The Snowman (1982) on Netflix
After heavy snow, a boy named James plays outside and builds a snowman. At midnight he sneaks downstairs in his dressing gown and finds the snowman has come to life.
- Netflix2.3/5
- IMDb8.2/1019,387 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes80%
Trailer
Plot summary
Snow falls overnight, and James, a boy in a rural part of Brighton and Hove, wakes on Christmas Eve and plays in the snow. He builds a large snowman in the garden. At midnight he puts on his dressing gown and goes downstairs, and the snowman comes to life. James shows him around the house, and the two play with appliances and toys while keeping quiet so his parents do not wake.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about The Snowman (1982)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Laurence Olivier and Julie Andrews were among the names suggested for The Snowman, but a request for a rock star led to David Bowie being involved; he was a fan of Briggs's When the Wind Blows and later provided a song for its animated adaptation.
- The boy is unnamed in the original picture book, but animator Joanna Harrison named him James on his present tag after her own boyfriend, who later became her husband.
- Chorister Peter Auty sang "Walking in the Air" in the film but went uncredited until the 20th anniversary version; in 1985 Aled Jones's cover of it reached number five in the UK, and Jones is still sometimes wrongly credited with singing it in the film.
- Howard Blake wrote "Walking in the Air" some years before the film, during a difficult period in his life, and it became the work's main theme; in 2021 he said he wanted its lyrics to carry "a symphony that expressed the complete innocence and beauty that we are all born with".
- A static car sequence from the book was replaced by a motorcycle ride because one of the animators was a keen motorcyclist; executive producer Iain Harvey said the ride kept the action flowing after the comedy of the boy and the Snowman exploring the house.
- The Snowman was animated using pastels, crayons and other coloring tools drawn on pieces of celluloid traced over hand-drawn frames, and the background artwork was painted with the same tools to keep continuity.
