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Arthur (voiced by James McAvoy) and Steve (voiced by Hugh Laurie) in ARTHUR CHRISTMAS, an animated film produced by Aardman Animation for Sony Pictures Animation. Photo By: Courtesy of Aardman Animations for Sony Pictures Animation. Copyright: © 2011 CTMG, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Arthur Christmas (2011)

Opened: 11/23/2011 Wide

Trailer: Click for trailer

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Genre: Animated

Rated: PG for some mild rude humor.

Synopsis

The 3D, CG-animated family comedy Arthur Christmas, an Aardman production for Sony Pictures Animation, at last reveals the incredible, never-before-seen answer to every child's question: "So how does Santa deliver all those presents in one night?" The answer: Santa's exhilarating, ultra-high-tech operation hidden beneath the North Pole. But at the heart of the film is a story with the ingredients of a Christmas classic -- a family in a state of comic dysfunction and an unlikely hero: Santa's youngest son, Arthur. When this amazing operation misses one child out of hundreds of millions, Arthur, the least capable Claus, embarks on a hilarious, exciting rogue mission against the clock with his politically incorrect grandfather Grandsanta and a giftwrapping-obsessed elf named Bryony, to deliver the last present before Christmas morning dawns.

Columbia Pictures and Sony Pictures Animation present an Aardman production, Arthur Christmas. Starring the voice performances of James McAvoy, Hugh Laurie, Bill Nighy, Jim Broadbent, Imelda Staunton, and Ashley Jensen. Directed by Sarah Smith. Produced by Peter Lord, David Sproxton, Carla Shelley, and Steve Pegram. Written by Peter Baynham & Sarah Smith. Co-Producer is Chris Juen. Co-Executive Producer is Peter Baynham. Co-Director is Barry Cook. Music by Harry Gregson-Williams.

The film includes the song "Santa Claus Is Comin' To Town" by Justin Bieber from his new album "Under The Mistletoe" (featuring the new single "Mistletoe").

How Does Santa Do It?

Imagine a city under a starlit sky. It's Christmas Eve, and the children are nestled in their beds, dreaming of Santa on his sleigh pulled by eight beautiful reindeer. Suddenly, a shadow comes over the city. A million pinpricks of light. A million figures descend. The invasion has begun and there's not a jingle bell to be heard...

...but don't panic. This is how Santa gets the job done every Christmas: with a huge, mile-wide, state-of-the-art sleigh with stealth cloaking technology, and a million elves, working in precision teams of three, who have 18.14 seconds to get into each house, deliver the presents, and move on to the next one.

Santa Claus is coming to town, but this time, he's not coming down the chimney.

"They have all the technology in the world and no expense is spared," says Sarah Smith, who directs and co-wrote Arthur Christmas, the new 3D, CG-animated film from Aardman for Columbia Pictures and Sony Pictures Animation. "This movie reveals what their equipment looks like and how they do it."

Arthur Christmas is Sony Pictures Animation's first film collaboration with Aardman, the landmark animation company best-known for their award-winning and crowd-pleasing stop-motion films Chicken Run and Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit. The winners of over 400 international awards, including four Oscars® (three for Best Animated Short Film, and one for Best Animated Feature Film for Were-Rabbit), Aardman delivers their second CG-animated project with Arthur Christmas, and takes on an ambitious subject: the delivery of two billion presents in one night.

At the top of the organization is the man himself, Santa -- but these days, he's more of a figurehead facing the prospect of retirement. Arthur Christmas has a second incredible secret to reveal: the Clauses are a dynasty, a long line of Santas stretching back over 1,000 years! Running the day-to-day is Santa's firstborn son, Steve -- an alpha male, the next in line to wear the red suit. Santa's own dad, Grandsanta, used to wear that suit -- and he'll grumble to anyone that he wore it best -- but he's long since been put out to pasture, along with his lovely old sleigh, "Eve." Mrs. Santa, the North Pole's highly capable First Lady, keeps the home fires burning -- in between opening elf hospitals, negotiating treaties with Greenland, completing online degrees, and stirring the Christmas Day gravy.

And then there's Arthur, Santa's youngest son.

"Arthur believes in Christmas, and not just because he's been born into the family business," says James McAvoy, who voices Arthur. "He believes it in his soul -- there's nobody else in the world who cares about Christmas more than Arthur."

However, love of the holiday only counts for so much. Not the most practical Claus in history, Arthur's struggled in just about every job his father's placed him in -- even ordinary tasks, from wrapping to maintenance. Yet, as the story begins, he's finally in a position he loves: in the Letters to Santa Department, where he revels in the hope of countless children -- not just asking for presents, but sending gifts and drawings and asking questions about how it's all done.

Arthur is the unlikeliest hero--that is, until he discovers a single child's present wasn't delivered and he takes the reins to deliver the one last present the old-fashioned way

Arthur finds an ally in his grandfather, Grandsanta, who has his own reasons for wanting to go on the mission. "Grandsanta is cranky and a nuisance, but he and Arthur share something: an uncomplicated, deep, and profound commitment and enthusiasm for the idea of Christmas," says Bill Nighy, who voices the role. "He's the only one who can truly help Arthur."

Grandsanta isn't interested in saving Christmas just because it's the right thing to do -- it's also a chance for the crotchety old codger to show his family that the old way of doing things is truly best by using the old sleigh. But even Grandsanta has a chance to come around: "I like that he starts one way and finishes another. All of his impulses in the early part of the movie are unattractive, but he is rehabilitated by events," says Nighy.

Hugh Laurie joins the cast as Steve. "Hugh is marvelous as Steve," says Smith. "The character is incredibly cool and slightly in love with himself -- the kind of character that just doesn't quite get it. But Hugh completely gets it, and gave us a beautiful and funny performance."

"Steve isn't the head of the operation. As part of the Claus family, he plays a subordinate Claus," says Laurie. "But that is a terrible joke, unforgiveable, and if you use that, I will sue."

The film is directed by Sarah Smith and written by Peter Baynham & Sarah Smith. "Pete is one of my oldest friends and collaborators," says Smith. Not long after Smith started work at Aardman developing a new slate of films, "He rang me up and said, 'I think I've had one of the best ideas I've ever had -- and he pitched me the idea for Arthur Christmas. I loved it from the beginning. It's a big, emotional, funny story -- my favorite."

"I'd started to wonder how Santa actually does it," says Baynham, whose many credits (including co-writing Borat) have earned him a BAFTA TV Award and an Oscar® nomination. "What does he get around in? Presumably something bigger than a sleigh pulled by eight reindeer. How come, with all our radar and satellites, we don't see him? This felt like a very exciting world for a movie. But I'm always drawn to comedy; so then came the notion of what if Santa had a son as utterly impractical as me, massively into the magic of Christmas, but who you don't really want pressing any buttons, especially in such a high-tech operation."

For producer Peter Lord, one of the founders of Aardman, the idea hit home immediately. "You get a thousand ideas a year, and you're waiting for the one that means something to you -- the one that really works," he says. "This was that idea."

"When Aardman first pitched the story, we always saw it as such a big idea," recalls Bob Osher, president of Sony Pictures Digital Productions, who, as the senior animation executive at the studio, was a frequent visitor to Aardman's Bristol base. "This was something that had the potential to bring the wonderful Aardman appeal to a wide audience."

"It really appealed to us at Aardman because it was that big, simple idea, with broad appeal -- but what we loved about it was the humor and the characters," says Carla Shelley, a producer of the film. "It felt very Aardman -- the characters are slightly flawed, not quite perfect."

"The movie is really funny and very clever -- in just the way that all Aardman material is," McAvoy continues. "It's ingenious, inventive, irreverent, different, and funny -- I suppose that's what drew all of us to do it."

For Smith and Baynham, half the fun of writing the screenplay was working out the math of Santa's operation -- and of Arthur's heroic mission. "Once you start working out how Santa does what he does, it's madness," says Baynham. "You start thinking, well, he'd have to start at the southern tip of New Zealand and then zigzag around the world to do it in twelve hours. We got into a big argument about time zones and whether Santa could fly into daylight and then back into darkness. The idea that the elves have exactly 18.14 seconds per household is based on calculations we did."

"We had to figure out how many children there are in the world, how many presents they'd get, how long it would take to travel," Smith continues. "Then we researched the distance between all of the places that Arthur and Grandsanta fly to. We worked out how fast the sleigh would need to fly with eight reindeer for Grandsanta to get around the world back in the day. Then what happens if they lose a reindeer -- now how fast do they fly?"

"They did all of this research for the logistics of the story, and we found little ways to incorporate it," says Alan Short, senior supervising animator. "We made a timeline, a chart, of what happens throughout the film and when. Whenever you see a clock in the movie, we figured out what time should be on that clock, so it all fits together chronologically."

But don't worry -- there won't be a quiz. Smith and Baynham crunched the numbers so you don't have to. Instead, they hope that the audience focuses on what really matters: the heart of the story. "The biggest principle Pete and I worked by when we were writing the movie was that we wanted to feel the emotion ourselves, the truthfulness of it," says Smith. "It was important to us not to borrow the emotion, but to have it come from a real place. And because the movie has our genuine emotions in it, the final result is a film that is very special to us."

"We start by asking: 'How does Santa do it?'" adds Baynham. "But as the story progresses, the issue isn't so much how, but why."

About the Characters

Arthur (James McAvoy)

"Santa's my dad!" Despite living in a world devoted year-round to the business of Christmas, Arthur LOVES everything to do with the season. He is especially passionate about what Santa -- who he adores as both dad and figurehead -- means to children, whose identities sometimes get lost in the huge logistics of the operation. Trouble is, in the ultra-efficient, high-tech delivery operation of Christmas, Santa's youngest son is a spare part. Allergic to snow and suffering from a fear of heights, reindeer, and high-speed travel, Arthur isn't exactly a natural Claus. The family loves him -- but has never quite known what to do with him. And although Arthur's office in the Letters Department is a chaotic mess of snow globes and pictures of Santa, it's a magical little corner where Arthur alone revels in the joy of it all. In Santa he believes.

"Arthur reads every single letter that comes to the North Pole, because he believes that every child deserves to receive a present at Christmastime," says James McAvoy, who voices the role. "You know, he's relegated to the mailroom, because he's caused a lot of accidents at the North Pole, but it's just perfect for him -- he gets to read these letters about the importance and the essence of Christmas, every second of every day."

"Arthur cannot bear the idea of a kid waking up on Christmas morning and finding out that Santa didn't come," says Smith. "Arthur sees the world through that kid's eyes -- it would be the end of the world."

"Arthur is a fanboy and a workhorse for Christmas," McAvoy continues. "He wouldn't want to do anything else -- he lives for Christmas. It's exciting to play somebody that fulfilled because you get to keep increasing the energy, as the character tries to maintain that fulfillment."

Steve (Hugh Laurie)

"Christmas isn't a time for emotion." Santa's oldest son Steve is the hereditary heir to the Claus reign. He's extremely qualified for the job, having introduced high-tech efficiency, military-style precision and the S-1: a mile-wide, invisible sleighship. Steve has dreamed of being Santa all his life; he's even redesigned the Santa suit into something more akin to Versace than Saint Nick. But Steve might still have a little catching up to do in the heart department.

"For Steve, running Christmas is the biggest challenge he could ask for," says Smith. "It's like he's running FedEx, UPS, and an army, all at once. But he's frustrated, because he can't take what he sees as his rightful place as Santa Claus."

"Steve takes himself a bit too seriously -- he's sort of laughable at times, because he gets it so wrong," says Laurie, "But we all do that from time to time. He's a very confident fellow who has plans for modernizing and updating the operation -- he's looking to run a state-of-the-art Christmas and he's impatient with the softer, fluffier sides of the holiday. He's driven to maximize the gift-giving. He might not have all the social skills you'd want in a boss, but he's just doing things the way he thinks they ought to be done."

Grandsanta (Bill Nighy)

"I could still do it now! And I wouldn't need a trillion elves in bleepy hats." Santa's father but also the previous Santa Claus, Grandsanta, now 136, is the archetypal old codger who complains constantly that "Things were better in my day," when he used to go out in a lovely red sleigh pulled by eight beautiful reindeer. Frail old Grandsanta may have been put out to pasture, but he's still a proud man who has never fully adjusted to retirement. Arthur's mission just might be the thing to pull him back in for one more go.

"Arthur and Grandsanta share something special," says Bill Nighy, "an uncomplicated, and undamaged enthusiasm, a deep, profound commitment and enthusiasm for the idea of Christmas. It's a tender relationship, and, ultimately, a successful and important one for them both."

Grandsanta is stuck in his ways, but Nighy says that he sees the character's point of view. "Gransanta doesn't reject the 'new, improved' Christmas out of nostalgia -- it's because he quite properly considers it to be an inferior way of going about things. He doesn't consider what's happened to Christmas, technologically speaking, to be a progression of any kind."

Santa (Jim Broadbent)

Ever think your dad works long hours? Spare a thought for Santa. A big, jolly, white-bearded man in a red suit, Santa Claus (the 20th in the line) is every inch the hero of children's Christmas dreams. However, in recent years, as the operation has grown more complicated, he's become more of a figurehead. He still delivers the presents as the General of his vast army of elves, but it's Steve who coordinates it all, even if dad seems a little oblivious to that fact.

"Santa has been running the show for the past 70 years -- he is Santa as we know and love him," says Jim Broadbent. "It's a great honor to be asked to play him. I didn't feel worthy of the responsibility, but I took it on with humility and excitement."

"Santa loves being Santa," says Smith. "He's the most adored man in the world -- he's spent years and years being utterly beloved by children." At the same time, he is a man of conflicting emotions. "He's very tired. He's been Santa for a long time, his every move is monitored by Mission Control. But he's terrified of retiring -- he's been Santa for so long, what would he do if he wasn't Santa anymore?"

Finding the character's voice, Broadbent says, began with seeing a drawing of the character. "You get the image, and then you find the voice from the image," he explains. "It was quite easy to imagine a voice to fit such a detailed and inspiring model."

Mrs. Santa (Imelda Staunton)

Like the wives of most world leaders, Mrs. Santa is a highly intelligent, capable, caring woman forced to exist in her husband's shadow while quietly running a huge amount behind the scenes. But when it comes to the crucial moment when Santa has to step up and go back out into the world in order to do the right thing, it's Mrs. Santa who takes charge, using knowledge gleaned from decades of reading, studying, and taking internet classes in everything from global navigation to flying a microlight aircraft.

Smith says, "Mrs. Santa is a bit like the First Lady. She has to let the men run it -- but behind the scenes, she keeps a lot of things in good running order. She's the power behind the throne."

"Mrs. Santa is the one who keeps everyone together and keeps everyone organized," says Imelda Staunton, who voices the role. "She is like most women -- not seeming to run everything, but in fact running everything."

Santa is getting to that age where he's thinking about retirement -- an idea that Mrs. Santa fully supports. "What she'd really love is for Father Christmas to be at home a couple of Christmases, which is rather sweet," says Staunton.

Staunton previously teamed with Aardman on their first feature film, Chicken Run, and takes on a third role in their next film, The Pirates! Band of Misfits. Not only that, but Staunton was the inspiration for the character of Mrs. Santa in Arthur Christmas, even before she was cast in the role. Of course, the admiration is mutual. "When it's anything to do with Aardman, whether it's one word or 10,000, you say yes," she says. "Who isn't a fan of theirs? I feel lucky to be a part of it."

Bryony (Ashley Jensen)

Bryony Shelfley, Wrapping Operative Grade Three, is an elf, a lowly member of Santa's Giftwrap Battalion. A loyal if somewhat manic footsoldier, she is utterly obsessed with her job and can list every one of the 118 types of ribbon bow. But all elves live for the chance to go out in the world in the service of children, and Bryony is no exception. So when the opportunity arises for Bryony to join Arthur and Grandsanta's rogue mission to deliver the last present, there's no holding her back.

"She's a feisty little worker -- she loves rules and a little bit of order," says Ashley Jensen, best known for her award-winning work on "Extras" and "Ugly Betty." "She is very excited to be part of Arthur's mission to deliver the final present. She's like a good, well-behaved child; she obeys and does what she's told, and if there's any deviation from routine, she goes into a bit of a panic."

For her inspiration for the role, Jensen didn't have to look too far. "We knew that because she's an elf, she'd have a small voice -- like a small child," she says. "I often look at my child and go, 'Here, listen to this tiny voice box.' I think my son really did influence this character. It's like having my own wee elf in the house."