"Exploring the Christmas Spirit in a Fun Way"

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What You Need To Know:
GLISTEN AND THE MERRY MISSION is a fun, enjoyable, cute movie for families with younger children. Most of the jokes are funny. All are wholesome. GLISTEN AND THE MERRY MISSION has a strong moral worldview, with multiple references and allusions to Christmas. The story promotes family bonds, helping others, gift-giving, kindness, love, and repentance. It contains references to the Christmas star, to the “spirit of Christmas,” to needing a miracle, to faith, and to belief in things unseen, like love (or God). However, GLISTEN AND THE MERRY MISSION has light cartoon violence, a sequence with scary wolves, and no other references to the Nativity Story or Jesus.
Content:
More Detail:
GLISTEN AND THE MERRY MISSION is an animated fantasy set at the North Pole where a female elf child tries to save Santa’s delivery of presents by bringing back the original flying reindeer, Glisten, who gave Santa’s reindeer the power to fly. GLISTEN AND THE MERRY MISSION is a fun, enjoyable, cute movie for families with younger children, but the story has some light cartoon violence, there are scary wolves in one sequence, and the movie’s morally uplifting content and references to Christmas, which includes references to the Christmas star, don’t have any other overt references to Jesus or the Nativity Story.
The movie opens with the child elf, Marzipan, playing with her dog, Lula, in Santa’s Village. They spot a twinkling light among the peppermint trees, but the light disappears.
Meanwhile, Marzipan’s widowed mother, Cinnameg, begins her first day as assistant manager in Santa’s workshop. She alerts the boss, Crumble Starsnaps, that the workshop is behind in building toys, with only seven days to go until Christmas. Crumble sees the world through rose-colored glasses, however, and doesn’t want to hear her concerns.
The next day, Marzipan sees the twinkling light on Cathedral Mountain above Cathedral Canyon. She follows the light into the canyon, but it disappears, and she runs into a big bear named Grizz. Grizz is wary of Marzipan because he’s on Santa’s Naughty List and all the elfs fear him. However, Marzipan removes a thorn from his fur, and he becomes more friendly. In fact, he tells her to come find him if she needs anything.
That night, Marzipan’s wise grandmother, Sage Evergreen, tells her about the story of Glisten, a Snow Deer who was made of pure stardust. Glisten sprinkled stardust on the elves’ garden, and, when the reindeer ate the corn from the garden, they began to fly, just like Glisten. Every year after that, Glisten led Santa’s sleigh delivering Christmas presents to the world’s children. Glisten disappeared, however, because people stopped believing in her. Grandma Sage says Glisten sparkled with Christmas Spirit, and Marzipan figures that that’s the sparkle she saw un the twinkling light.
So, when Marzipan hears from her mother that elves are falling behind in their toy production for Christmas, she decides to seek help from Grizz.
GLISTEN AND THE MERRY MISSION is a fun, enjoyable, cute movie for families with younger children. Most of the jokes are pretty funny, and all of them are fairly wholesome.
GLISTEN AND THE MERRY MISSION has a strong moral worldview, with overt, allegorical and metaphorical allusions to Christmas. The story promotes family bonds, helping others, gift-giving, kindness, love and repentance. It also contains references to the “Christmas star,” to the “spirit of Christmas,” to needing a “miracle,” to having faith, and to belief in things unseen, like love (or God). However, it has some light cartoon violence and peril, including a sequence with scary wolves who menace Marzipan and the bear. Also, neither Jesus or the Nativity Story are otherwise mentioned in GLISTEN AND THE MERRY MISSION. In addition, one line of dialogue says that the Christmas Star merged with the “Wishing Star.”