Small Town Santa (Original Title: Holiday Miracle) is a Christmas Comedy movie by Joel Paul Reisig.
The movie stars Rick Langston (Dean Cain), The Sheriff of the small town of Rockford, Minnesota. He does his job to the best of his ability, and wants to be a good dad to his daughter, Kara (Mandalynn Carson). However, Rick wasn't the best of husbands, and his ex-wife Diane (Janet Caine) won't let him spend Christmas with Kara. This has put something of a damper on Rick's Christmas Spirit, prompting him to try and get a new job as a big city police officer, hoping it'll help him.
That Christmas Eve, Rick finds an old man in his house (Paul Hopper) claiming to be Santa Claus rooting through his refrigerator. Rick immediately had the man arrested for breaking and entering his home, and locks him up. This begins a night with "Santa" that could possibly revive the spark of the Christmas spirit in Rick.
The movie was released on October 27th, 2014.
Small Town Santa contains examples of:
- Actor Allusion: Rick Langston has a sticker on his computer that says "Real Heroes Don't Wear Capes". Dean Cain, who plays him, also played Superman in Lois & Clark.
- Cool Old Guy: Santa Claus, of course.
- There's also Mr. Harold, a guy who knows basically everyone in town. When he gets word that Evan's dad lost his job, he makes him the manager of one of his stores.
- Desires Prison Life: Raynor comes into the sheriff's office admitting to having stolen the doll of Baby Jesus from the church, asking to be locked up. They all know he's doing it because he wants to spend Christmas in a cell because it's still a roof over his head, but they still give him what he wants. He spends most of the movie in the cell at the office.
- Egging: Early in the movie, Sean and Evan decide to throw eggs at Mr. Harold's house. They get caught by Deputy Tom and hauled into the sheriff's office.
- Extremely Short Timespan: The whole movie takes place on Christmas Eve, both day and night.
- Reasonable Authority Figure: Rick shows himself to be this early in the movie. When Evan and Sean beg not to be thrown in the clink, and how the former's father lost his job, with Evan's paper route being their only income, he decides to instead have them clean up the house they threw eggs at, and clean its pathway for the month. That said, he warns them that he will lock them up if he finds they're slacking on their job.
- Santa Ambiguity: While the old guy Rick arrests claims to be Santa, and knows a lot of very intimate details about the people of the town, he is neither confirmed or disproven to be Santa Claus.
- Scenery Porn: The intro montage is set in a multi-level workshop with toys everywhere, with some shots lingering on certain objects.
- The Sheriff: Rick Langston is this for the people of Rockford, Minnesota.
- The Stinger: After the credits roll, we cut to a scene of Raynor and Santa back in the Sheriff's Office cell, having this conversation.Santa: When's it gonna start?Raynor: I don't know. When's it gonna end?Both: *laughs*
