Arthur Christmas

Synopsis
Aardman Features and Sony Pictures Imageworks imagines what the inside of Santa's workshop looks like in this CG-animated family comedy. Peter Baynham and Sarah Smith provide the screenplay, with Smith and Barry Cook taking on co-directing duties.

Reviews
3 stars out of 5 -- "[L]ively and amusing....ARTHUR is at its best during a world tour that takes McAvoy, his granddad and their sleigh from Toronto to the Serengeti." (Total Film)

"What makes ARTHUR sing is that it plays as much like a family comedy as a holiday film." (USA Today)

"[A] tender and upbeat spirit informs the writing and the execution." (Los Angeles Times)

3 stars out of 4 -- "[A] worthy addition to the Christmas movie canon. It's funny and good-looking, with an impeccable voice cast of U.K. actors." (Washington Post)

3 stars out of 5 -- "Animation here is top notch....It does have a secret weapon in its stellar, mostly British voice cast lead by McAvoy who brings a nice sense of sweetness and sincerity to his likeable goofball Arthur." (Box Office)

"[A]n endlessly amusing 3D, CG-animated Yuletide romp with lively innovation at every turn and a dream voice cast headed by James McAvoy, Hugh Laurie and Bill Nighy." (Hollywood Reporter)

"[T]his scrappy, smart animated tale can hold its own against the rest of the genre....The script by Peter Baynham and Sarah Smith has plenty of sly jokes for grown-ups." (New York Times)

"[W]ith an avalanche of charm, wit, and enlivening, highly oxygenated performances....[A] fleet, sweet-natured film." (Movieline)

"[It] strikes just the right combination of naughty and nice, reverent and irrelevant, holiday-sweet and Aardman dry." -- Grade: B+ (A.V. Club)

"[It's] genuinely sweet, and the complicated relations among Santa's clan are surprisingly believable." -- Grade: B+ (Entertainment Weekly)