Sagan om Karl-Bertil Jonssons Julafton (The Tale of Karl-Bertil Jonsson's Christmas Eve), often shortened to Karl-Bertil Jonssons Julafton and known as Christopher's Christmas Mission in a 1987 English dub, is a 1975 Swedish short directed, written and narrated by Tage Danielsson and animated by Per Åhlin. It's based on a short story Danielsson wrote in 1964. It's been shown on Swedish television every Christmas eve since its inception.
The short takes place in (presumably) WWII era Stockholm. The titular character is the 14-year old Robin Hood-adoring son of Tyko Jonsson, the wealthy owner of a department store. His love of Robin Hood inspires him to take advantage of his part-time work of sorting packages at the postal service to secretly collect incoming Christmas gifts intended for the rich. Later, at Christmas eve, he borrows Tyko's Santa costume and goes on a pilgrimage through the poorer parts of Stockholm where he gives out the stolen presents to the downtrodden people he encounters. When Karl-Bertil is forced to admit to his family that he'd done this, Tyko furiously sends him to bed early and the following day the two of them visit all of Karl-Bertil's victims to apologize, but to Tyko's surprise, they all take it well, arguing that the happiness he brought to the impoverished outweighs the grief they might feel over losing one package. The short ends with Tyko declaring to his family that Karl-Bertil is a good person.
The story was adapted into a stage musical in 2018 and a feature length movie in 2021.
Sagan om Karl-Bertil Jonssons Julafton provides examples of:
- Ambiguous Time Period: The story seems to be set during WWII, based on the presence of an En svensk tiger (a war-era slogan comparable to loose lips sink ships) poster, wood gas generators on the cars and a flag of Nazi Germany. The tax calendar Karl-Bertil uses to check the incomes of Stockholm's wealthy is from 1942. The family also watch a movie that was released in 1944. However, they do this on a TV, when televised broadcasts didn't begin in Sweden until 1956, they also watch a show that premiered in 1971 and one of the gifts featured is Jean-Paul Sartre's 1964 autobiography The Words.
- Bowdlerise: The 2004 DVD release of the English dub lacks the shot of Beda Larsson pressing the satin tie she received from Karl-Bertil to her chest.
- Crappy Homemade Gift: Implied by H. K. Bergdahl as a reason why he condones Karl-Bertil's acts. Tyko also assumes this about aunt Märta's hand painted porcelain plate, but he quickly changes his mind, because "said and said, it was my plate!"
- Defrosting Ice King: Tyko Jonsson is furious to learn what his son has done, but has a change of heart when he discovers that all the other rich people who were "robbed" think it was a very nice thing Karl-Bertil did.
- Drunk Driver: Defied. Tyko nearly ruins Karl-Bertil's plan by offering to drive him, but his mother objects because he's drunk glögg, a mulled wine particular to Nordic countries.
- Just Like Robin Hood: But of course!
- Large Ham: Tyko Jonsson.
- Leitmotif: The jazzy melody created by Gunnar Svensson that surfaces throughout the short. Outside of the short, it's been extended and given lyrics, becoming a Christmas song in its own right.
- Lemony Narrator: Tage Danielsson's snarky narration is one of the short's most iconic features. Expanded upon in the stage musical, where the narrator (played by Henrik Dorsin) more overtly plays with the Fourth Wall.
- No Antagonist: Tyko is the closest thing the story has to an antagonist, and even he changes his mind rather quickly when it's proven to him that Karl-Bertil did more good than harm.
- No Name Given: Karl-Bertil's mother and younger sister go unnamed. In the stage musical, the mother is known as Bojan, but seeing as that is Swedish for "the shackle", it's possible that this is a nickname hinting at tensions in her and Tyko's marriage.
- Rich Kid Turned Social Activist: Karl-Bertil.
- True Meaning of Christmas: Lampshaded in the last scene, when the narrator tells us that Karl-Bertil's mom "got an almost religious expression in her eyes...for this happened at a time when Christmas was used to celebrate the birth of Christ."
