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'm a huge fan of Robbie the Reindeer- and this is definitly the preferred version. CBS's American-ised re-dub of the voices is bland where the original sparkles with dry wit and humor. Robbie the Reindeer is the best Christmas special since the original Grinch, and everyone should get to see it at least once in their life.

Ardal O'Hannon, Steve Coogan, Ricky Tomlinson, Paul Whitehouse and Harry Enfiled and Allistar McGowan! This must be a dream! No it isn't! They do provide voices in this hilariously rib-tickling Christmas treat! The story is extremely orginal, and the spoof "Chariots of Fire" title just makes it a true gem of british comedy, and aniamtion, of course! The animation is just as good as any claymation classic, like Creature Comforts or the Wallace and Gromit films! In fact it's only slightly better! It well-deserved the BAFTA TV Award forBest Entertainment (Programme or Series)"production team"! It just had one of best production team ever to assemble an animated film ever! Also, at the Berlin International Film Festival, it recieved 2 awards: a Deutsches Kinderhilfswerk - Special Award for Best Short Film, and a Glass Bear for Best Short Film! Well done Richard Goleszowski, who recieved the 2 awards! In addition to his awards cabinet, Richard Goleszowski recieved an Audience Award at the 2000 Leipzig DOK Festival! But it should have received the Academy Award for Best Animated Film, as well but that went to Aleksandr Petrov's The Old Man and the Sea, which I must see!

I was winding up my weekend, doing house-y errands with my television humming in the background......but I had to drop everything when this came on. A 30-year-old adult, watching this alone, and I was laughing out loud. I'd never heard of it before, but I'll be sure to tell everyone I know to add this to the list of Christmas "must-see" classics. Great voices, great animation, and a feel-good story as well.