santa claus (cinema history class)

Session: Christmas Themed Creepiness, Week 2
Movie: Santa Claus (1959)
Directed by Rene Cardona (English Direction by Ken Smith)
As always, there may be spoilers here. And the trailer may be NSFW and/or NSFL

Plot:
Santa Claus is preparing for his annual trip to earth (you know, to deliver presents). But the devil is trying to tempt those kids into being bad. Hilarity ensues.

Background and Reaction:
This was a Mexican movie until K. Gordon Murray bought the rights to it, dubbed it in English (and added narration), and took it on tour of the US as a children's Christmas movie. This should not have been marketed as a kids' movie because there's a whole lot of disturbing imagery. In fact, Keith told us that he was once making a library presentation on Christmas movies and showed clips from this. One woman in the audience told him that it gave her severe nightmares. But the marketing material made it look like a kids' film, so parents dropped their kids off at the theatres. And this was before cellphones, so the kids had no choice but to stay for the whole thing.

It's hard to know where to start with this acid trip of a movie. Oh, Lord, it's so bad and there's so much wrong with it.

There's the seven minute musical sequence at the beginning where kids from all over the world perform songs of their native lands in order to entertain Santa (who, himself, is a bit maniacal). And it's a sequence that doesn't serve any purpose other than to take up time. Then there's our first meeting with the devil (actually, Pitch, who is Lucifer's indigestion-suffering chief demon). It kind of plays like a cross between Lost in Space and the old movie musicals. And the strange just keeps on coming. Lupita's dream sequence (which  is supposed to show giant dolls come to life, except the dolls look more like corpses). The disembodied ear on a fan. The giant mouth on the wall in Santa's workshop (looking more like a vulva than a mouth, but it does talk). The creepy spying eye. The mechanical reindeer...

And aside from things like that, the story is a muddle. WTF is Merlin doing working in Santa's workshop? And why does he hop like a bunny when he moves? Actually, I assume that that was to make him look old. He was supposed to shuffle but it ended up being a hop. Oy.

The movie feels like an odd cross between Peewee's Playhouse and a high school PSA. The latter is due in large part to Ken Smith's* narration. "Lupita isn't thinking of stealing that doll! Is she? No, No, Lupita! You shouldn't steal! Put it back!" In fact, though, it's a big morality story. Actually, three morality stories. Pitch represents temptation, as he keeps appearing next to kids and encuraging them to do bad things -- like kidnapping Santa and keeping his toys. While Santa, who can read kids' thoughts, is trying to encourage them to be good. And one of the stories features parents who ignore their kids. Until Santa gives them a drink that will burn their throats if they don;t have enough love in their hearts.

Through all this, the movie feels disjointed, and it can be hard to understand just what is going on at any point. So it's really an awful movie.

That said, we in the class had a grand old time watching it. I was laughing up a storm at the sheer stupidity of it. There were only three of us, as Ethan, Sean and Joe each had to miss class. But Dave, Scott and I turned it into our version of MST3K. And, while we're on the subject, this was the movie featured in MST3K #521. I think the phrase "so bad it's good" is way overused. But this was a case where it fits.

Ratings:
Me:1
Dave: 5 (but 7.5-8 for the overall experience)
Scott: 1 (but 8 for the overall experience)

Bechdel:
Santa Claus fails the Bechdel test.

*"Ken Smith" was a pseudonym for K. Gordon Murray.