Review by C.J. Bunce
Dashing Through the Snow stars rapper and Fast & Furious franchise star Ludacris as an unhappy but successful man, an Atlanta social worker currently separated from his wife with whom he shares a young daughter who loves Christmas. When his daughter Charlotte is left with him for Christmas Eve, they encounter a strange man in a nontraditional Santa Claus suit who says he’s THE Santa, played by comedian Lil Rel Howery (Free Guy, Luck, Get Out). Barbership and Shaft director Tim Story pulls back on the reins of your typical holiday film, grabbing some of the best tropes from Christmas movies past to forge the next holiday classic. The result is a worthy successor to Miracle on 34th Street with more Christmas spirit than Home Alone.
The framework is roughly that of Miracle on 34th Street. Ludacris’s social worker Eddie works with the police to help people, and in his first scene he saves a homeless man and gets him to a mission for care. He steps into the role of Natalie Wood’s mother in that 1947 film classic, dismissing everything about the Christmas holiday. But this time the daughter character, here played by a vibrant young Madison Skye Validum, doesn’t need convincing, and instead she’s a cheerleader for Howery’s very silly, goofy, and–yes–jolly, St. Nick.
St. Nick has work to do, after all Christmas Eve is his biggest work night of the year. But he eyes some odd activities by a not-so-merry trio of holiday-dressed ne’er do wells who are chasing Santa because they think he has something that may expose bad acts carried out by their boss. If it sounds like Home Alone, that’s because the villains of this movie (including a ringer for Cowboy Bebop’s Jet Black) are from the same bumbling bad guy league. For the good of the script they pretty much stay in the background so we can have more fun with the story’s leads.
The mix of slapstick (in a climactic Rocky-inspired throwdown), mildly crude humor (Howery’s Santa sweats glitter and his farts smell of cinnamon), and thoughtful writing (the underlying themes are all good stuff) pretty much measures up to the sweetest of perennial holiday film classics, thanks to writer Scott Rosenberg, known for his personal High Fidelity, his funny Jumanji reboot movies, and his action-packed superhero movie Venom. One smart bit hidden in the script may sail right past most viewers: Nick calls the reindeer “ladies,” an inside nod to the fact that only female reindeer have antlers in December, something Rankin and Bass never brought up. Straight man Ludacris and the happy-go-lucky Howery bring that brand of pairing that made Steve Martin and John Candy such a good team in the Thanksgiving classic, Planes, Trains, and Automobiles. Maybe after a few more viewings over the next few years, Dashing Through the Snow will get some staying power, too.
It really has it all. Composer Christopher Lennertz creates a great soundtrack complete with fresh and enticing renditions of holiday classics, like Nick singing “Run, Run, Rudolph” at a nightclub, a dark “Good King Wenceslaus” to cue dark things ahead, and Nick admiring snacks to a recurring theme from Tchaikovsky’s “The Nutcracker.” Run DMC’s “Christmas in Hollis” is well placed, too. C.S. Armstrong’s end credits tune “Santa, You’re Alright” is a snappy new song that should get season radio play. Plus viewers will never have seen Christmas costumes like this before. Veronica Mars costume designer Salvador Perez, Jr. brings an eye-popping mix of the traditional and the modern together with a new, bright, and fun palette of color and sparkle, especially with Nick and the designs worn by his team of “associates.”
Yesterday we discussed TCM’s Christmas at the Movies, which listed one person’s top 35 recommendations of films centered around the holiday. The genre is lacking in major, big-budget big studio films starring black actors, but two new films this season may be changing that. One is Eddie Murphy’s Candy Cane Lane, coming to Prime Video December 1. The other arrived this month on Disney+.
Howery’s snappy, syrup-filled dialogue will make you a believer. This Christmas movie is sure to exceed your expectations (I’ve watched it twice already). Catch Dashing Through the Snow now streaming on Disney+.
