ExplorerDS6789 Before I even start, yes, the Nostalgia Critic brought me here. But don't worry, I'll do my best not to retread his steps or repeat any of his jokes. So with everything that everybody has said about this animated special, is this really the Anti-Christ of Christmas specials? Duh! So anyway, how does this charming little tale begin? At an orphanage run by a cold, calculating she-demon called Mrs. Mavilda, who treated the children badly. She overworks them, starves them, and even pilfers money from the mayor, who donates cash in actual money bags with its intent to take care of the children. She pulls a few fast ones and keeps the money for herself to gamble with. One fine day, a couple with two children of their own venture into town, seeking a new life... boy, did you make a wrong turn. The mayor gives the father, Ray, a job at the mill, though it would require him to be away from his family for some time, and he arranges for the mother, Judy, and her two kids to stay at the orphanage, because... this town has no hotels, I guess. She can be Mrs. Mavilda's new slave... I mean, assistant. Mavilda runs a tight ship and lists off her extremely strict rules... I would say I hate this character, but she's not a character. She's an over-the-top stereotype who can't possibly be taken seriously. Still a bitch though. So, after Judy slaves away at her new job, the children introduce her to Mrs. Hopewell: a pine-tree that sat behind the orphanage. It was named Hopewell because it somehow gave the children hope, and faith. With Judy's help, they build a makeshift playground around the tree. With her around, the children felt happy and it looked as though things were starting to change for the better.One fateful day, the mayor delivers two money bags to Mrs. Mavilda, which were intended to buy the children new clothes and Christmas presents. Bet you know where this is going. So while Judy tells the kids all about Christmas and Santa Claus and what-have-you, greedy Mavilda gambles the money away with her crooked friends. In the final game, it was all or nothing, and guess what? She lost. Yep, Mavilda done goofed. How will she explain this? Oh, she won't. She just orders Judy to keep her mouth shut about what really happened and tell the kids they won't be getting new clothes. So while she delivers the heartbreaking news, the overly-paranoid Mavilda tries to think of a way to get rid of Judy without arousing suspicion, as she so blatantly exposits to us. So she calls one of her lowlife friends and arranges for Judy to be framed for theft. Oh, and she also plans to cut down Mrs. Hopewell. Um... there's petty, and then there's... this woman. Excuse me while I imagine myself breaking a few of Mavilda's bones and slamming her head through a wall. Well, a little girl overhears Mavilda's plan, but doesn't get to warn Judy. She tells the others, and they hatch a plan to save Mrs. Hopewell...and Judy too. They send Pappy and Lilly, Judy's kids, to tell the mayor about what's been going on, but alas, they decide it's late and the mayor's gone home, so they decide to seek out Santa Claus to save their beloved tree. The kids set out to the North Pole on a makeshift dog sled pulled by their dog Liccorice. Suddenly, they're chased by Baloo the bear and lose control of the sled. Liccorice fights off the bear, while Pappy tries to help up his sister, who was slipping down the edge of a cliff. Unfortunately, poor Lilly slid off and became lost. Well, I guess Mrs. Mavilda's plan of framing Judy for robbery didn't work, so she just outright fires her and plans Operation: Chop Down Hopewell. So after I imagine myself cracking a few more of Mavilda's ribs, Judy stands with the children in defense of Mrs. Hopewell. I certainly hope they're chainsaw proof. Thank God the mayor arrives just in time to stop the madness. Pappy and Liccorice show up, and report that Lilly has gone missing. Determined not to let some children and a tree outdo her, Mrs. Mavilda revs the chainsaw to finish the job herself, when all of a sudden, lightning strikes her. Then, Santa Claus himself rides by on his sleigh and makes Mrs. Hopewell shine bright. He'd even found Lilly, who was reunited with her family. So, the mayor declares Mrs. Hopewell city property and makes Judy head of the orphanage. She and Ray adopt all the children there, and as for Mrs. Mavilda... she becomes Judy's assistant apparently, and she turns good, because you always win when you are good. Um, no!Okay, so... bad animation and bad acting aside, this thing is an atrocity. There is ZERO character development, everybody is flat and boring, the story is ridiculous, and everything is just plain wrong. I don't need to stress what a horrible bitch Mrs. Mavilda was, just your typical abusive orphanage manager. Nothing like a little child abuse to brighten the holidays, eh? At least the children don't look abused. They're overworked and underfed, sure, but at least they look as though they were still able to eat and keep themselves clean. I hope so anyway. Not much else I can say. This was garbage. If you're curious about this special, watch the Nostalgia Critic's review or any YouTube Poops you can find. Don't torture yourself and sit through all 42 minutes of it like I did. It sucks the big one in all respects. Just...avoid it. It will anger you, annoy you, bore you and depress you.

Horst in Translation (filmreviews@web.de) These are the last words of this 43-minute animated Christmas movie from almost 25 years ago. Sadly, this means that this film does not win as it's not good for the most part. However, i also do not think it's a complete failure. The animation is mostly solid and I like the traditional style. It looks a lot older than 1991. Unfortunately, the characters' movements look a little abrupt at times, almost robot-like, and the females have lips that look like they are full of Botox.It probably shows occasionally that Ferreira never directed another movie and Christianson never wrote another. But this can also be used as a bit of an apology. Brazilian animated films are frequently pretty bad copycats of the American original and this one here is mediocre at best, even without an American original. The story is a bit weird, but I found the nasty orphanage witch's gambling problem sort of funny. Her change of character at the end (bad towards good) wasn't particularly credible though and there are more flaws with this film in terms of the script, for example the random appearance of the mayor in the end. The voice acting is so-so. The witch's voice actress was probably the best, but the other ones struggled quite a bit. All in all, not a terrible watch, but not a good one either and you really shouldn't see this movie outside the holidays.

ofpsmith To be fair, after I watched Doug Walker's review I expected this to be bad. And guess what? I was right. This is awful, stupid, poorly animated, poorly acted, and every bit as bad as I imagined. The plot goes like this. A new family arrives in town and the mother Judy (Karen Drygas) get's a job as an assistant to an evil Gestapo head of an orphanage, Mrs. Mavilda (Helen Quinn). But Judy decides that all the kids can have a good Christmas anyways. That sums up the plot. I won't explain anything else because I decided to take the time to make this review a full on rant about how awful this film is. The story is plain stupid, but honestly that is one of the redeeming qualities about the film. What really brings this crap storm is the acting. One end of the scale is Quinn who plays Mavilda, who pretty much screams at the top of her lungs and makes Nicolas Cage look subtle. On the opposite end of the scale are the child actors who make no effort whatsoever to put any kind of emotion in their characters. The other big problem is the animation which is really choppy and badly done. The film overall is just horrible! Let's just leave this pile of manure at that!

mercuryix2003 POSSIBLE SPOILERS, NOT THAT ANYONE WILL READ THIS REVIEW OR SEE THIS FILM:I just saw The Nostalgia Critic's review of this made-for-TV animated "Christmas" movie, just published on Christmas day, 2013! It is probably the one and only review this "Christmas" movie ever got. I put "Christmas" in quotations in that, except for a brief fly-over by Santa Claus where he nearly electrocutes the bad guy and magically gives orphans new clothes (all of which takes less than 30 seconds), Christmas is never mentioned. There was an army of animators for this film, which is curious because it is so badly done, and the script (if you can call it that) absolutely did not merit the time and effort it took to make this. I have no doubt the TV stations that aired it were angry about what it must have done to their ratings. It completely misses the spirit of Christmas, and desperate to wrap things up at the end, the narrator says "and so as you can see, you always win when you're good". Uh, what? There's about 2,000 years of history to contradict that. I feel bad for the animators that put so much effort into producing something so forgettable and irrelevant; I wonder what they thought about it? We will never know, as there are no other reviews for it, and no information about it is available. You will be wasting your time and inflicting considerable pain on yourself if you see this 45 minute film, but you will at least have fun watching The Nostalgia Critic tear it apart. There is so much wrong with this film, that it took him over 30 minutes just to point it all out, which is almost as long as the film! If you want a Christmas animated special, "The Christmas Tree" isn't it. Not that it matters, as it isn't available anywhere; which is perhaps how it should be (alright, you can find it on YouTube; which is probably the only thing saving it from extinction).