Originally published at National Catholic Register
‘Red One’ reimagines Santa Claus as a no-nonsense action hero but stumbles with excessive vulgarity.
Nearly universally panned, I thought Red One was an entertaining movie. It might offer a hearty serving of cheese now and again but not as much as most other secular Christmas movies.
To be clear, the film is a secularist fantasy, though it has Christian highlights. For example, Santa Claus is constantly referred to as “St. Nick” throughout the movie. Red One’s St. Nick was not portrayed as the warm and gentle grandfatherly type. Rather, he was remade as exactly the type that would punch out the heretical Arius — the original naughty-lister — at the Council of Nicaea. St. Nick is calm and laidback but serious and focused on his task to bring presents to all of the good kids in the world all within a single night.
I was also pleased with the quick drone shot of Brazil’s Christ the Redeemer statue, which served to remind the audience of the “reason for the season.”
Santa One managed to create a workable and engaging mélange of action, spy thriller and Santa mythology reworked for the modern era. The movie’s producers successfully combined a
