Metacritic reviews

The colourful film of course is allegorical: Peace is tough and tedious; war is an easy solution. And while the kids’ enthusiasm for battle wanes, pint-sized audiences will likely remain engaged.

Sophisticated in its look and feel on the one hand (the warm hues and tones evoke a warmth that defies the wintry cold), it’s almost too retro for its own good on the other.

Though the story’s midsection, with its shifting alliances and reversals, feels distended, the movie offers well-defined characters and an inventive sense of earthbound fun, as well as poignant moments.

It is aimed at younger children and includes pretty songs, but it doesn’t soft-pedal anything. Its low-key story is about friendship, but it’s also about loss, which should leave pint-size viewers with plenty to think about.

Snowtime! is by turns ribald (there’s a flatulent dog), boisterous (there’s charging through the snow with wooden swords wildly waved), tender (there’s a boy grieving quietly for a father killed in a real war) and, yes, tragic.

Dialogue is witless (though at least there are no pop-culture references), and the kids are all generic types with pre-packaged personalities.

Covering the emotional spectrum between dog farts on one end and tragedy on the other reps a tonal challenge that Showtime! can’t pull off, despite a gentler touch than most kiddie fare of its kind.

A startlingly inappropriate tragedy in the final act drives home the film’s pacifist message, while virtually ensuring that the youngest and most sensitive viewers will be left in a puddle of tears.

Directors Jean-François Pouliot and François Brisson fail to organize the material into a coherent story or strike a consistent emotional tone.

Despite a few diverting moments and some ambitiously dramatic themes, this one is simply too uneventful and too populated by thinly sketched characters to keep its target audience engaged.