Best Christmas movie of recent years quietly streaming on Netflix

Stephen Porzio

Boasting a 95% score on Rotten Tomatoes, the cast includes an Oscar-winner who recently played Santa in another big film, as well as Norm Macdonald and Rashida Jones.

Once again, it’s that special time of the year when we all start discussing our favourite Christmas movies.

As always, it’s the same contenders: Elf, Home Alone and It’s a Wonderful Life.

This is as people get into the same old tired debates about the quality of Love Actually (a mixed bag, but the Emma Thompson section makes the rest worth it) or whether Die Hard is a Christmas film (of course it is).

Alas, I digress because the point of this article is to highlight a Christmas movie quietly streaming on Netflix that is certainly the best in recent years and maybe one of the best of all time.

This is Klaus, the 2019 animated flick co-written and directed by Sergio Pablos – who created the Despicable Me franchise.

His directorial debut essentially serves as an alternative origin story for the figure of Santa Claus and all the traditions associated with him.

It centres around Jesper (Jason Schwartzman), a spoiled young man in 19th-century Norway – who is the son of the Royal Postmaster General.

Feeling that Jesper needs some maturity and life skills, his father assigns him to be the postman for the distant, northern island town of Smeerenburg.

His task: establish a post office there and post 6,000 letters within a year.

The Royal Postmaster General also says that if Jasper fails, he will be cut off from the family’s fortune.

Much to Jesper’s dismay, he finds Smeerensburg to be an underdeveloped, almost lawless place – comprised nearly entirely of two feuding familial clans, who are too busy fighting to send mail.

Feeling hopeless, one day out on his rounds, the young postman is startled by an elderly, imposing, reclusive woodsman and amateur toy maker named Klaus (Oscar-winner J.K. Simmons, embodying a very different variation on the same character he recently played in Red One).

Fleeing from the recluse, Jasper accidentally leaves a drawing given to him by a local child with Klaus, who later sends one of his toys to the child.

Soon enough, all the children of Smeerenburg start posting letters to the woodsman – giving Jasper a fresh chance to return to his privileged life.

Klaus is a perfect Christmas film for the entire family for two main reasons.

For one, its screenplay is genius – starting off by telling a story about a hilariously pampered self-entitled buffoon before ripping him from his comforts and placing him in a humbling scenario that teaches him about what’s really important – friendship, kindness, and community.

In the midst of all this, writers Pablos, Jim Mahoney and Zach Lewis inventively and elegantly weave into the story more and more elements of the Santa mythos.

And each time they do so, the audience is left beaming with joy – because of how unexpected, clever and heartfelt it all feels.

Without spoiling, the best example of this is the incredible final moments, which are truly transcendingly beautiful.

Yet, while this might all sound too cloying or saccharine, Klaus has more than enough to entertain more stone-faced or cynical viewers.

The amount of the movie Jasper acts like a selfish jerk is genuinely impressive for how much you completely accept his redemptive arc.

It’s the same case for Klaus’ transition from a quiet stoic man filled with pain – something Simmons does brilliant work conveying through limited dialogue – to the idea of Santa that we all know and love.

In fact, the cast is all excellent. As always, Schwartzman makes for a lively presence and he’s backed up by punchy supporting performances by actors all with really great voices, including Joan Cusack and Rashida Jones.

However, the real standout is the late comedian Norm Macdonald in one of his final film roles as Mogens, the wry and sarcastic ferryman for Smeerensburg who winds up being Jasper’s guide to his new settlement.

Macdonald’s presence and Mogens’ mocking commentary of Jasper’s predicament at the start of the story provide Klaus with a slightly edgier comic tone, which also helps it appeal to both adults and children.

It’s all this, along with the vibrant animation style that blends an older textured look with more modern kineticism, that led to Klaus earning rave reviews and even securing an Oscar nomination for Best Animated Feature.

And yet, it still feels underrepresented in best Christmas movie ever lists. Because if there is one film in recent years that captures that particular wonder of the festive season, it’s Klaus.