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The movie is less ho-ho-ho than uh-oh, or oh-no.
There are some scattered big laughs and a sweet message here, so I'm giving it a mild recommendation.
As derivative and predictable as any of the holiday comedies of the past few years, providing audiences with at best a handful of laughs. Most of it is uninspired.
It senselessly dims an idea that should shine as brightly as Rudolph's nose.
A complete bust, derivative and uninspired, boring and dull, not funny, not moving and about a half hour too long.
Fred Claus turns out to be not bad for a Santa movie, which I suppose could be interpreted as either faint or excessive praise, depending on your view.
It's no improvement on Bad Santa, or National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation, for that matter.
Fred Claus will never go down in history as a holiday classic, or even one of Vaughn's better known films, but a sterling cast lifts up what could have been easy mediocrity.
Because of the PG rating, the comedy had to be somewhat clean, which crippled Vaughn's improv style.
Fred Claus may not be as funny or as instantly classic as Elf, but it's still a fun family holiday movie--one that didn't deserve the lambasting it took.
A turbulent ride that shifts tonal gears and messages like oscillations in the weather, ending in mythological frostbite.
Silly it is. Frenetic it is. Loud it is. Funny it's not. (Blu-ray Edition)
A feel-bad Christmas flick, not exactly the way anybody would want to kickoff the holiday season.
Vince Vaughn's famously rude Wedding Crasher gets macho with Ludacris as a m-igitalized feisty Santa elf, while huddling over the pint-sized urinals in the john with another, to clue him about North Pole dirty dancing and romance.
Fred Claus is not an entirely bad picture, but it is a decidedly bland one.
Vaughn's act may be toned down a bit, but he still plays the same fast-talking, quip-spouting arrogant schmuck that he usually does, and it wears thin real fast.
Rather than creating imaginative situations for Vaughn to explore, director David Dobkin merely asks that Vaughn be himself, as if his personality were big enough to wring humor out of a comic vacuum.
Unfortunately, this is a broad family comedy that depends on odd sound effects (zonks! splat!) during every scene...
Does it make me a Scrooge to suggest that this is one piece of holiday coal you should leave in your stocking?
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