Product Details

• Actors: Norm MacDonald, Emma Roberts
• Directors: Michael Hegner, Kari Juusonen
• Format: Color, Full Screen, Subtitled, NTSC
• Language: English
• Subtitles: English, Spanish
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Number of discs: 1
• Rating: G (General Audience)
• Studio: Weinstein Company
• DVD Release Date: October 28, 2008
• Run Time: 81 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B001B3LIRE
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #19,385 in Movies & TV (See Bestsellers in Movies & TV)
• For more information about "The Flight Before Christmas" visit the Internet Movie Database (IMDb)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

A reindeer boy named Niko dreams about flying like his father, whom he has never met. Despite suffering from severe vertigo, he sneaks out of his home valley to take flying lessons from Julius, a rare member of a Finnish family of flying squirrels.

Stills from The Flight Before Christmas (Click for larger image)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good European animation -- for older kids and grown-ups, December 14, 2008

By	Rowana - See all my reviews

When this popped up on CBS TV the other night, I started watching it, and the first thing I thought was "This is not an American-made film." For one thing, it's fairly densely plotted and has a much more complex and dark storyline than a U.S. cartoon would have. Sure enough, although CBS zipped through the ending credits almost too quickly to read them, I saw that it was made in Finland. That explains it! The night I watched, it followed on the heels of the awful 1996 "The Return of Frosty" cartoon, which made the Finnish production seem that much more intelligent.

As a grown-up viewer, I thoroughly enjoyed the story -- a young reindeer searching for his father, whom he believes to be one of Santa's heroic flying squadron. The youngster is helped along his way by a fatherly, protective flying squirrel and a female ermine/weasel (?) who warbles pop tunes like an American Idol contestant. There's also a pink French poodle who appears suddenly and disappears mysteriously once her plotline is over (what becomes of her??). Yes, there are implications of reindeer one-night stands (how very Scandinavian of them!), and Niko's real dad turns out to have, shall we say, commitment issues (many kids will relate, I'm afraid). And there are some scary wolf villains -- but really, no scarier than the hyenas in "The Lion King," which this production seems to channel (one could say "copy" if one were ungenerous) more often than not. The digital character animation looks a bit clunky, with giant grinning amorphous faces that too often really look computerized -- but the backgrounds and landscapes are quite lovely. There are shots of the Scandinavian forest with the aurora borealis overhead that are very memorable. The musical score recalls Howard Shore's "Lord of the Rings" and almost seems a bit too grand for the room. But this is an hour-long cartoon that is really trying to be quite epic in its story and scope, and I think it's the first Finnish production (that I can recall, anyway) to make it to the U.S. TV market in such a big way (major network broadcast).

As for the scare factor of the big bad wolves -- really, can ANYTHING be scarier than the classic 1939 "Wizard of Oz"?? "Oz" gave me tornado and flying-monkey nightmares for years as a kid, but I loved it and watched it whenever it was on. I think a few good TV scares never hurt any child! Classic Brothers Grimm and Hans Christian Andersen fairy tales are chock-full of scary and often quite violent situations; even the best Disney films (like "Lion King") are full of scares and sadness. I give the Finns points for offering a little darkness and scare factor, and not serving up sugary holiday syrup like "Frosty Returns" (or even the original 1960s "Frosty the Snowman," which also preceded "Flight Before Christmas" the other night -- yup, it may be a beloved classic, but wow, it's so sweet it makes your teeth hurt!).

So, yes, I recommend "The Flight Before Christmas" -- a Finnish production that is a quite worthy and surprisingly intelligent entry into the annual holiday animation derby.

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Flight Before Christmas: More Enjoyable Than Rudolph, December 12, 2008

By	Rani Clark "the_poet" - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I liked this film, I thought it was better than Rudolph the red nosed reindeer. It had a great moral at the end: no matter if the person in your life is your real parent, it just matters that they care. Niko was a cute little reindeer, I loved the animation and I thought it was far better than a movie about a red nosed reindeer whom no one liked until he became useful to them. I watched it on television though, so some of it was cut out because it was edited for the time alloted but I want to see it on DVD, I really enjoyed it. I don't agree with the G rating though, I thought it was more of a PG movie. They disguised the more mature themes through colorful dialogue and I think that's why they got away with a G rating. But all in all it was worth watching and I wouldn't mind seeing it again and again. Niko is the cutest reindeer in a movie, he blows Rudolph out of the water:)

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Incredibly inappropriate, December 24, 2008

By	SoyPeppermintMocha (Chicago, IL) - See all my reviews

Like has otherwise been said by other reviewers; the primary plotline in this production is a young reindeer tracking down his deadbeat dad who knocked up his mother. The father when found tries to remain incognito about his fatherhood, then begrudgingly admits it but takes at pass at the idea of getting back together with the mother/being a father to his biological son.