92% Arthur Christmas

All Critics (124) | Top Critics (29) | Fresh (114) | Rotten (10)

It's as bright and twinkling as a Christmas tree, decked with warmth and humor.

It's busy but buoyant, and it honors the tradition of giving with wit and style.

The action is swift and witty, and the 3-D effects are imaginative and not simply tacked on as with so many animated movies these days.

With a clever script that successfully updates many Christmas myths and dialogue that crackles with sophisticated wit, this movie offers the kind of pre-holiday experience that parents and children alike will appreciate.

Everything you see in Arthur Christmas is fashioned in the service of telling a story ... brilliantly

The results are not only funny and fresh, but represent a new way of tackling the whole yuletide paradigm: Santa as a high-tech hereditary monarchy.

Arthur may not be perfect, but he cares. The same can be said for the film. 'Arthur Christmas' is full of just enough holiday cheer.

The opening sequence, establishing the methodology of Santa and his army of elves, is a bit frantic, especially in 3-D, but once the story-proper begins the staging and timing are right on the money.

Arthur Christmas manages to deliver some holiday cheer.

What is most surprising about Arthur Christmas is not that it is beautifully animated... but that it is, legitimately, one of 2011's funniest comedies.

A very pleasant -- if hardly overwhelmingly great -- animated Christmas fantasy with at least two inspired choices for voice casting.

A charming and inventive exploration of the mysterious workings of Santa, his sons and his elves. This animated tale is sure to be popular for Christmases to come.

There's some great stuff here... What's missing is the delightful Britishness of Nick Park's films.

A fairly inventive Christmas movie that might get lost in the current glut of family movies

The film does have a nice ending. It just takes a little too long to get there.

The holiday season is an emotional rollercoaster for many reasons and Arthur Christmas does a neat job of exploring many of them while still being both heart-warming and wonderfully entertaining

The best Christmas movies have a kind of humility about them that's lacking here ...

A scene in which zebras, elephants and other African animals float like balloons in the air after an accidental dusting of Santa's flying-reindeer magic is close to surreal poetry.

'Arthur Christmas' gets off to a terrific start by letting inquisitive viewers know how the guy in the red suit manages to get all those toys to two billion kids on a single evening.

Arthur Christmas an early holiday gift.

The under-10 audience I saw it with were entranced, and, remarkably enough by itself, so were their parents. Huzzah, Aardman!

Here's hoping this becomes another family Christmas classic deserves. A veddy British take on the "monarchy" of Santa, this is an inventive, sweet-natured adventure about the importance of delivering a gift to the one child who was missed by Santa.

...a disappointing Christmas movie that never quite comes together. There just isn't enough Christmas cheer.

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Source: http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/arthur_christmas/

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