Kringle Time
A cellar-dwelling television producer gets his lifelong dream of playing the snowman on a kiddie show when the host dies on air, but finds it a hollow victory in this oddball comedy.
I’m not sure what it says about a kid that their dream was to grow up to be the star of the lame-o local-access TV show they watched starring a snowman who for some reason is dressed up as a cowboy. Or when that kid becomes a man who turns into the producer of said show, thanklessly putting the same songs and routines on the air year after year while having to deal with the crotchety old drunk who’s still inside the snow suit.
But that’s the premise of “Kringle Time,” an odd and dark comedy that’s very much in the tradition of “Bad Santa” or “Santaland Diaries” — very adult takes on yuletide themes. (Though, as is often noted by characters in the movie, Kringles is just a snowman and not explicitly Christmas-related.)
Benny Ellege plays Jerry, the showrunner who secretly yearns to put on the snowman suit and take over the role played for decades by Herb (Vernon Wells, forever Wez from “The Road Warrior”). Herb drinks constantly, growls about not going on the air but eventually does, putting on a show for small children that seems to just consist of songs, ABCs and the simplest of dances permitted by the bulky Kringles costume.
Jerry is a mess himself. Balding and portly, he’s completely disrespected by everyone from the station executive director, Daphne (Alyssa Keegan) — a piece of work herself who is unacquainted with the concept of personal space — to the young song-and-dance sidekicks on the show. To boot he’s married to Herb’s daughter, Layla (Gigi Edgley), who seems to spend all her time on couches swigging from a bottle, not unlike her dad.
Herb kicks off live on the air, and of course the ancient woman running the board has no idea how to turn off the live feed, so all of Goshen, Ind. gets to see his demise in all its chaotic, frantic glory. But the station owners want to give the show one chance to carry on before they pull the plug.
Daphne intends to give the role of Kringles to an idiot intern who’s at least good with kids , but it turns out Herb bequeaths the Kringles identity and costume to Jerry, which is not even a thing I was aware you can do. After much flop sweats, and some very esoteric ideas about how to turn the show into an avant-garde spectacle that everyone quickly ignores, Jerry takes to the air and is a hit.
Trouble is, he’s still being haunted by the shade of Herb in the form of Kringles, or at least a very creepy Halloween-y version of him with burnt eye-holes and a twisting, accusing carrot for a nose. The ghost works to undermine Jerry’s confidence, and some revelations about Herb’s long habit of burning through interns gets a #MeToo twist.
Meanwhile, the barely coherent mayor (Jeff Wincott) is diligently, almost obsessively, carrying on with Herb’s request to get a statue of him erected. He’s basically a child in a suit who does whatever everyone tells him, though he clearly sees the statue as his sacred quest as a public official.
There’s a lot going on in “Kringle Time,” but not very much of it is funny. Directed by Matthew Lucas, who came up with the story along with screenwriter Zan Gillies, it feels exactly like something that would spring forth from a free local access TV show rather than a feature film.
Jerry isn’t a particularly compelling protagonist, the sort of dweeby character who populates the background of a richer cast. I could see him in the rotation of "The Office," for example, maybe as a playmate for Kevin. I liked the warped energy of Daphne, who hates her job but is determined for it not to be her dead end. It probably would have made more sense to make Herb the focus, and do something really dark about a children’s show host being a complete lech.
But Jerry? He's a drip.
It’s important to remember that it’s OK to have a movie where you hate your main character, but you can’t make him the most annoying person on screen.