Elf

Elf is a good Christmas comedy with a story that depends heavily on our affection for its leading man. Jon Favreau gives Will Ferrell room to be silly without making Buddy’s sincerity seem embarrassing, and that choice does much of the work. The film is sweet, sometimes insistently so, but the performance earns a fair amount of indulgence. It remains agreeable company for most of its 97 minutes.

Will Ferrell understands that Buddy must never seem pleased with himself for being funny. His physical comedy has an eagerness that makes the effort amusing before the joke has quite arrived, and his guilelessness keeps the exuberance bearable. We laughed at how completely he commits his body to that enthusiasm. We also began to care about Buddy, because the performance gives us no reason to suspect that his good nature is an act.

Greg Gardiner’s cinematography keeps the physical comedy legible, which is more useful here than making every image demand attention. Rusty Smith’s production design favours an old-fashioned fantasy feel that suits Buddy’s simplicity, although the prettiness contributes less than the performance. Dan Lebental’s editing is surest with individual gags, giving the comic timing a briskness the story does not consistently possess. The film can be funny from moment to moment while still feeling rather loosely assembled.

Bob Newhart’s Papa Elf brings a welcome calm to the framing material. Zooey Deschanel’s Jovie is useful in another way: she feels sufficiently recognisable to give the film some contact with ordinary behaviour. There is also James Caan as Walter and Mary Steenburgen as Emily, a promising pair of names for a comedy that needs the people around Buddy to matter. The supporting cast deserves more room than the writing allows.

The writing by Jon Favreau and David Berenbaum is weakest in the connections between its comic situations. The next good joke often matters more than the story, whose predictability becomes harder to overlook whenever the comedy slows. A family comedy need not surprise us at every turn, but it does need something beyond a likeable protagonist to carry its quieter stretches. Here, the supporting characters are not developed enough to do that.

John Debney’s music fits the Christmas sweetness, though it does not make the more insistent sentiment any more persuasive. The film pushes hardest for warmth when it could afford to trust the affection Buddy has already earned. That is an avoidable weakness, and it makes some of the softer material feel dutiful. The sincerity of the leading performance survives, but the writing asks too much of it.

As a family Christmas comedy, Elf succeeds often enough to make its shortcomings tolerable. The humour gives adults a reason to stay without requiring them to apologise for enjoying something so openly good-natured, and Buddy is worth spending time with. Those are substantial pleasures, even when the plotting is not up to much. Choose it for Will Ferrell’s willingness to look foolish, and allow for a little more sweetness than the story has earned.