You don’t have to be a sucker for Christmas movies to enjoy Red One, although you may have to be the type of person who actively seeks out four-quadrant blockbusters as a hobby. Assembling three actors that everyone is tired of and the screenwriter for eight(!) of the Fast & Furious movies, this PG-13 Christmas caper is set in a world that explains the existence of Santa Claus as a combination of a highly sophisticated technical operation and “really good magic.”

J.K. Simmons plays Santa, who eschews the fat and jolly stereotype for that of, well, J.K. Simmons. This version of St. Nick shoulder-presses 300lbs as a warmup set and burns some 4 million calories a day. His spotting partner is a 6-foot head elf named Cal, played by Dwayne Johnson. Becoming disenchanted with the job, witnessing the loss of cheer and hope in human adults, Cal has decided to hang up his hat after several centuries of protecting Santa full-time.

If you’ve seen enough Hollywood movies in the past decade, Johnson and Simmons are exactly what you’d expect in their respective roles. But there’s a third member of the party too — and it’s no Captain America. Chris Evans plays Jack O’Malley, a professional hacker, bounty hunter, and deadbeat dad (a Christmas movie staple!) all rolled up into one. Jack spent his childhood trying to spoil Christmas for other kids and is now a “level-four Naughty List-er.”

After Santa gets kidnapped, Cal and his crack team of elves figure out that Jack was somehow responsible for tracking down the location of the North Pole for these nefarious individuals — unbeknownst to him. He and his contractor maintained an anonymous relationship, and now the North Pole decides to hire Jack to track down Santa once again. You’d be right in assuming that Johnson and Evans spend the next 90 minutes busting each other’s chops and, eventually, growing on each other.

It goes without saying that Jack will change over the course of the film but what surprised me was how effectively they allow him to find his purpose in Cal’s life as well. Despite a hilarious and often irreverent storyboard, Red One keeps its sentimental spirit alive and ends on an authentically touching note that’s admittedly difficult to find in our current market of saccharine holiday films.

Reminiscent of the underrated 2012 animated film Rise of the Guardians, Red One takes a hypothetical approach to its story. But while Rise feels more like a comic book, Red One is much more grounded in its fantasy. Obvious parallels to 1994’s The Santa Clause are also present, such as with the father-son relationship, the North Pole set design, and the mere societal doubt revolving around St. Nick.

Like some of the best modern capers, Red One takes notes from the video game world for its storyboard. Cal and Jack venture from interesting location to interesting location, defeating one obstacle after another. And with each new challenge, the lore of this universe expands further. Dabbling in more plausible locations here in the real world, writer Chris Morgan (Fast & Furious 3 through 8, and 10) still knows his way around action plots and continues his streak here with some seriously cool ideas that take into account the collective panoply of the Christmas canon. Best of all, he combines all these different references in a way that makes sense.

For theoretical world-building, Morgan has some help from Jake Kasdan, known for his work directing the Jumanji sequels — coincidentally set inside video games. Here, the filmmaker manages to churn out yet another fun movie with a narrative that’s cohesive and snappy.

So much of art nowadays feels sterile, especially from the studio world. But watching Red One, you can feel the love and excitement of the writers’ room. If you’ve ever collaborated on a good creative project, there’s an energy that hums all throughout that process, and that energy almost always comes through in the finished product, just like it comes through the screen here.

Twizard Rating: 96