how him and Broke Shields dated at one point? I think he was a little before my time.

Can you just give me a synopsis of Dan Kaine's history. So Dean Kane, I find him a very frustrating person because like he's he's kind of a terrible human being, but clearly like and he's not a great actor, but I think he has a certain presence and physicality that like he's really easy to cast in things. He so he was a football player. He went he got like scholarship to Princeton, was playing football at Princeton, So probably pretty intelligent even like okay, yeah, fit plul scarship, but like no, you still have to have, you know, be smart to get there. He had a I think NFL contract, but then got injured.

So then he started, like you shifted. I think his stepfather was a director and his mother was an actress, and then he like moved into Hollywood and went through that whole thing. And so Dank probably best known for Smallville, not Smallville. What was it? My god, my husband Clark.

Clark, Yeah, yeah. So, I mean he had like he was big in the nineties, like he was kind of a heart throb. He did after that. He's done a lot of these kinds of a lot of Hallmark movies. Uh.

He seems he's very conservative politically, which sucks. He is not Kevin Sorbo levels of just like detestable human being who just says terrible things. But like he is definitely leaning very very red. But like he's so easy to things because you put him in something like he's in a great Monitor SVU episode where he plays the exact character you would you would put Dean Kine in, so like here at least, like I don't know, Like I think he's actually fine, and like I'm not so distracted thinking like Dean Kane, you you know, voted against me and my rights. I think he's like I think he works in this movie for what he's playing well.

And it's funny because of what you just said. All I knew Dean Caine from was I worked at tub for two years and I used to have a running bingo chart with the other people who would write descriptions of the metadata, and Kevin Sorbo would have been in the middle of the bingo chart because he was so frequently in our movie. Now, and so was Dean Kane. Sure, that's all I knew, and I knew he was conservative, but really that's all I knew about him. So it's it's interesting how certain things from your legacy are what stick with people.

Yep, yep, uh. Now let's talk about his relationship in this movie with his love interest. So we have Lauren, who like, okay, so much to say about Lauren played by Rachel Blanchard, who you would know. I think anybody that looked at her, we're like, oh right, she was in something something. She was in the Rage Carrie too.

She's one of the mean girls. Yeah, chare on the Clueless Show and a lot of other things. She works very steadily. Let's talk about Lauren. So she's Dean Kin's best friend, Dean Kane's uh like friend from high school who has now stuck around for how many.

Years out of this exactly, And I want to quote something directly from her character. It's in the second scene of the movie. She says, Lily, I'm not just your dad's mechanic, but I'm also an awesome babysitter. Yeah, so this is somebody who's been waiting in the wings. But let's be real.

Has she looked in the mirror because she's gorgeous? Yep, she's a mechanic. And there's a also something she says to Santa later about the fact that no one would want a girl who drives a truck and can fix the carburetor. But it's like you just described many men's dream women. She's a dream woman.

There's nothing about her that's not likable. Right, And it like Dean Kane is not supposed to be young in this movie, right because he he says like he didn't go to law school straight out of high school, like he just finished law school, but it was after his wife and after this and that it's like he's gotta be supposed to be in this movie like over thirty. So has this woman just for twelve years, like waited for this one man to see her differently? And in the meantime, she's been like cooking for his daughter and babysitting and fixing his car and like polishing his tables. Like it's it's a very toxic relationship, and I'm very concerned for this woman's self confidence and self worth.

I agree, And when it comes to babysitting, she does go above and beyond. She's reading Bedtimes stories, She's emotionally invested, like I'm with you, Emily. I really wanted her to just leave the house. At one point, it's like you're not being appreciated. I know you're not getting paid for anything.

She says that, so it's like, wait, he can't afford it. Maybe she's not looking for a loving relationship. Maybe this is about her relationship with herself. She doesn't leave, she deserves love. Like this goes deep.

I mean, the other game you can play with any one of these movies is flip it into a lifetime thriller where if you just whisked away the Christmas decorations and like the happy music and the Christmas music and like inserted like ominous music, you could tell the exact same script and it would be very disturbing. And I think in this scenario it's kind of like, oh, she's kind of a like you could twist it and say maybe she's gonna kill him, Like there's a little bit of if I can't have you know, and Ken, that's just like waiting in the wings for it to pop out. And we know she has socket wrenches, so she has a weapon with her, yeah, all times. And she could like easily like fudge the brakes in his car, like, yeah, you do not want to piss this woman off.

So no, and she has the key to the house. There's no way she's getting out. Yeah, and Lily trusts her so like you could just see her like whisking Lily away, And yeah, it can go very dark, very quickly. Absolutely. Now let's talk about our setting.

So typically we have big, bad city, charming small town, or magical winter wonderland. Here we kind of get two out of three because we get New York. Maybe we'll say maybe we get magical winter Wonderland. Kind of, yes, yes, it's somewhere. I also kind of felt like it was maybe in the Midwest somewhere, just because of how big the house was.

I feel like, Man, I didn't write the specifics, but I wrote a lot of establishing New York City moments, so I feel like they must have said things making me think very directly it was New York, even though no interior is as clean as this version of New York would be. I don't know that they did. Emily. I watched it twice and I was okay, any indication. Yeah, this morning I watched it looking specifically for like, oh, yeah, well we're going to Minneapolis next or like they don't say any town names.

Yes, it is unclear exactly where we are, but we know at one point we are in the North Pole, which looks kind of just like a I mean, what is that the North Pole? You want to see? It's one room with some sort of device that has a lot of Christmas ornaments on it and it's been wonky lately. Yes, the in general, the we should be worried about North Pole. Uh, this movie, there's a lot that we'll get too shortly on how the makers of Elf should probably sue this production.

The makers of Elf and the makers of Miracle on thirty fourth. There's quite a bit of stealing from. Both movies, very much, very much. But yeah, the whole like Christmas Spirit powers the North Pole and Santa Claus which isn't defined it anyway, but it's like a running fill. I feel like that was a oh no, we didn't quite make it.

Eighty seven minutes. So let's fill it up with constant shots of Christmas spirit dipping. And it's just like an internet graphic of that. It's a flat pie chart from Microsoft Words. Yes, and it made me realize there are not enough pie charts in movies.

Now, I loved that. I love a good pie chart. You're right, You're right. This this movie has it all, including a number four dead parents or a dead wife. We got the dead wife, yep, yep, and.

So many medical bills for our dead wife. And I believe his dad is also dead, right because they mentioned. Yes, yeah, yes, we know this, and he thinks his mother got him the legal beagle. Yes, yes, and then yeah, And that's always my thing about like Santa Claus. And now I don't have children, so this was never a decision I had to make, but I always felt like the I get the idea of like, oh, Santa Claus, Christmas is magic, it's cute, blah blah blah.

But also you're a parent. You've worked very hard, and you you know, you go to work every day and you're saving up, and you know your kid really wants a legal b goal, so you put all your money away and then like you decide, Okay, I can't disappoint my child, so I'm gonna get them legal b goal. But of course they'll think Santa Claus got it for them, and then the kid's like, thank you, Santa, and you're like, but I just worked overtime to get the stuffed animal and you think it's a magical being. Doesn't it always feel a little bit unfair to the parent? Ooh?

Or is it a metaphor for being a parent in general. And just never getting the appreciation. You never get appreciation even when you've worked over time. Yeah, yeah, that's possible. Now.

Of course, all Michael really had to do was ask Santa, like, what do you want for Christmas? I want my wife's medical bills taken care of, and perhaps he could have done something about that. I want you to bring my dead wife back from the grave. Yeah I don't know, Oh Santa has that kind of because well we'll talk about it again, but Santa does have magic abilities, but I don't know if that includes bringing people back from the dead. I mean, I he wouldn't have limits on it.

Then, yeah, I would have taken that movie. This could have been like a monkey Paw situation where he just wishes for more wishes. Yeah, which always goes perfectly well as we. Know, it's true, it's never gone bad one. M Now, let us talk about number five, our sassy sidekick.

I feel like we have one. So is Do you think it's Lauren the girl mechanic? No, I I mean I feel like she is firmly in the camp of love interest because she doesn't. Okay, you know, I think when I'm thinking sassy sidekick, I'm thinking, like literally Santos sidekick. It's little Charlie.

Well, it's gonna be Charlie, Charlie, Charlie. I feel like Charlie took a note from uh from the Santa Claus. He was trying to go for like kind of like the wise Elf. I'm not trying to insult this actor, but this is a very annoying performance to me, and quite a lot of the middle of the movie is taking up with these antics of Charlie and Santa Claus switching spots and it never works. No, it's clearly supposed to be like this kind of like slapstick easy Andy, Oh, I turn around, I want to talk to Santa instead.

It's Charlie. Oh wait, let me ask Charlie something. Oh no, it's Santa. But like this film doesn't have the ability to pace that I think correctly. So instead you're just like, oh, oh great, it's Charlie.

He's gonna eat things again, and let's. Get it because I know this is coming down the line. We have to give that actor credit. He really ate a lot of spaghetti for that scene. Yeah, again, Elf needs to sue this movie.

Unless Elf created the cannon that like elves eat spaghetti, like if that's now a thing because of that movie, it's very possible. But he ate it like Buddy the Elf with his hand with his yep. Yeah, he did pour maple syrup on it, but he was one degree away from that, I. Think, which is odd because it was clearly in Canada. But it's I would guess maybe they couldn't afford the maple syrup or it's like usually you don't want to do anything that's gonna get stuff on your costume.

And again, like they definitely were eating food in this movie, so they were risking it. They were playing with fire here, they really were. They had real coffee in this movie too, which is excited. It's crazy, it's crazy. Uh.

They also had villains right now, Number six is our evil. Usually it's an evil woman character, but a lot of times it's like or it's the boss who's obsessed with the bottom line, and we get both in this one. Oh my gosh, I can only say so many good things about Dina. Oh my god, goddess. Did you ever see Marriage Story with Scarlet Johansson.

Yes, she is, Oh my god, Laura dern her. She needs to fucking mail her oscar to this woman. Yeah. So I heard an interview with Laura Duran where she said she played the lawyer character like going for a long performance, Like she has long limbs, it's really stretching, and Dina the evil lawyer does that here with like just the way she movess. Yeah, and like she's really like kind of a slinky kind of character.

And I just could not get enough of what she was wearing. What she said, she was amazing. Well and even can we talk about pro con her hair in this movie? It is such a choice. Yeah, it's a bit of like a poof in the back.

Yeah, it's almost like I'm trying to think, like it's almost like a sixties like Austin Powersy Go Go dancer where you have like the really big bump only corporate right, because it's like a bun at one point and another point it's a ponytail, but it's still like the big in the front part. It's it's like a very like it's almost like she's like made herself a cone head with that hair. It's a choice. Could you do that to your head? Do you think it would work on you?

I don't know. I could I pull it off? Maybe? How do you do that with your hair? Though I don't And like she it's a bun that has a huge poop in the.

Back and I don't know if there was extensions involved because it was like all of the volume was up in the front. But that's a lot of like layering of hair to get this effect that made her look like three inches taller than she was. Yes, it was definitely going for that. In the first scene where we meet her with Braxton, her boss, he makes a comment about he's like make sure to wear that outfit in court, and it feels like it's going to be creepy, but it's not as creepy and also like because you kind of think he wants to fuck his doll a little bit like, oh yeah, Like Wade takes out the so the doll that he wants to replace Santa with. It seems like he has a weird crush on that doll.

It's very much like a Brat's doll, is what I thought. It was kind of ripping off. Yes, it's Brats meets like a snow person. But almost like Monster High. Yeah, yeah, Monster High and Brats together.

So the prototype of the doll has a blue face, and he does say they're gonna make changes, and when we see the doll at the end, she's now white with blue hair, which is a weird switch. So was it about whitewashing, Yes, definitely, definitely. You can do a room room two four seven, three four seven? What is the room? Yes, you know what I'm saying.

You could do that reading of the room. Yeah, of this movie totally. U Yeah. Krista Bridges is the actress, and God bless this woman. She's working hard.

She she's doing the most with the least here Like she was my fa. Anytime she was on screen. I was so. Happy and I even liked that as much as like she was like hard ass, you know, a prosecutor. They do give her like she is not pure evil.

She does give Dean Caine a job offer, and it's very like, hey, look like things aren't looking good for you, we would hire you at our law firm, like you can drop this case and and we'll hire you. Like there's something that they could have made her more monster, and I, I don't know. I kind of liked that they didn't, because they let this actress play one more note, which I appreciate. I agree. And she's not unethical because when she does meet the Deine Kane, she discloses the information about Santa at the mental institution.

So she's a good lawyer and she's got great style, So we cannot dislike this character. No, by no means now this is wild to me. We're up to number seven, which is the montage, and I misspoke because I thought we had all ten. I don't think we have a montage in this movie. It feels like it needs a montage, and I'm gonna argue there should have been a montage somewhere in the middle of the movie because there's a lot of talking and this is where it gets really boring.

And I found myself even on the second watch, I was like what happened, because towards pretty much after we meet Charlie, the rest of the movie's just talking until we get to the courtroom. Yeah. Wow, I hadn't really thought of it, but you're right. There's no like we're going to decorate for Christmas. Now, we're gonna build a snowman.

We're going to right cook food and talk about Christmas. Like. No, it's purely like, here's what's happening in the legal world. Here's what the press is saying about it. Yeah.

Yes, it's all sitting down conversations. There's really needed a montage here, and it's no coincidence that's where both my mom and my husband fell asleep, so that I can see where the movie's dragging. Yep, yep, director's cut. Need to go back in there and just PLoP a montage in there somewhere. Makes it.

Now. Number eight is slapstick. I think most of the slapstick revolves on one round one character. Yeah it's Charlie. Yeah yeah, Charlie and Santa switching spots is about as slapsticky as it gets.

And it never works. You know, because I think there is something about the as you made a great point about it being very talky because the other part about this is like the staging of it. I noticed a moment or two where like the camera was kind of zooming, which is a weird thing to do in this kind of movie, but that, like every shot is very much just like people in a room talking to each other. So if you want to do any kind of like high jinks of tripping, falling off a ladder or like you know, reaching under a car and dropping something like, the camera's too close on people standing to ever do any of. That, that's true.

The framing of this movie is very head on. It's very boring. I don't want to assault the DP, but I'm going to. I don't really think there's a lot going on here. Yeah yeah, again, probably filmed in two weeks, so we got them some slack, but you know we're gonna che sack.

Yeah, Emily, did you catch the other moment of slapstick involving the judge? Oh? I have something very important to say about the judge later. What was the slapstick? So there's a scene where the attorneys meet the judge, which good job on the legal setup.

They are all meeting before the court scene, and I feel like the director maybe gave some sort of direction of this is too boring of a scene. So there's this sudden slapstick element to added in where Dina and Michael the Dan King character, like I can't decide if they should get up yeah, just like you can go now. And then it's like the music, it's like it's like. What you were so right? I didn't write it down, but I remember it very well.

It was like this little like random like throwing a joke judge, Okay. It doesn't match for the Dina character. Suddenly she's like should I go? Should I say yes? Yes?

Yeah? It doesn't make sense for the character or for like she knows this judge, she knows he's a bulldog, as she puts it. And yet suddenly she's like, I don't know if I should. Go stand up down? Yeah it is.

It is an awkward little moment, and it does. I think you're right. I think like on the day of the director's like, hey, can we try something I got one day left? Guys, No, no, it's bad, No. Put it in, put it in, yep now.

Number nine is our sage old person and on the Really Lucky Movies, Number nine and ten joined together to create a sage old person who is also Santa Claus. And by the golly of Christmas magic that happens here now when this particular Santa. Let's talk about this Santa, because obviously, you know you put Santa in movie. You can do a lot in Santa. You can have a jolly Santa, you can have a Santa, you can have a you know, legally troubled Santa who just puts all of his faith in Dan Kane.

What did you think of this particular version of it played by George Buza Buza who has played Santa in many things, so he has experienced in the art of Santa Claus. Uh, how do you work? For you? I loved him. There was something so familiar about him, and I realized afterwards, this guy, George has done so much voiced over work.

Yes, And the thing I think that I knew him from was he was Beast in the animated X Men series. And you do hear him sometimes like he'll make a little voice or something and you're like, Okay, George has more voices inside of him than this character, allowing him. To do Yes, I'd agree, Yeah. Did you love him as well I did. Yeah, I thought he had like this, you know, very if you looked at this guy, you'd say, I wonder if he's played Santa Yes, he obviously has.

He had fun with it. He was in one note. I think he got to kind of go different places depending on who he was interacting with. I think he had a different you know, kind of playing of it inn atitude. And he was with Lily verse when he was with Michael and so on.

Yes, And I thought he was like a Santa Claus who understood the severity of a situation, but also like was still Santa Claus. So all of that like I liked, and I liked how like also like therapist he ended up being, because that's just always something entertaining to me when like Santa Claus is also like, you know, the man who sees everything and knows everything because he does, which is creepy. So therefore he can, you know, give Lauren advice about men. And I think now I wrote this, and I don't know if this was verbatim from the movie. Does he say to Lauren that Michael has been in an emotional stand still since his wife died, or does he imply that.

So Michael asks Lauren, do you think I've been in an emotional stance? Oh? Oh, okay, But. Does Santa directly say that. I don't think he does.

I think he roundabout says it right. But Michael then interprets it as that which he is. But Lauren answers it in such a judicious way. She's like, well, I think I would say your wife died not too long ago, and you're going through something like she's. I just really can't give enough props to Rachel Blanchard for a very quiet performance that worked.

Mm hmmm hmm. And then later and I mean she wouldn't be a saying old person, but her you know, sage wisdom. Uh, Because I don't want to miss this line that she had to say, which is when like Michael is finally going to be like, Hey, I think I think I could have sex with you. I think like you could be my partner and not just my babysitter slash accountant slash mechanic slash mechanic whatnot, She says to him, love. I looked it up in the dictionary ones and the definitions there's so many, and they don't define it.

Yes, And I believe she said, I looked it up, and yeah, when she said I looked it up once instead of this morning or like to not like to not give a date of like I one time got a dictionary and looked it up like that made it so weird to me, Emily like that also stood out, like, yeah, if you said to me about any word, I looked it up in the dictionary. Once I was playing Balderdash and the word love came up and I didn't know what to write as my prompt. That was such a weird line. Yeah, yeah, oh so we get nine out of ten. We missed the manta, but we like got two villains, so I feel like we made up for it.

And now we moved to the bonus round. So the first of this is like trying to spot just how many public domain Christmas songs you can cram into eighty eight minutes worth of television? Did you catch any? So first of all, Deck the Halls? Did you hear where it played?

In the good It played so many times during the diner scene. There's like a Musac version and it just like it's the same verse, same. Yes, Oh it was upsetting, there was, and then like later it was also like Muzaki with we Wish You a Merry Christmas, Like it feels like somebody had a Christmas toy that plays Chris like. I don't know if you ever had like a spinning top or like one of those like little like like Christmas pianos that had bat like the battery ran out, then he threw it away and it would just like you'd press a button and it would play like two verses of one Christmas song in like a very electronic way. That's what the score felt like for most of these Christmas songs.

Not to blow your mind, but that was the legal beagle. That's what the legal beagles. Yes, there's something I appreciate too, which is when it's not just music that's public domain, but sometimes it's like a Christmas carol or twas the Night before Christmas. In this case, we actually get a very clear Charlie saying, well, Santa's face is public domain. So I wrote that down.

It's box, Yeah, it's. I liked it. I liked it. Yeah. The the music was was a kind of like this would be a hard one to watch a second time because you'd have to hear all that music again.

Yes, it was a very generic playlist. Yes, very much, very much. Uh now number two is the secret family recipe or complicated holiday cocktails? I don't think we have any. There's a mention of eggnog at one point, maybe.

Spiked spike, and I okay, so, having seen this movie twice, I might be reading into this too much. So he's when Lauren is lilately to bed, she says, and when I come downstairs, I'm gonna want an eggnog, and Dean King goes spiked. And then when we see him the next time, his face is a little bit red, and I'm like, did was that a choice? Did he? Is?

He saying he had a couple of glasses while she was upstairs, and he's being like a little more aggressive. So again I might be reading in this too much, but I think he might have drank some of that spiked aggnog alone. Or again the lifetime thriller version of this movie. Did she put something in his eggnog to make him a little more open to the Dictionary definition of love? Wow?

This really gets into criminal territory now. Thing he's a lawyer. That and he knows another lawyer if he ever needed like somebody to help defend. Do you mean the elf lawyer who barely got a part in this movie? But I had this great pistasfio colored suit.

So like, is that is he like an actor of renown? It felt like, didn't it feel like that was a cameo of some like we were all supposed to be like, oh my god, look it's but it wasn't right. It wasn't like was it meant to be Peter dnklic and they couldn't get it. Yeah, it was that because also so okay, again, if you haven't seen this movie, you need to watch it right now. But what we're talking about is at the very beginning of the movie, when Santa arrives in New York City or wherever we are, he's he has set up a meeting with a lawyer, but he has no hotel, okay whatever, So the meet the lawyer he set up a meeting with, or I should say, Charlie set up a meeting with is an elf lawyer.

And the elf lawyer gets all of five seconds on screen. He strolls in wearing a pistachio colored suit, and then Santa says, no, they so I don't need your service, and then the elf lawyer handles it really maturely and it's just like okay, and then he calls Charlie and said we need to talk and that's it. Yeah. Why, like, is this lawyer based in this city and is like on retainer constantly, like he's on the Pole payroll and just there to dispatch or like was he sent from the North Pole? Like that's what it was implied that he came all the way down from the North Pole.

Why didn't they ride together that came from the same place? So inefficient? And yeah, why wouldn't they meet together at the North Pole as opposed to coming down because we know when he got to the courtroom, the secretary said, you're here a few days early, so he had time to meet with this elf lawyer. What was that about? Yeah?

I wondered if there was another movie there I did. Yeah, Yeah, I don't know. I think that they were doing this actor a favor of the actor was doing us a favor. I don't know what they was. Definitely one of the two.

It was the real mystery of this movie. Who really benefited from his cameo? Uh? Now, next up is The Small Business in Danger, which I think you kind of have in a way you have two. Yes, one is not a small business right now, the North Pole needs some kind of technical advisor, head engineer, something, because like all of their equipment is just fallen apart.

Yes, and we're told multiple times Charlie is the best for a reason, but he can't fix anything. And I wonder why isn't Lauren sent up to the North Pole. We know she's a mechanic. There's such a misconnection here. Yeah, that would have made all the sense in the world, because it's like, and it's something that bothers me a lot in business, is you know, you can't do it all yourself.

You have to delegate, you have to train, Like because what happens when Charlie gets hit by a bus, right or Charlie wins the lolato apparently is the better thing you're supposed to say? Now then like, oh, nobody can fix it? Like why is Charlie in New York quote unquote if he's the only one that can fix the machinery? Are there no other Elves? It doesn't make sense.

No, So none of the other elves have speaking roles in this movie other than the one law that we talked to. Yes, well, I mean, that's also I guess having to do with like how if they don't speak, they're just extras, right, you don't have to pay them as much. They have some good reactions though, because at the beginning, when Santa shows the age of the movie by picking up what looks like a razor phone and it's like yeah, and then all of the else go. Charlie says something like, well, that's what all the kids are asking for, and then three elves. At the same time, Rady's like a list of like, yes they.

Are these kids and their toys. Yeah. Uh the other small business in danger. I don't know that we can call Michael's profession like a law practice because it seems like he hasn't actually practiced law yet. But I mean, you know, young lawyer startup trying to trying to build a client base.

They're one of my favorite Dan Kane moments in this movie. It was such a grounded performance. He said something to the effects of let me just pull of the exact line. Okay, so Santa says something like you don't have any clients yet, Dean Kane says, it's always the struggle to get established. I just felt like a very real moment where like as a freelancer, I've had moments where I've been like, well, you know, it's been a hard season with the striker.

Sure, Like we all, we have things we say when it's like, yes I am unemployed, thank you for acknowledging it. And whether you are an attorney or a writer, or an or an elf lawyer, any one of those things that's true is universal truth. You're gonna have some sort of standby phrase that makes sense, yeah, and everybody's gonna get it, like unlike the definition of love, which doesn't make sense according to Lauren. I looked it up once. Yeah, it's the dictionaries.

Doesn't doesn't nail it doesn't at all. Now let's talk about some product placements. Yes, I clocked one that I don't know that it was intended. And I feel like this was just like written and they didn't I don't know that it was the actual product that we see. But Dean Kane goes on like a very long speech about the Ford Galaxy.

Wow, I miss that it was so boring. It really was. Yes, this is supposed to be, like I think when like him and Lauren are finally connecting and he starts talking about cars, which everybody loves talking about cars and not actually seeing cars. Right, No, well film is not a visual meetings. Yeah, it's all about the script.

Yeah. In the dialogue, well I have I don't know if. This weeknt as product placement, but it's product placement for fake products and there was a lot of it. Yes, this is a good time to talk about So the cereal we see at Michael's house, we see it twice and it's heavily featured. It's called nes Bits and it's a lime green colored box, so they really wanted us to look at it.

Uh. And one of my favorite things is is like store brand cereal when they have to try to find out find names for it that aren't like, right, Chrispy's Right, So Rice Krispy's is Krispy Rice. And my favorite Food Network game is watching when they do a baking show and you can tell the contestants had to keep doing adr because they kept saying Rice Krispy's and they're supposed to say chris Rice. But it reminds me of because I guess it's supposed to be like Chex mix or checks you think. You think nes Bitz is chex mix.

Nes Biz checks don't yeah, wait is it like something backwards nez biz Ze's I think. I think the production designer was making a little joke with us somehow, like because what it made me think of is in Toy Story when this is such a deep cut, when Buzz puts on an apron and he's acting like he's hosting a tea party, he says, call me missus nesbitch, And I wondered, is the production designer winking to Toy Story or am I just making something up? Why not? Both would be my easy answer to that. I don't know.

I I was trying. I didn't. I was more distracted by how the word because it's a good source of fiber, and how fiber was spelled the Canadian British way, if I b r E because it was a good like yep, we're in Canada. So because of that, I even wondered if it was fake, what if that's a real cereal it was nez biz biz bits. Like b I t s bit CeAl.

I don't know dictionary, no, No, I just see a bunch of power tools. Uh it's so many definitions but none really fit. No. I just get a bunch of router Uh what do you call it? Like drill bits for nez biz, So.

The same thing. Okay, I have to talk about other fake products, please, there's a lot. Okay. The movie goes out of its way to call the cafeteria at the courtroom. Is that a Canadian because we wouldn't call it a snack room here?

Well, and it's like here, you could call something a break room, but this was this was like the room that had a vending machine, like right, It was like maybe you'd be like the cafeteria, but it wasn't a cafeteria. It was just the spot that had like the vending machine in it. So, but no, you're right. They say it so many times. It's so adorable.

And at first Lily says it, You're like, well, she's a kid, and then Santa says it, and then Dean Kine is like, well you can go to the snack room after, and it's like what right. And then it becomes a key part of the testimony in this this climax of this lack case. Well, I was in the snack room. Yeah, and in the snack room okay, So this is just a classic set design thing. The vending machine just says cold drinks, which I enjoyed that.

Yes, it's not like PEPSI or coke. It no cold drinks. And then the peanut butter cup, which they keep revisiting this Santa buys one to split with Lily. Lily mentions that she wants to buy it where she gets the break with Raxton at the end. And the brand of peanut butter cup.

Did you catch what it is? No, they just kept saying peanut butter cup, which that in itself was very amusing to me. The brand is called peanut butter. Was it registered? Was there a little like you know, R or TM behind it?

None of that. It just said and it clearly was going for Reesis because it was orange with dark brown lettering and it just said peanut butter You. Know, it just seems at a certain point that it's got to like I understand you can't always use branded material, but like somebody on the props department had to make that, and that just takes time, and that props person could have been like making better angel wings or something. So it just seems like where you were like spreading your time and budget. I just question some of the choices here.

I agree with you, but I mean, what a delight for a second be watched to pay attention to brand names that our brand? Yes? Uh so? Now number five is our cloying child. So we do we have a child here?

We have a little Lily. What were your thoughts on Lily? So they definitely were going for a young Natalie would look like she really looks like she does. Actually, I feel like she has some moments where she was really good. And it's a tough thing as a child actor because so much of what they're going for is just adorable one hundred percent of the time and just reacting with a maturity that I don't know any child of ten or eleven would ever have.

And also, did you see the way she she colored with crayons? It was perfectly in the line. I was felt very inadequate with my ability to color watching her color. Never colored that well as an adult. No, nor have I cried on cue when testifying on behalf of Santa the way she does.

I wasn't crazy about that performance. I felt like that was the audition scene and I can feel that energy of like I did this and everybody who loved it, and I just I really like, again, you don't want to insult a child, But I just didn't look. I didn't love that scene. I thought overall the kid actor did pretty good. Yeah, it had big like that Wayne's World joke when he's crying.

I know I didn't. I never learned to read like that Oscar clip like flashing because it's like this kind this is a really big swing of a dramatic performance from a kid in a spot that I don't know that we needed to go that far. Yes, we didn't need it for that. Well what did you think about her performance? I actually thought she was likable, Like, I thought she didn't have to try too hard.

I thought she was a cute kid. Like I was watching her, I was like I would see I feel like she has a career ahead of her. I think she seemed to have like a And again, part of it is like I grade on a curve because I have seen some insufferable children in these movies. Yes, and I thought she felt professional but not overly child actory, which can also sometimes drive something a certain way. So I thought like, no, we did we did okay?

Here? Yeah, I am a quick sidebar. I had a quick stint as a receptionist at a casting office and we had we sometimes we cast kids, oh gosh, and it was so fascinating because I saw that kids were learning how to market themselves, oh, which is and like learning how to network, but with the mind of a seven year old. So it was very annoying, like extra annoying. And one time I saw this kid had just come back from a Hawaiian vacation and his mom's like, Honey, gift Donna the present you got her in Hawaii, and the kids like, Donna, I got you back a day.

And that's when I was in Hawaii, and I was like, oh, gross, you just learned how to network. And I hated it. I you know, like I'm have a fascination a little bit of like adults who were child actors, because I think you can usually like tell in a different way, like Sarah Michelle Geller, for example, Like there is something about like an actor like that who grew up in this industry and like clearly learned very quickly how to talk to people, that to always be on, to always present yourself a certain way, And there's something about like them as adults sometimes where like you can really like see the professionalism in it, like when they don't go like the Lindsay Lohan route of like personal troubles and like bad family and all that.

But I always think of, like, my god, there can't be anything more nightmarish than like, hey, we're gonna do an open casting call for a new production of Annie. Like that's gotta be the saddest most like because you can picture all the stage moms and dads. You can picture the child who's like wise beyond their years, you know, in like that dark way of like I think of that. There was like an SNL sketch once with where Drew Barrymore is playing like Abigail Reslin interviewing I forget Amy Poehler as Dakota Fanning or vice versa, and it's like Abigail Bresling came on the scene, is like this cute little kid, and like Dakota Fanning is like, yeah, I should have been none for an Oscar and I haven't been yet, and you have like just that, like that's too much to put on a child, and like you kind of need it because like, look, we do need kids and movies because you you know, there's only so many Charlie's in the world that can play young, but it can be I think there's like just again rabbit holes to go down of how dark some of that world must get.

So absolutely I agree with you. Yeah, all right. So number six is finding the perfect tree, which we don't really get the big like tree hunting, the importance of a Christmas tree. There is a tree. There is a tree, and it's an important scene.

It's where Lauren and Michael have a fight. She's decorating the tree because she does everything for this house. She's basically a nanny who fixes the. Car like handy woman. Yeah, she's probably the one keeping the mortgage bill like under control.

I feel like she does it all. But okay, so the house is already immaculately decorated for the holidays, but then somehow they didn't have a tree, and so we see her putting like one ornament on the tree. So it's not a big scene, but it is a part of it. Yeah, it's a really ugly fake tree too, Like it's just. It's not the best.

Did you see the snowman in the front yard because it bothered me? Okay, so it's can you describe the snowman? Because there's a lot that bothered me about it. Okay, so I have never had good luck building a snowman. Like it's just building a snow It's a really hard You have to like really really gather and pack really tight snow to get it into a ball.

Every time I have tried, I can never get it into like an actual ball. It just ends up being like a lump, and then I put another lump on top, and then there's another lump. Imagine like that, but now imagine the like plastic snow not the inflation, but the old school plastic snowman that you would put on your lawn. You put a light in it. It always blows around when it gets windy, and then like you come home and you have to like walk all around the neighborhood try to figure out where your snowmanblue.

But like it's that material, it's that kind of like hardness. You're taking that hardness of a like store bought snowman, and you are morphing it with my mutant poorly constructed I don't know how to shape this thing snowman, And somehow that's what you have on the lawn. And it's the same snowman. The entire movie. It is like marshmallows, like shaped stacked on top of each other.

It unnerved me. I did not care for it. You've nailed the texture of the snowman, but you missed one important detail. And I actually I drew a picture of it because it bothered me so much. So it's missing a mouth, that's it.

That was what really bothered me, I think, because it was just like it was something out of an Speaks No Evil Snowman exactly. It had that stiff texture you're describing. It's clearly a hard snowman yep. And then and I wrote this down, unnaturally stiff arms like he's being frisked, like even for having stick arms, which are not like they're not gonna be loose. It looked like this, and it had no mouth.

It was kind of like airplane like. The arms were too high. It was sort of like when a child draws like a person and they don't really understand proportion or like where eyeballs go. It wasn't quite Picasso. It was more like uncanny snowman.

Like if you told Ai to build a snowman, it would have been kind of that. It's messed up, like I've spent a lot of time thinking about it the first time and the second time. So it's just a bad production choice because the snowman sticks out. And also we're saying he didn't have a mouth, which I think was just laziness on whoever was doing it and forgot to put one there. But what could have done right?

This is a law movie, right, it's all set in justice. He could have given him a mouth but covered his eyes, so it could have been like the justice is blind snowman and his stick arms could have been holding like, you know, a scale in both arm, and then you would have had a like court snowman. I think we've written a better movie. We've certainly production designed a better movie, if nothing else. That's true.

Now number seven empty coffee cup acting. No, we established that Lauren pours a real cup of coffee at the beginning, she doesn't drink it. And then Charlie drinking or eating a lot of spaghetti. Yeah, I think they did a good job. They filled they were surprising.

Yeah. Now the for actors trying hard not to actually eat on camera. Here's something that I have kind of figured out over the years, is that one of the ways you can tell the budget on a movie is if the actors eat or not, because I'm telling you, like Charlie eats in this movie. He is like putting stuff in his mouth and chewing and swallowing. And my theory is that you see that more on movies where they don't have as big of a catering budget, so the actors are like, bring it like this.

They might be the only meal I get today. So yes, I will eat the spaghetti with my hands. I think that's completely valid. But he is the only character we see really eating because everyone else is just taking SIPs. Yes, And we need to get to a very important cookie eating.

I don't know if we want to get there now. Oh my god, no, we're saving that cookie. Okay, the cookie drop's big. Yeah. So nine is canadianisms.

Oh I don't know. I don't spell fiber with an R. So there's one. Oh oh they're okay. I have two really good ones.

So one is a basic one, which is just like the first line in the movie is Santa being like I spent half the night trying to figure this cell phone. Oot. Like it's a very like deliberate Canadian pronunciation of out. The other one was the one that made me really happy. And I actually didn't notice it.

My husband did and I had to pause it and rewind and I was like, oh my god, how did I miss this? In the courtroom we talked about the judge, right, this incredible judge who has like a squirrely sense of humor. Yes, did anything about the judges wardrobe stick out to you? Oh? I must have missed it?

What is it? The judge is wearing a like he Okay, American judges, what do they wear? They wear the black rope? Yeah, so I believe British and Canadian judges they have like the white collar kind of underneath and over. This judge definitely has a like you can see it is the like he's not wearing the wig.

I wish he was wearing the wig. That even better. But he is wearing a car the collar that you would wear if you were in Canada. But he is sitting in front of a sign that says the United States of America. So yes, very much, very much.

Those are the ones I call. Were there any more canadianisms you found? No? I missed them. Other than most of the cast being very Canadian, I missed it.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, Rachel Blanchard. Definitely. You can hear it in her voice too. There's something about her that reads as Canadian and I can't tell you what it is. But there's like with Canadian actors, I can always send something about them and forgive this it sounds so like so central to America, but there's something kind of off brand about them and I can't put my finger on it.

Yeah, and there's like that, there's like a a chipperness that always kind of often comes out a bit more I think, And it might just be like our associations of like, Oh Canada, they're all cheerful up there, like I don't know. In Christmas movies they are, and you can hear it because they, you know, say a boot. I don't know if it's their healthcare or what it is. Help really happy about them. Yeah, I don't know us.

You know, Number ten is the warm weather watch, so we're not outside much, which gives characters excuses to not to be carrying coats instead of wearing them. Yeah, I have a really good one. I don't know if you saw it. I'm excited to talk about it. In the courtroom.

Did you notice anything about people sweating? I didn't specifically, but please, okay, there's two actors in general. I had noticed that Santa sweated a lot in this movie, and in fairness, one of the scenes he was sweating in he had just been like magically flipped from the north pole. So I'm gonna allow that one. Sure, but I'm gonna.

Say he's wearing a huge heavy coat. Yep, So I think this was more to do with the actor was physically too warm. But in the courtroom, Santa is sweating profusely, and then Braxton, the man who's suing him, is also sweating right a lot. Yes, we're talking like Albert Brooks in broadcast news level like Santa. You can see the japlets on his forehead.

Robert Hayes airplane just like get a like glass right under an air and drink it. No, you are, You're absolutely right, and it again like it makes sense, like, oh look, I'm a big person. I sweat easily. Like if you my hell, I was at Macy's this weekend. Have you gone to Macy's at Christmas time in a coach?

It's the worst, it is because you're in there in a winter coat. Because I just get out of my car and it's twenty degrees outside. Oh no, now I'm in Macy's. And it's not just like oh the heath on, No, it's the heat, it's the lights, it's the people, it's the energy. And you suddenly realize like I stink.

I'm gonna come home and need to shower because I feel so dirty because I know how much I'm sweating, and I feel like that is definitely our Santa Claus in this movie is just constantly living in a state of Macy's and it can't be good for anybody that is. Such a nightmare. I also need to have one thing about the courtroom because we may not get to it, but it's very important. Did you notice that when Dina was walking and Dean Kane there's a squeakiness to their shoes that the sound mix could not bike it out. And also when they swung the door open, it like kept way too long.

Yeah, they And I don't know, was it that sweaky or did they like have a mic somewhere they shouldn't have. I don't know. I don't know, or if they wore the wrong kind of shoes to be on that kind of floor and just someone didn't realize it, but there was a squeakiness that no mix could clean out. I mean, those New York floors are really clean. What can you do?

Justice is clean? Yeah. Now eleven is our old people aggressively matchmaking. I mean, Santa really wants things to happen for Lauren and Michael. He does, and he even he does a cute little pun with her.

He's like, so, how's your labor of love going? He's like really proud of that pun, and she's like, well. I opened up my dictionary and I couldn't find it there. All right, Now, number twelve is our favorite fashion moment. So I'm gonna say right off the bat, I'm very mad that there were no good pea coats in this movie.

I live for a good Hallmark pea coat. Didn't find him here. Again, Lauren's in like a jean jacket in most of this movie. Yeah, but what did you think, Like, did anything stand out to you in terms of fashion? Oh my god, it's so easy.

Dee when she first comes in, is wearing a totally Breakfast at Tiffany's inspired outfit, which is her boss. Yeah, it's got plus the poopy hair, booby. Hairs it's a perfect little black dress. Yeah, it's a little black dress. And because I could tell the budget was a little bit limited, her bra strap does keep falling to the side.

We've all been there. That's just it happens. But you know, in most movies the wardrobe person would be kind of like tugging at it. Yep, they missed it here. Yeah, but I loved it.

She really went for again the long on. It worked. I was disappointed a bit by, Like, Okay, so this family, right, So Michael and Lily have taken Santa Claus into their home. Like that's a lot of work, right, Like they're you know, I don't know, like they're entertaining a house guest they didn't plan on having. So Santa Claus like kind of owes them big, right, I mean, and granted, like he does do like magic to the car.

That's nice of him. Uh he And like Lil's gift was like, oh, it's Christmas, what's my gift? And she opens her gift and I we have I know, we have to go into this in more detail. I just didn't like the look. I thought, like, this looks like something you would get at party city.

I was a little bit underwhelmed. Those were very cheap wings. The party cities generous, Emily, I would have seen a dollar because they looked like they were about to snap off immediately. Yep, yeah, she gets fairy wings. They are very unexceptional fairy wings or are they are?

We gonna talk about it. Let's let's do it. So the twist of this movie, right, So, Santa Is wins his case, the Braxton drops it after after okay, like and again the legal you know, is this correct to do? So Lily ends up talking to Braxton in the snack room. Braxton tells her about how he's suing Santa in order to bring his own toy to market.

So then Michael the lawyer calls his daughter to the stand to tell the jury what just happened with her in the snack room. Again, all of this like, now, I've seen my cousin Vinnie, and that's where a lot of my legal knowledge comes from. And like this all would have happened to my cousin Vinnie. So I'm kind of cutting the movie slack on those laws, but I so she tells them like so basically it's like, oh, his motivation wasn't about Christmas? And being wronged by Santa.

It was that he just wants to sell his choice, so they drop the case. Santa is free. Now. My problem with all of this was that it felt like Dean Kane wasn't actually asking questions. He was really just giving a statement to the jury.

And I don't think that's how testimony is supposed to work. But am I wrong about that? You're not wrong. I also noted that. And the other bigger issue I had with that scene was because he so, Okay, we're gonna allow him to have a surprise win.

That was a bit of a choice. But then right after he finished questioning Lily, he goes into his closing argument without the opposing counsel getting an opportunity to talk to her. They eventually are asked that, but he gets a closing argument at a weird time in the case. Yeah, so to your question, no, that's not allowed. And I don't know why Dina didn't object.

There was a lot of things he said that were just his opinion with no fact to back it up. I thought the same, Yeah, may I read just a short paragraph of his monologue because it is Shakespearean? Yes, please? Okay, that is what Santa does. Santa is good.

Santa is a lie. He exists in the heart of every single one of us who believes, and if you find him guilty, you are condemning the very best that the human spirit has to offer this world. The defense rests, Now, what part of that is fact? Emily who opinion? If I was sitting in that courtroom, I would open up my bag, I would pull out legal eagle, and I would pull his strings.

He could say, are you object because no, that's not it's not well how court works. It's not And somehow that monologue makes Braxton tear up and he turns to Dina, and we've talked about this moment in the movie. He has, like the actress has a great moment where you can tell she despises the choice for clients making and she's like, my client is dropping the lawsuit and everyone goes, oh, case dismissed. And then the gavel is hit and it's like what. Yeah, it's not how it works, and like, what is Michael's future in this because earlier on there's another moment we didn't go into detail, but basically, like the the this case is getting a lot of publicity.

We see a newspaper. That's that's kind of like painting Michael Now as a kook, because oh my god, you got to be crazy to defend Santa Claus. It has a headline that they'd be really angry. Yeah, did you write it down? What the headline was?

I did? I wrote down Looney lawyer takes Santa in quotes case, is that the one you're talking about. I don't know if it's the same, if it's like on the same paper adjacent to it, or if it's another one. But that's one. There's another one that is x dash miss e x p O s e d x miss exposed.

But they do the thing and this is like the biggest pet peeve of mine where they like write Christmas as if it's x dash miss, but then instead of like x miss ex posed right where it should have been an x dash x dash. It's like, yeah, they couldn't write out x even x miss. They couldn't write like x m A s. They had to add a dash in that. But then they write out the whole word exposed, so it doesn't read the way it's supposed to, the visual joke of that is xsdash miss x sdash exposed.

Right, it's a problem. And also are you interested to know that the publication is called the News? Ah? Oh that makes me happy. That makes me happy as well.

It should be. I trust that paper more than anything else. Oh. Absolutely. There was another scene at the beginning of the movie where they're at the cafe and the newspaper is called Cafe and it has it's not a picture of a coffee cup, and it's like they needed more space to fill up on the paper, so they wrote like, cafe with a coffee cup, and then underneath it cafe with another coffee cup, and the headline is millionaire Bennett takes on Santa Claus.

That's a little bit of a better headline. Though. I like that the cafe has its own newspaper. It does. Yeah, it's the cafe paper.

What's in the news today? At table eight, all the waitresses write it when they're not writing up the orders exactly. Now, I want to ask another question that comes up. There is one other witness that we see testify, right, so we are led to believe that the plaintiff has brought in several character witnesses because it's a class action lawsuit against Santa Claus. And there's a bunch of people that like get on stand and like say, you know, are saying how Santa ruined their lives.

And the first one we see is a scientist, a Nobel Prize winning scientist, I think, and he's he's get gets called up and like they describe it as like, oh, this is a guy who invented, discovered, created, I don't know what what's the right definition is there? I need to borrow Lauren's dictionary for this. But he like is responsible for saving people from a bola right. He has made vaccines for very very rare like deadly diseases. This this man has saved millions of people.

And he is testifying because when he was young, he asks Santa for a video game console. I believe that's the term he uses, not a Nintendo, not a Genesis, but a video game console so that like he could have friends and that friends would come over and play games with him. But he didn't get the video game console. Instead, do you remember what he got as the gift. He got a little microscope set.

Uh huh. And because he got that microscope, it made him like the little weirdo. I guess that nobody wanted to be friends with, but it also made him a scientist who ultimately saved lives. And Dean Kane says to this man like, essentially, well, it's really good that Santa Santa gave you something that saved other people, like and and this guy on the on, you know, on the stand, is like, oh, yeah, I guess you're right. I guess like Santa did the right thing here.

But there's something very that opened this up to me. I'm like, this is a very utilitarian reading of like, Santa Claus isn't there to make you happy. Santa Claus is there for the greater good, right if like killing this child or killing this boy's social life means it will save others, Like, that's what Santa Claus does, And it just opened up a whole other like I wanted to read that philosophy book. That's a good point, and I'm remembering that. Dina then says something like isn't it so sad there's no vaccine for social damage?

Yeah, Like she has like such a good line. Also, I want to point out that in the next scene, we're at Michael's house and he tells Lauren that Dina wiped the floor with him, and she brought in ten witnesses. Would that not have been a great montage? We want to see the witnesses of all the people just being like I wanted a doll and instead I got legal vehicle like whatever it was just back. Yes, oh man, I want to see all those Canadian character actors be like I want to tinsel and instead I got a tonsil.

Like, you don't have to do long, it doesn't have gay sense. Just give us something. I asked for red vines, I got twizzlers, Like just something. Yeah, exactly, except what would there be for? They wouldn't call it red vines or twizzlers.

They'd be like I wanted rip in the strings that are licorice. I wanted licorice trademark. I did get cravings for peanut butter cups while watching this movie, though I won't lie. Big peanut butter is doing its job. It definitely, it definitely is.

Yeah. Now, I can't believe we still actually didn't get to the big question mark of this Let's let's do it. Let's do it so our little Lily, uh you know, she's happy at the end of the movie because now she has like a new mommy probably Santa Claus has been proven correct. Her dad seems happy. Everything is great, and tell me Emily what happens from there.

Okay, so, as you said, everything's in a good place. Lily is asleep. She's about to fall asleep on the couch, and this is important. She has a cookie that she's taken one bite out, and she's it's kind of like resting on her hand, and then she falls asleep immediately, and it's not her best acting because it's like it's pretty fake looking sleep. Yeah.

And then Lauren says to Michael she can really just switch switch it off. Huh. And then Michael says, she's just the right age, which what the what what does that mean? I don't know. This is where my husband positive the theory that Lily died, because the next thing we see is that Lily discovers a little Christmas box under the tree, and it's of course the wrapping paper where they wrap the top and the bottom so there's no ripping because it's Hallmark, and inside, as you mentioned, are those cheap fairy rings.

And then and then she literally takes off off the ground in an ungrounded moment, and her dad and his girlfriends start making out and the movie ends with a little like circle closing in on her like a cartoon yep, it zero's in on her as she's taking flight. She's ascending away from the mere mortals. Emily, the question is did she die? Obviously I want that to be true. I think it is a bold choice and I like it because, like her dad is about to start a new life, right him and Laura, and they're gonna have more They're gonna have more kids.

Has she served her purpose and now she And also like she was kind of excited earlier on in the movie because suddenly there was going to be a new toy that was like exactly what she wanted, right Braxton's Snowy Santana, like again the monster high doll that is essentially a fairy. She was like, wow, oh yeah, I would want that for Christmas. And instead, like she becomes. That whoam hm? Because we don't have that toy anymore?

So is she now going to replace Santa and give gifts as the floating faery. With the cheapest ways possible, which inspires kids who don't have a lot of money that they can make it. Yeah, yeah, yeah, you don't need you know, a fancy budget, like you just need Santa, you need to eat a poison cookie again. Going back to the lifetimeeness of it all Right, you have Lauren Who's like, I finally have my hands in Michael. Right, he finally sees me as a woman and not just his mechanics slash best friend slash babysitter.

Perfect. My life is fine. I've got the car, I've got the house. It's all good. The only thing that's gonna hold us back.

Every time he looks at his daughter, he's gonna see his first love. Every time he looks at her, he's gonna see his dead wife. And I can never live up to her because she, you know, everything was perfect and then she died young, so she'll always be beautiful, She'll always be younger. I'm gonna get older. What can I do?

I need to get rid of the daughter. And I am a big Flowers mantic fan. I grew up on VC Andrews, So when I see a cookie, my mind always goes to, like, well, what was being sprinkled on that cookie? And was it poison cookie? From Aunt Lauren?

Mommy Lauren? Who? Wow? Mm hmm, Right, I think you're right. I hadn't even considered how she did it.

But there's a very specific folly drop when Lauren drops the cookie, and that feels like that was a choice on the part of the filmmakers, Like it's like a shoe thod, it's too loud for a cookie. So when Lauren drops the cookie, she's dead. I'm with you, yeah. Yeah, And that makes sense because otherwise I would have to say this is a terrible movie, and I can't say that obviously. So it's well planted that yes, it's a thoughtful movie.

It's transgressive, yeah it is. Yeah now, and there is like for additional viewing. So I realize last minute that, like, oh, let me make sure Emily watched the right Dean Cain protects Santa Claus in a small town in a legal situation movie, because there's another one also on Hoopla called Defending Santa which is I think it's even from it's either twenty thirteen or twenty eleven, but Dean Kane also plays So I watched like the first five minutes of it because I was curious. And Dean Cain also plays a widowed dad to a daughter about the same age as the one in this movie who stumbles on a Santa Claus and like is like the only person that can take care of him. I got as far as seeing there is a lawyer woman in this movie.

Only there's a twist is she was a high powered defense lawlawyer who has left that to go to a small town and become a defense attorney for like people that need it. And one great line from that movie was when she's leaving her law firm and her boss is like, oh, come on, you're not going. Is this about your conscience? Which made me want to finish that movie. So it is probably a good like you know, back to back with this one.

It's a double feature, definitely, sure, definitely, so. Quickly I just have to run through good lements. Yes, okay, so let's talk good legal moments. We've touched on some of these. First of all, Charlie has power of attorney for Santa, and that does come up, yeah, which makes sense why they keep switching spots, because legally Charlie can be a stand in for Santa and sign on his behalf for real estate, banking or taxes.

It's important to have that sorted out. Absolutely. We know Santa has a retainer agreement and he paid. Yep. We know that the judges put this case on the fast track, which explains why, in the course of less than a week it's turned around.

Okay, Michael meets with the opposing counsel and the judge. The opposing council shows the psychiatric hospital record to Michael in the interest of full disclosure. So there you go. There's some great legal moments. Here's some very bad ones.

We talked about this. Dean Kine's closing argument occurs while his daughter is still on the stand as a witness. The closing argument has nothing to do with what Santa is accused of, which is setting children's expectations up for failure emotional negligence. It has nothing to do with that. We're just talking about how Santa is all love and belief and good, but we don't address what he's being sued for.

I have a question about that. Can you object during a closing statement or no? Is that like the judge is supposed to be the one to say, hey. I'm with you. I don't think that she could object.

But it was technically not a closing argument because there's still witness on the sands. This was talking. He was just talking like you can do that if it was a real closing argument. He's just talking while his daughter was said, that's not a closing her okay, And then I oh, after that, it's just legal legal phrases. So I think I've hit all of my points.

Yep, yep. Now all that being said, do you recommend the case for Christmas? And who would you recommend it to? If anyone? So I wrote down, I could not recommend this movie in good legal conscience.

However, I find it to be uncooked in the middle, like a bad Christmas cookie, perhaps a poison perhaps cookie. I will say, though the actors are doing their best with a very odd script. Having seen the movie twice, I can't say I'm a better person, but I'm a more curious person. What about you. Yeah, it's a it's a tough one because it is not good.

There's no like universe in which I can call this a good movie. I am very aware of that. It is not incompetent. No, it is so it falls into like the other category of these movies, which is like, is it weird enough to be entertaining? Right?

Is it weird in a way where whether it's deliberate whether it's like these deliberate things that you wonder if somebody was having fun, or there's something charming enough about it, or it's just so zany, And in this one, it's kind of like a combination of those factors that sort of makes it like, no, it ends up feeling really, really fucking weird. And part of that is, like it's twenty eleven, so this is now a thirteen year old movie, which in Hallmark years is like this might as well be like a Fritz Lang film, Like this is old and you could see it, you could tell watching it that it's a different timeline of like it doesn't look like a Hallmark movie today, and there's something very charming about that.

A lot of the movies, like in the early days, you had a lot of these ones that like involves Santa Claus and involved the North Pole and had this like magical element to it that was always really cheap because they're not obviously putting a lot of money or time behind it. And you don't get those anymore because they've they found like the formula is much more like focus on the romance, keep it like ground in reality. So I like seeing that because it just like takes me back to a simpler time. There's so much strangeness to it that I think has aged in a very funny way. Again, like the because Elf was what like two thousand and three, this movie is eight hours later, and it's still just like pulling Elf jokes.

That there's something about that in itself that's kind of like charmingly like lazy in a way that I find amusing. So it's it's one that like, if you watch these movies to find the good ones, this is not one of those if you watch them because you're a completist and you're looking for like the odder ones that sort of stand out for being entertaining if you watch them closely and like realize how strange things are. This is a really good example of that you can create a lot within this movie to make it entertaining for yourself. I agree with you completely. There's a lot to appreciate, and as you said, it's extremely competent.

Yeah, it's just I think if they could have worked out some of the Act two issues and had at least one bontage and we needed to see a few of those testimonies on the stand, yeah, we could have had a pretty good movie here, Like I think, people, it might be kind of campy if we had some more action in the middle. Yeah, I think it's lacking the awareness of how campy it could have been. I think like here and there, Like I think like again, like Krysta Bridges playing that mean lawyer, Like, I feel like she kind of got it more than anyone else in this movie, which is really interesting. Yeah, she was ahead of her time in this performance. Yeah.

Yeah. Well, I cannot thank you enough for joining me and being my legal advisor on this journey for this movie, because I think it is important to you know, we all have watched our years of law and Order and so on to like think we know how things work, but it's important to remember like no, we need to go to the experts for it. So your expertise has been very helpful for I think anybody watching, and your dark interpretation of what really happened to Lily is something that will haunt me forever. And I say that in the best possible way. So, Emily, where can people find you if they want to read more of you, watch more of you, listen to more of you.

I am on. My pieces have been in the New Yorker. I am on the internet. I have a website at Emilymanez dot net and I'm an editor for slock Job, so I'm frequently publishing things on there, and actually this Friday, I have a piece about Santa's affidavits from throughout the years. Oh so, if you like Santa and you like Legal Trouble, this is for you.

Kids. That just seems like a true like not the opposite of coal in your stocking right there, the perfect gift under the tree. I'm just gonna say, Emily, this has been such a delight, and I hope as we're coming upon the holiday season, you're careful what cookies you accept from friends and. Went and out listen to the words of Legal Eagle. Absolutely, thank you, Emily, Thank you, Emily.

Time for bed, Kay. This is a Christmas very hiding in your Christmas dream. She's a very naughty, very soon to thank you your closs. Then she lets in all her bed friends for a magical parting jingle bells and magic sellsands. Sad has fun his way, you will have lots of thumb all friends on a merry Christmas Day.

She flies into your kitchen, finding all the Brussels grounds and she beats them to the reindeer, give. Me, they shout. Finally, she waves some magic fun as she spreads us crowns to her greeting as she loves to spread them. Their just don't like more sansly truding novels and magic spells. Your surd sun his way, we'll have lots of fun.

Okay, that's a good stuff for Virginia, as he very up and does she pulling mad. With that shirt? She doesn't thinking novels and magic spells to your lotlessness. They will issue lots of fun and all your friends and Christmas very wor