Watch Robbie the Reindeer: Hooves of Fire For Free

Sadly Over-hyped

This is a tender, generous movie that likes its characters and presents them as real people, full of flaws and strengths.

A lot of perfectly good film show their cards early, establish a unique premise and let the audience explore a topic at a leisurely pace, without much in terms of surprise. this film is not one of those films.

Not sure how, but this is easily one of the best movies all summer. Multiple levels of funny, never takes itself seriously, super colorful, and creative.

In 1999, when Hooves Of Fire was put into production, who could've known that it would have turned out to be one of the best Christmas films ever made. From that echoing opening music, to the brilliant acting by Adral O'Hanen (Or however it's spelt), playing Robbie, "Robbie The Reindeer's" first appearance has blown away fans, not just in Britan, but all over the world.According to the narrator, the film is set in "Coldchester," which is Norther than North, where good old Santa (Father Christmas, Saint Nicolous) lives. Robbie, son of Rudolph, ("Don't EVER... say that name.") has turned up to take a position on the sleigh. At first, there is some mistaken identity ("It's a... It's a... It's a thing!"), which is soon settled ("It must be the last of some poor, endangered animal."), then re-opened ("Cool! Let's kill it!"), and then settled once more ("Call me Robbie, 'cus, I am.") And those jokes are nothing compared to some of the films other lines.This film will captivate audiences all over the world at any time of the year. A FULLY recommended Christmas comedy with a gift. Maybe you could sit down and watch it late on Christmas Eve, early on Christmas morning, after Christmas lunch, or late at night before bed. Whenever you watch it, be it Christmas, Christmas Eve, or April, you will love it.

No one ever says "hurrah" do they? You never see, "And Gene Shallit says, 'Hurrah!'" in a newspaper. Which is a shame, because it's so much fun to say. Go on try it. No one's looking. Okay, on three, ready? One...two...three. HURRAH! There, that wasn't bad, was it?Anyway, onto the actual film, it's wonderful. The story concerns Robbie (voiced by Irish comedian extraordinare Ardal O'Hanlon), the son of another famous reindeer (whose name is never uttered) who wants to be on Santa's sleigh team. Trouble is, he's lazy. In the end he gets up off his butt, defeats the evil Blitzen ("Around the World in 80 Days" star Steve Coogan) and finds love. The writing, performances, animation and everything are superb. You will find yourself laughing out loud at these reindeer and the silly things they do. But make sure you see the UK edition, because on CBS here in the States they've rerecorded the dialogue with Ben Stiller, Britney Spears, Hugh Grant and Brad Garrett and removed charming Britishisms like, "You're chucked" rather than "I'm breaking up with you."There is an important point here. Americans are obtuse about other cultures. We are so convinced that ours is the best nation out there despite never EVER having set foot off her shores. Anything foreign, we remake and redo and Americanize. This is the logic behind American versions of British comedies, Kevin Costner as Robin Hood and the decision that American primetime TV audiences wouldn't like an Irish reindeer so let's make him Derrick Zoolander instead.See the British version, I beg you. And its sequel, "Legend of the Lost Tribe."

The British have been best known for creating wacky claymation masterpieces, like "Wallace & Gromit" and most recently, "Chicken Run". Around this holiday season, you see A LOT of claymation Christmas stories, i.e. Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer. So, the creators of "Robbie" think up the idea...what if Rudolph had a son?But that's not nesscessarly what they were thinking. By the looks of it, they were trying to do a remake of "Rudolph" with certain twist. Nevertheless, "Hooves of Fire", the first Robbie film, tells the story about Robbie the Reindeer, the son of Rudolph. Robbie wants to become a reindeer on Santa's sleigh, just like dear ol' dad. But, of course, there is a conflict. Rather than slicing Rudolph's notorious red-glowing nose, Robbie has a huge honker that he could bounce with. Robbie and his good friend, Donner, throughout most of the 20-minutes of the story, practice for the Reindeer Games, an Olympic-type event held in the North Pole. Robbie wants to impress this other female reindeer, Vixen, who's going with Blitzen, a clithe-jock that you see in practically every 80's teen flick. Robbie trains with an insane reindeer, Old Jingle and he eventually makes it to the games, but trouble (I'm not gonna say) occurs and stalls Robbie. But could he make it? Is that really important?The voices of the characters are most likely celebrities in England, because I have never heard of them (besides Robbie Williams, who narrates the story.) Recently about a week ago, CBS showed the "Americanized" version of the special, that featured the voices of Ben Stiller as Robbie, Britney Spears as Donner and Jerry Stiller as Old Jingle. All and all, the Americanized version was pretty bizarre. Like I said, those crazy Brits! However, they also showed the follow up story to "Hooves of Fire", with a even weirder "Robbie the Reindeer and the Lost Vikings", whom Stiller and Spears both did, along with "Everybody Loves Raymond"'s Brad Garrett, James Woods and Jeff Goldblum.Most of "Robbie" is not only bizarre, but also kind of adult subject matter. Donner, along we already know is a girl, has boobs! Reindeer boobs??? In a way, that's kind of Tongue-in-cheek, spite that Britney Spears plays her in the American version! There is also some violence and sexual innuendo. But it's still a fun movie to watch. I hope Amazon.com sells the American version (no offense to the British). Very funny.

I stumbled across this at the local library and brought it home for my 3 grade daughter. After the first 10 seconds, I stopped it and held it for us all to view. What a great surprise. We've been fans of the classic annual Christmas cartoon specials and this rates right at the top of the list as a new must see annual classic. There is so much happening in this short animation, you have to watch it again and again. I'm sure we didn't get all the British humor, but we still laughed a lot. Maybe they will do Frostie next?