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Starring: Will Ferrell, Zooey Deschanel, Bob Newhart, Ed Asner
Directed by: John Favreau
Screenplay by: David Berenbaum
Release Date: November 7th, 2003
Running Time: 95 minutes
MPAA Rating: PG for some mild rude humor, language.
Box Office: $173,398,518 (US total)
Studio: New Line Cinema
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  Elf Production NotesThirty years prior to the events of the film, a baby crawls into Santa's sack at an orphanage. Santa unwittingly takes the baby back to the North Pole, where it is decided that Papa Elf will raise him. The baby, named Buddy, is raised unaware that he is actually a human, until his enormous size and poor toy-making abilities cause Papa Elf to tell him the truth. The old elf reveals that Buddy was born to Walter Hobbs and Susan Wells and placed up for adoption, that Walter never knew Buddy was born, and that he now works at a children's book company in New York. From Santa, Buddy learns that his father is also on the naughty list; nevertheless, Buddy sets out for New York to find his father.
 Once in the city, Buddy displays his naïveté in several ways, as he crosses the street at the wrong time, chews discarded gum on the street, and takes a coffee shop's claim to have the "world's best cup of coffee" literally. Buddy eventually finds his father in the Empire State Building, but an incredulous Walter Hobbs has him thrown out. Buddy takes a security guard's sarcastic suggestion to "get back to Gimbel's," where he is mistaken for an employee and meets the lovely but unenthusiastic Jovie. The next morning, Buddy is shocked to discover that Gimbel's Santa is not the genuine article, and a fight ensues between them. Buddy is arrested and Walter reluctantly bails him out and takes him to a pediatrician for a DNA test. Once it is proven that Buddy is in fact Walter's son, he takes Buddy home to meet his wife Emily and son Michael. Walter is clearly put off by Buddy's immature, innocent behavior (he slathers his pasta with maple syrup and can't seem to understand that Walter isn't interested in playing with him), but Emily insists that they take care of Buddy until he "recovers."
Buddy befriends Michael after the former defeats a gang of bullies single-handedly in a snowball fight, and Michael encourages Buddy to ask Jovie out. The next day, Walter reluctantly takes Buddy to work with him, and uses Buddy's naïveté to send him down to the mailroom. Buddy gets drunk on a coworker's whiskey, thinking it's syrup, and ends up throwing a party in the mailroom. That night, Buddy has a successful date with Jovie. Walter, meanwhile, has been trying to save his floundering business by hiring the temperamental best-selling writer Miles Finch. When the vertically-challenged Finch arrives, Buddy mistakes him for an elf. The offended Finch attacks Buddy and storms out of the conference room without signing a deal with Walter's company. Walter is so upset over this setback that he screams at Buddy to "get the Hell out of [his] life."
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