The Gift of Winter, on CBC (Canada)
BCDB; fan site; IMDb; Mill Creek Entertainment
streaming sites: Amazon; Google Play; iTunes; Vudu; YouTube

This came out in 1974, about a year before I was born. In 2013, I became aware of a Halloween special called Witch's Night Out, which is from 1978. And I discovered that it was a sequel to this special. I gather "Winter" isn't as fondly remembered by fans as the sequel is, but still I thought I should check this out before seeing the sequel. And both specials came out on DVD in 2014. So I put them on my Amazon wish list, and rather unexpectedly, I received this DVD for Christmas that year. I got around to watching it in January 2015, and now that I have, I definitely intend to get the sequel and watch that this Halloween. But that's way in the future, so for now I'll get on with talking about this special.

So, um, it's weird. The voice actors include Dan Aykroyd and Gilda Radner, of Saturday Night Live fame. The animation is basically a bunch of simple doodles, which I think is part of its charm. And all of the voice acting seems just as amateurish, which I also found charming (though Aykroyd and Radner's acting is somewhat more professional, basically all the characters sound more cartoonish than any cartoon I've ever seen). But the oddest thing of all is the story itself. It's about how a long time ago, there was no such thing as snow. Winter was just cold and windy and bleak and everyone hated it (even though there was Christmas during winter, which I get the sense that everyone liked, they still felt like there was nothing good about winter). So this one guy named Goodly (voiced by Aykroyd) got the idea to go to the Ministry of Winter and talk to... um... Winter himself, and ask if something could be done to make winter... nicer. Goodly is joined by a few townsfolk, including a very nice woman named Nicely (Radner), a weird guy named Bazooey (who kind of reminds me of Wilt from Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends, if he had done too many drugs in the 60s), and a pair of troublemakers named Rotten and Malicious (also voiced by Aykroyd and Radner). There are a couple of kids, too: a boy named Small and a girl named Tender; I think they're siblings, but I'm not sure. The two of them want to join the expedition, but the adults tell them to stay home. So, they go off in secret, taking a shortcut through the woods.

Well, it's a long, cold, and tedious journey for everyone. The main group of adults were accompanied at first by a bunch of unnamed townsfolk, but they eventually gave up and went home. Shortly after that, the two kids rejoin the group that's continuing on toward the Ministry of Winter. They all finally get there, and face some ridiculous bureaucracy before they can even talk to Winter. And when they do, he doesn't want to help them. But he eventually does help... sort of. I dunno... it seems like he spontaneously invented snow by accident, and there's no explanation of what exactly it is or how it was created. But at least in the end, everyone is happy, including Winter. (Actually, it seems like snow is created by Winter becoming happy, like snowflakes are his tears of joy or something, except that there's way more of it than could possibly be created that way, and of course it falls from the sky rather than from himself, so... I dunno.)

There, I've spoiled the whole thing for you. But I did leave out some important details. And anyway, the special is worth watching just for the sheer trippiness of it. Seriously, there are only two types of people who could have possibly made something like this: very young children, or people who have done a lot of drugs. Either way, it's so bad that it's awesome.

Oh, also the DVD includes 10 bonus holiday cartoons, but I think I'll hold off on watching any of them until next Christmas. ...Edit: I ended up watching most of them on "Christmas in July," 2015. All except The City That Forgot About Christmas, which was apparently a TV special, whereas the other nine were theatrical shorts. That last one, I watched in December 2015.