| Santa Claus Is Comin' to Town | |
|---|---|
| Genre | Animated Musical |
| Directed by | Jules Bass Arthur Rankin Jr. |
| Produced by | Jules Bass Arthur Rankin Jr. |
| Written by | Romeo Muller |
| Starring | Fred Astaire Mickey Rooney Keenan Wynn Paul Frees Joan Gardner Robie Lester |
| Music by | Maury Laws |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Original channel | ABC |
| Release date | December 14, 1970 |
| Running time | 51 mins |
| Followed by | The Year Without a Santa Claus |
Santa Claus Is Comin' to Town is a 1970 stop motion television special, made by Rankin-Bass with models carved from wood (as with most Rankin-Bass specials). The film stars actor Fred Astaire as S.D. Kluger, the narrator, and Mickey Rooney as Kris Kringle/Santa Claus (a role which he would frequently play later on). The film tells the story of how Santa Claus and several Claus-related Christmas traditions came to be. It is based on the hit Christmas song "of the same name", which was introduced on radio by Eddie Cantor in 1934. The film is also believed to be inspired by Saint Nicholas.
Contents |
Special Delivery "S.D." Kluger (voiced by Fred Astaire) is introduced. His mail truck breaks down, so he begins to tell the story of Santa Claus, in order to answer children's letters to Santa.
The story begins in a gloomy small town called Sombertown, which is ruled by the grouchy, ill-tempered, child-hating Burgermeister Meisterburger (voiced by Paul Frees). A baby arrives on his doorstep, with a name tag reading "Claus" and note requesting that Burgermeister raise the child as his own. However, Burgermeister angrly orders his right-hand man, Grimsby (also voiced by Paul Frees) to take the baby to the "Orphan Asylum." On the way there, a gust of wind blows both sled and baby far away, to the mountains of the Whispering Winds. There, the animals hide him from the Winter Warlock (voiced by Keenan Wynn), a powerful wizard who dislikes anyone trespassing his land. They bring the baby to the other side of the mountain, where he is found by an elf family by the name of Kringle, led by Tante Kringle. They adopt him, naming him “Kris.” A few years later, Kris hopes that he can one day restore the Kringle family as "The First Toymakers to the King." However, the fact that the Kringles can't pass the mountains without coming across the Winter Warlock has kept them from doing so.
When Kris is old enough, he volunteers to deliver the toys to Sombertown. Meanwhile, the Burgermeister has outlawed all toys in the town, having being injured by tripping over a toy duck while walking out of City Hall. He declares that anyone found possessing a toy will be arrested and thrown in the dungeon. Before Kris makes it into the town, he meets a lost penguin (a rhinoceros in early scripts) who he names "Topper" (originally known as "Waddles"). Once Kris enters the town, he meets two children washing their stocking by a water fountain before Kris could give the children the Kringle made toys he is stopped by Miss Jessica (voiced by Robie Lester), a schoolteacher. She is at first rude to Kris, but likes him when he offers her a China doll to shut her up. However, the other townspeople are even frightened by Kris saying "toy" and are questioning him about the "clothes" that he was wearing. The children of the town have been put into labor, mostly washing their stockings. Kris decides to change that and begins handing out toys. Just then, the Burgermeister arrives. Seeing the children playing with the toys He almost arrests the children but Kris confesses it was he that gave them the toys. He tries presenting the Burgermeister with a Yo-yo in which the Burgermeister happily played while recalling when as a child the he was the Yo-yo Ace loving to do tricks with his Yo-yo, only for Grimsby to remind him that he's breaking his own law. Kris barely manages to escape the Burgermeister's forces.
As Kris and Topper pass through the forest, the Winter Warlock's magic trees capture Kris and Topper. Kris tries to get out of trouble by offering the warlock one of his toys. He gives him a toy train, and melts the warlock's evil icy heart. Touched by this act of kindness, the warlock, now wanting to call himself Winter, turns to human form and befriends Kris. To repay him, Winter shows Kris how to make a magic snow globe, showing that Jessica is searching for him. Kris finds Jessica , who informs him that the Burgermeister destroyed all of the toys and the children now request new ones. Kris becomes burdened every night with the ever increasing demands, while the Burgermeister implements harsher measures to ensure that he does not succeed. When Burgermeister hears that Kris is going to bring more toys, he orders all doors to be locked, before their houses searched. Kris then uses the chimneys to get inside. The children to hang their stockings by the fireplace to bluff the Burgermeister so he thinks that the stockings wre being dried in front of the fireplace but as a sign to Kris so he could put their gifts inside, so that Burgermeister can't find them. Growing frustrated with his inability to stop Kris, the Burgermeister sets a trap for him as he makes another delivery, as well as jails the Kringles, Topper and Winter. Jessica pleas to the Burgermeister to release Kris, the Kringle clan, and Winter but her pleas fall on deaf ears. Realising now that all of Sombertown and the Burgermeister are against her, Jessica visits the dungeon. She tries pleading Winter to use his magic to break everyone out, but the old warlock despondently feels that he has no more magic left except for a few items, including magic feed corn, but it can only make reindeer fly. Jessica gives Kris's reindeer friends some feed corn, and with the help of the flying deer, the Kringles, Kris, Topper, and Winter escape.
After having spent months of being an outlaw and discovering that their home was destroyed by the Burgermeister troops, Kris returns to the woods, where he since he's a full fledge Kringle grows a beard as a disguise. Tante suggests that he return to his real birth name "Claus" for safety. Kris asks Jessica to share the name Claus with him, as his wife. After the marriage, the group travels to the North Pole, where they eventually build Santa Claus's Castle and Workshop. Eventually, the Burgermeister regime ends after the Burgermeister's death and everyone realizes how silly his laws were. Kris' legend goes worldwide, and, having now become Santa Claus, he realizes that he cannot keep up with all the toy requests. This leads him to his decision to visit just once a year, on December 24 Christmas Eve "The Night of Profound Love".
The film ends as S.D. Kluger reflects on what Santa's real meaning is all about even though there are a few misguided people who do not understand what the real meaning is (like an Ebeneezer Scrooge-like man, a CEO Businessman, a Department Store Worker). Just then, though, S.D. remembers that he still has a load of letters to deliver to Santa. Then, joined by Topper, Winter The Kringle Bros,and a parade of children from the town once known as Sombertown, S.D. begins to sing "Santa Claus Is Coming to Town". The film's closing scene has Kris and Jessica in silhouette, as he puts his old hat back on his head. Then, Santa steps out of his Palace, revealing himself in full splendor as the children calls out "Merry Christmas" to Kris/Santa.
Santa Claus Is Coming to Town was created using stop motion animation called "Animagic". All of the creatures and people were made out of wood and plastic and animated one frame at a time.
Beginning in 1989, the special has been released numerous times on VHS and DVD. VHS release dates include 1989, 1993, 1998, and 2001. DVD dates include 9/6/05 including a CD single of Mariah Carey performing the title song, and most recently, 9/4/07. The special is available as an individual title, or as part of a box set including other famous Rankin-Bass Christmas titles. On October 12 2010, the special was released on Blu-ray Disc as part of a box set including Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, Frosty the Snowman, and Frosty Returns.
Released by Rhino on October 1, 2002, the entire audio portion of Santa Claus Is Coming to Town is available on CD along with the entire audio portion of Frosty the Snowman, the Rankin-Bass special produced the previous year in 1969. This edition contains the full dialogue and song audio of both specials.
The tracklisting is as follows: