Watch Jack Frost For Free

Best movie of this year hands down!

Clever, believable, and super fun to watch. It totally has replay value.

The acting in this movie is really good.

It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.

There's probably too much back story used to give the exposition to the dramatic story of a bullied kid whose father dies and comes back as a snowman. Sounds fine, right? Well, I should mention that it takes half of the film's running time for this to happen, and when it does, it's rolling like a giant snowball flying down the slopes of a slippery mountain. Then, the fun begins and it never lets up.I really didn't need much background to get the story going. Like similar fantasies like this, little background was needed other than a chance to see a live action Michael Keaton as opposed to the voice coming out of the moving mouth of the snowman. The fact that his real name is Jack Frost is his real name is a nice twist. Try to remain patient through the dull first half, and you will find yourself enjoying the funny and moving second half.

Winter scenes, sleds and snowmen in a movie usually mean it's intended as a holiday film. Warner Brothers released "Jack Frost" the second week of December 1998, so it would be playing around the country over the Christmas school break. But all the trappings don't quite make this a Christmas film. Billed as a comedy, drama and family film, it is a combination bizarre fairy tale and dark cartoon. The parental guidance rating is appropriate. Any number of kids who have lost a parent, especially boys and their dads (to death, divorce or desertion) may find this film a little unsettling. No amount of attempted humor – especially in this bizarre way – can assuage the loss or hurt a child may live with because of a missing parent. The idea that a snowman can pass as a surrogate dad for a time is truly bizarre. The acting by Michael Keaton, Joseph Cross, Kelly Preston and others of the cast can't offset the morbid aspects of the plot. The animation work for the snowman, and special effects photography and CGI can't compensate for the off-color screenplay. The attempted humor fails for the most part, so all that remains leaves a bad taste in one's mouth. I didn't give it the lowest rating simply because of the skill and art work in the animation. This isn't a movie I'd recommend at any time, especially not during the Christmas-New Year's holiday.

Jack Frost (1998): Dir: Troy Miller / Cast: Michael Keaton, Joseph Cross, Kelly Preston, Mark Addy, Henry Rollins: Depressing family film with a character given the title name. What kind of nit-pick bullshit is that? Could they not give him a name of more normal presentation? It just sounds like cruel parenting. The concept fails because the magic harmonica is never explained and just sounds like a dumb plot device. Instead it gets reduced to formula that becomes as much fun as a snow covered rock to the head. Michael Keaton plays Jack Frost, a musician who spends less time with his family. A nasty storm sends his car off the road and he is pronounced dead. His son plays the magic harmonica and the result is a talking snowman. We know that he will attempt to conceal him from his mother, and he will eventually melt giving an ending of all the quality of yellow snow. Director Troy Miller has fun with the visuals but that is pretty much all the film has going for it. Keaton is a likable comic actor but this is far beneath his talent. In flat supporting roles are Joseph Cross as his son. Kelly Preston is cardboard as his wife. Mark Addy has the thankless role as best friend who sticks around after the accident. One could say that he stuck around too long if he had any hint that this sh*t storm would be good. The snowman doesn't melt nearly as fast as the screenplay. Score: 2 / 10

Truly bizarre WTF? plot aside, "Jack Frost" has a good cast willing to endure it for the sake of a family friendly experience for the right kind of audience who can look past the spirit of a musician/father entering the snowman outside in the yard of his wife and son. You get Michael Keaton doing voice work for the Frosty the Snowman look-a-like (there's even a funny moment where his son comes across the Frosty Christmas special on the tube much to Keaton's chagrin), but at least he had a chance to get in a good forty minutes work in his own skin as a dad struggling to get his Jack Frost Band (his name is actually, really Jack Frost!) a music deal after a lot of neglect to his boy. His son and wife have tolerated his missing the big goal in the little league hockey game and the snowball fights with the neighborhood bullies, so in the form of Frosty, Jack tries to make up for lost time. What does come out of the weird plot is the "dad gets a second chance to be there for his son in a winter bonding missed while in human form" and the leads do what they can to make it work. The snowball fight with the bullies as Jack comes to his son's aid, and the subsequent sledding escape from those snowboarding pricks could be perceived as highlights if they weren't so strange (I had a hard time suspending disbelief as Jack the Snowman uses his stick arms and muffin hands to hurl snowballs at an accelerating rate, and "skinnied" after squeezing between two close trees (and snowboarding when the sled splits in two for that matter)). When Jack and his son get away for one last adventure and Kelly Preston (as the mom) hears her husband's voice across the phone when he calls from their cabin, it is a really emotional moment that is actually poignant…give it to the cast to really take their parts seriously even though the plot is so ridiculously absurd. One scene has Jack the Snowman melting while watching his son playing hockey that, again, is kind of surreal but makes sense considering how the father was often absent when his boy wanted him there so badly. I think for many it will take a hell of a lot to shake the premise, but maybe if you can, then "Jack Frost" might just be an agreeable bit of whimsy that seems best watched during the Holidays.