(2023, 84 min)
Country: Canada
Director: Bradley Walsh
Studio: Muse Entertainment/ Hallmark
Language: English
SYNOPSIS: Avery has long wished to become a broadcast news-anchor. When the regular presenter loses her voice, Avery gets the opportunity to host the morning news on Christmas Day. However, the night before, she is awakened by sounds in the living room and surprises and overpowers an intruder who identifies himself as Chris, Santa Claus, which Avery finds hard to believe, especially as a series of break-ins by someone dressed as Santa has been happening in the neighborhood. Christmas Eve becomes a much more intriguing night when Avery and Chris are drawn into the events surrounding the real burglar.
REVIEW:
The Gist: Avery Quinn (Italia Ricci) is one of the most talented researchers at her local news station in Dayton, Ohio, but what she really wants is to make it as an anchor. However, Avery is often stuck being unfairly compared to her “national treasure” of a newscaster mom, Sophie Ashburn (Suzanne Cyr), so she struggles to live up to peoples’ high expectations. That changes when the regular anchors are out of town or sick for the Christmas day broadcast, giving Avery the newscasting opportunity she’s always wanted.
Unfortunately, finding a handsome but strange man emerging from her chimney on Christmas Eve threatens her big break. The man, Chris (Luke Macfarlane), turns out to be Santa Claus’s himbo son subbing in for the first time to prove himself worthy as the new big man in red. While Avery initially and understandably thinks that Chris is absolutely insane, she comes to realize that he’s exactly who he says he is as the two team up to catch the Santa Crook who has been orchestrating a number of local robberies, clear their own names of suspicion after getting implicated themselves, and ultimately save Christmas.
Performance Worth Watching: Italia Ricci as Avery. She does a wonderful job as a believable normal person surrounded by absolute weirdos (who then eventually does get to lean into some of that silliness and whimsy for herself). Ricci really seemed to embrace the goofiness of this movie and runs with it, brings a genuine and easy charm. Luke MacFarlane also really understood the assignment as he delivered an earnest and entertaining performance as Chris.
Our Take: "When Catch Me If You Claus" had a character introduce himself as “Bink Binkerson” (Stefan Keyes) within the first 10 minutes, it therein established the tone of the rest of the movie: silly, a little weird, and overall not taking itself too seriously. Because this tone is consistent throughout, I think "Catch Me If You Claus" works as a light and fun Christmas movie, in large part thanks to Ricci and Macfarlane’s chemistry and work leading the way as likable nepo babies struggling to prove themselves and make their own way in the shadow of their successful and well-known parents. Plus, there’s just something about thinking of Santa’s son as a nepo baby that really tickles me.
On the more negative side of things, the whole crime busting aspect of the movie was perhaps a little complicated at times and also I was kind of taken aback by how weirdly deep the movie got into Dayton, Ohio’s fictional local politics. There were also some confusing moments where characters like Hewitt Vance (Xavier Sotelo) were mentioned multiple times as if they were significant but we don’t even meet them until briefly at the end (or not at all). But even then, that’s not enough to stop "Catch Me If You Claus" from feeling like a success. Everyone in the movie committed to the bit and that’s what gives it heart.
Our Call: STREAM IT! It won’t rock your socks off but it has enough self-awareness, charm, and Christmastime campiness to be an enjoyable holiday watch.
--Reviewed By Maddy Casale, The Decider (https://www.decider.com/)
