A Wee Man's Christmas
Christmas has come to the Harper household, the first Christmas since the Harper children's mother died and they are just about getting by. But things become difficult for them when inventor Mr. Harper (Mackenzie Astin) is kidnapped by Mickey (Jeffrey Combs) and his gang leaving young Kasey (Carly Robell) and Ryan (Blake Kaiser) fearing they have lost their dad as well. Santa over hearing the wishes and fears of the Harper children sends down one of his elves (Jason 'Wee Man' Acuña) to help the children although the elf has no idea how he can help the children and get Mr. Harper back. But it seems that the children do and believe the wee elf has super powers and set about turning him in to Elf-Man a mini super hero.
When I spotted that Jason 'Wee Man' Acuña was the star of "Elf-Man" I thought this is going to be bad. And then when I realised that the second name on the list was Jeffrey Combs who starred in "Re-Animator" I was even more convinced that "Elf-Man" was going to be one mega misfiring Christmas movie. The good news is that "Elf-Man" is not the complete stinker I had expected it to be and some of it wasn't even half bad. But at the same time it is at best one of those modern Christmas movies made for children who might enjoy the daftness of it all but will leave grown ups wondering why they are letting their children watch it.
The thing about "Elf-Man" is that everything is telegraphed; when Mr. Harper walks in to the shop to buy his Christmas ham you can already guess that he is sweet on the woman assistant by his nervousness and when the elf sits precariously on the back of Santa's sleigh of course he is going to fall off. I could go on but as I said this is one of those Christmas movies where everything is telegraphed right down to Wee Man taking numerous tumbles from falling down stairs to flying through a window and in a way that is part of what the movie is about, Wee Man and the stupid stunts.
What this all boils down to is that "Elf Man" despite starring Jason 'Wee Man' Acuña and Jeffrey Combs is aimed at the younger crowd who won't care that it is ridiculously daft or telegraphed from start to finish. And whilst young children won't learn anything from this movie the daftness of inept criminals and various pratfalls should keep them amused.
Tags: Christmas Movies
