With Christmas practically upon us, it's time to look back at some Yuletide classics. We've discussed the ones that truly resonate with everyone around the season--like Die Hard. Or Jingle all the Way. Or Gremlins. Yeah, and maybe one day I'll do something obscure, like It's A Wonderful Life. But for now, I'll touch on a movie that's infamous to connoisseurs of crap, one mocked for having all the festive spirit of a LSD-spiked Christmas pudding: Santa Claus Conquers the Martians.
This...interesting piece was the brainchild of Paul Jacobson, who assigned Nicholas Webster to direct. I can only surmise the writing process involved a very hazy simultaneous watching of both the original Miracle on 34th Street, Plan 9 from Outer Space, and a bootleg version of Forbidden Planet. All of it ultimately coming together with, as with everything in the sixties, copious amounts of fantastic new narcotics. And, just to be sure, the producers made sure everyone else on the set was high as well.
Still, the film doesn't waste time with trying to keep the kids from seeing Santa (John Call), who here seems to be a very easily amused if slightly senile fella. Indeed, Santa's existence in this universe is very public, as a TV crew at the very beginning can apparently just waltz into his workshop, after spending a good two minutes complaining about the Arctic cold, while standing out in said cold. After a good deal of rambling from Santa, we cut to what we really want--the Martians in question. Brilliantly, the denizens of the Red Planet are just people spray-painted green wearing deformed kitchen appliances on their heads. Such is the incredible worldbuilding on display here, that we even learn they refer to the month of December as 'Septorber'.
Nevertheless, the ruling Martians are displeased with their kids being hooked on Earth television and learning of such concepts as 'joy' and 'Santa Claus'. They should consider themselves lucky that it's not twenty-odd years later and they'd have entire channels dedicated to human reproduction. As such, it becomes their imperative to kidnap Santa, evade the ever-pervasive forces of US military stock footage you always get in these films, and eventually, forcibly take a pair of obnoxious child characters to help them pinpoint the real Santa. With the help of a robot so fake that it'd get the Ro-Man himself rolling around in hysterics, the Martians concentrate the power of their inexplicable headpieces and one of their porno mustaches to spirit him to Mars.
The movie gets even more flummoxing when we fully bring Cold War space programs and military efforts into it, with a fair few minutes devoted to the efforts of the US government and even a Von Braun pastiche discussing a potential rescue mission. It turns out all Kennedy needed to accelerate his dream was for bumbling green-painted imbeciles to steal Santa Claus. Sure, Earth might be menaced by automatons stumbling out of a kindergarten play, but at least in this timeline, both the horrors of Vietnam and the Brady Bunch might be averted.
Nevertheless, once Santa is on Mars, all it takes is his jolliness and cheer to start turning the minds of Martians not fully on board with their leadership's policy of literally forbidding fun. After a lot of hijinks involving Santa turning their paraphernalia on their own, the movie finally drops the acid at the end when our favorite festive icon does indeed conquer the Martians. By way, that is, of a bizarre middle finger to sanity in which toys, 'tickle rays', bubble machines, and other random crap is used by kids of Earth and Mars to finally...bubble their oppressors into submission. All the while, Santa laughs like how every grass-consuming hippie discovering the back of their own hand would a few years after this movie was made.
It's easy to see how this movie has held up as a fixture of bad movies, indeed as the absolute acme of bad Christmas movies, in the fifty-five years since it was made. It's barely coherent, nonsensical, but there was an effort to do something unique here, that had some sort of point to say. Even if said point was obfuscated a bit by the ganga fuelling the script. Strangely, some of the actors do seem to be doing about as best as they could with the material, so honestly, there is some watchability to this thing. There's little else quite like it, so if you want to start entering the gonzo realms of Crimbo flicks, this is about the optimal one to start with! Grab some mulled wine, and a hell of lot stronger stuff to that, and you might just have fun.
Either way--Martians or no Martians, enjoy your Christmas, and whatever celluloid celebrations, coherent or not, may go with it...
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