Rudolph and Frosty's Christmas in July

Rudolph and Frosty's Christmas in July was released theatrically in 1979, through Avco/Embassy pictures, showing mostly on children's matinees. Perhaps due to its summer release date, however, the film performed poorly at the box office, but was later revived through television airings, both during the Christmas season and the summer. It is notable for tying in the Mickey Rooney version of Santa Claus with Rudolph and featuring stop-motion versions of Frosty and his family, previously seen only in standard animation. Many of these characters would not be seen again until the 2000's.

Synopsis
Long time ago, the evil wizard king Winterbolt has caused havoc upon the people who have entered his domain. He is then punished by Lady Boreal when she places a spell that puts him in a deep sleep.

Years later, Winterbolt is awake. In her final act of magic, Boreal transfers the last of her power into Rudolph's red nose, which will stop glowing if it is ever used for evil. Winterbolt learns of this through his "genie of the ice scepter" and plans not only to dispose of Rudolph, the only power capable of stopping him, but also to reclaim his territory from Santa Claus. To achieve this, Winterbolt plans to take advantage of Frosty and his family. At the same time, Rudolph's ice cream man friend Milton arrives and tells Rudolph and Frosty that he plans to attract the heart of Milton's girlfriend, the high-wire act Laine Loraine.

Winterbolt offers Frosty magic amulets that will keep his family from melting and enable them to attend a Fourth of July Circus in which Rudolph is to star, but they will only be protected until the end of the event. Santa agrees to pick up Frosty and his wife Crystal before the magic wears off, but Winterbolt has his ice dragons blow up a blizzard to prevent Santa from arriving on time. Winterbolt also gets some "reinsnakes" and goes to the cave of lost rejections and recruits an evil, unintelligent reindeer named Scratcher (voiced by Alan Sues) to try to get Rudolph to turn, or at least appear evil in the eyes of his friends. With the blizzard keeping Santa from getting to them, time was not on the side of Frosty and family. When Scratcher arrives, he forms an alliance with Sam Spangles during the parade.

Scratcher, taking advantage of Rudolph's kindness, steals money from the circus and sets up Rudolph to take the blame. Rudolph agrees to appear guilty after making a deal with Winterbolt, to extend the powers of the amulets Frosty's family wears for an infinite time in exchange. Frosty's family, friends, and the circus' owner and Laine's mother, Lilly Loraine, are upset when Rudolph lies to them about how he stole the money and his nose stops glowing. Only Frosty knows the truth and wants to restore Rudolph's glowing nose. Winterbolt takes advantage of Frosty as well by lying and agreeing to do it in exchange for Frosty's hat, with intention to use the magic powers of Frosty's hat to create an army of evil snowmen. Rudolph manages to steal back the hat, and his nose regains its glow.

After Rudolph returns to the circus with Frosty's hat, Winterbolt attacks which ends with him turning into a tree when Lilly throws her guns at his scepter destroying it. Once Winterbolt is vanquished, Scratcher has not been seen again, and Sam is arrested, all the spells he has cast are negated and Frosty and his family are in danger of melting once again. However, Jack Frost, the villain from the previous Frosty's Winter Wonderland, arrives on Big Ben, who's Rudolph's whale friend from the previous Rudolph's Shiny New Year, to rescue his former enemy and family as they are whisked back to the North Pole by Santa, but Rudolph stays behind to help the circus out of debt. The special ends with a rendition of "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer", sung by Ethel Merman.

Songs

 * You Are Everything I Always Wanted
 * Everyday Is Just Like Christmas
 * Don't Let the Parade Pass You By
 * I See Rainbows When I Look At You
 * Chicken Today And Feathers Tomorrow
 * I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day
 * We're A Couple Of Misfits
 * Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree
 * No Bed Of Roses
 * Frosty the Snowman
 * If Only Now And Then
 * Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer

Trivia

 * With very few exceptions, almost every character to ever appear in a Rankin-Bass Christmas special up until 1979 shows up in this movie, even if only in cameo. However, Santa's old friend the Winter Warlock is not mentioned, nor is any possible relationship or connection between himself and Winterbolt brought up.