To wind up the Christmas reviews of 2014, I have Santa Claus (1959) as I must review something that is truly horrible, even more horrible than the Christmas season itself, which is well upon us. I probably don’t even have to watch this horror show to review it, in fact, I don’t even have the movie and I don’t know if it will hit my mailbox before Christmas, and I really don’t care. Matt Cale has taken many bullets for Team Ruthless, so I guess it’s my turn and I hope this one doesn’t kill me. At least I will have found the answer to the question:”What Christmas movie is worse than It’s a Wonderful Life“. Â I’m going to need a shower after watching it…and an emesis basin.
Just kidding, I watched it here on YouTube. Not only is this by far the worst Christmas movie made, it may very well be the worst movie of any genre made, anytime, anywhere. This movie is possibly more damaging to Christmas than Bad Santa and The Evil Atheist Conspiracy combined, minus Fox News. This so called movie was tedious bore, but was also the creepiest movie that I have ever had the misfortune of sitting through. Santa Claus was not even close to MST3K fun, it was in fact just the opposite in that it was infuriatingly bad.The music was painful to listen to, the acting atrocious and the Narrator would put 10,000 Vietnamese peasants to sleep while they were running away from a napalm attack. Oh, and the English was dubbed as well. I don’t even know where to begin. Strike that, I don’t even want to begin or to write this review, I only want to erase every frame and every sound of this miscarriage from my memory. It was not remotely camp funny, it was just disturbingly bad, bad, bad. Let it be clear that I did not watch the MST3K version, but the original stinker, so please pray for me.
Here’s the plot, just for the record. Santa doesn’t live at the North Pole, but lives in outer space above the North Pole. Unfortunately, this concept makes more sense than anything else in celluloid strip of used kotex, it’s all downhill from there.This Santa doesn’t have elves, but instead has hordes of kids who he uses as slave labor to run his sweat shop and to man the bizarre astronomical instruments that are in place to spy on kiddies all over the planet Earth. Yeah, he’s a creep. After an excruciatingly unwatchable ten minutes of seeing the enslaved kids at the “International Toy Factory” sing and dance in their native costumes, we switch to Hell and an unhappy Lucifer. Lucifer is outraged that the kids behave and love Santa, so he dispatches his right-hand demon, Pitch, to visit earth, and convince little kids to lie, steal and undermine Santa. Of course, Santa thwarts Pitch at every turn, Christmas is saved with the help of Merlin the Magician (WTF!), and the shitty little kids get their toys after all.
After watching this movie you will feel like turning yourself into the Sex Offenders Registry, it is just that disturbing. After the kiddie slave labor scene and the look into the bowels of hell, it doesn’t get any less bizarre as we tour Santa’s lair, complete with menacing and nightmarish surveillance equipment that is operated by one of Santa’s precocious little squirts, Pedro. Lucifer’s henchman Pitch is more laughable than threatening, but Santa and his wind-up reindeer were enough to literally scare the shit out of the most constipated of little kids. This Santa is just diabolical, and the movie doesn’t intend him to be, but after decrying the evils of tobacco and alcohol, he proceeds to Mickey Finn the rich kid’s parents so they won’t leave their little brat alone in their 6,000 sq. ft. mansion. This kid eventually grows up to be Henry, in Portrait of a Serial Killer (see picture below).
Notable Creepy Characters:
- Merlin-It would be easiest to just state “All of the above” but some were creepier than others. What Merlin the Magician had to do with Christmas, I don’t know, but he was more laughable and ridiculous than creepy, so he’s not even in the running.
- Pitch-Poor Pitch, in spite of his magical powers he is so inept that he is not really scary in spite of his bizarre appearance. Santa always had the upper hand and even blasted him in the ass with a kid’s toy cannon. Why Santa was giving little kids military grade weapons, I can only imagine.
- The Rich Kid-This kid just freaked me out. He convinced Santa to drug his parents to get his way. Â IÂ don’t know what happened after that. I don’t want to know.
- Hephaestus, a knock-off of Vulcan, I guess he was Santa’s blacksmith and donned one of the worst chest wigs I’ve ever seen. Why this scene was inserted in the movie, I have no idea, especially since Santa often just opened a window instead of using his magical key.
- The Reindeer-These wind-up Santa transports were just scary. I really can’t put in words how bad they were, but in true Biblical fashion, they turn into a pillar of salt or granulated sugar if they don’t get home by sunrise. Vampires.
- Santa-He made you itch and feel dirty throughout the entire film, but the first 10 minutes where he is banging away on the organ (and undoubtedly his organ) while leering at the hundreds of young kids that he had enslaved to make his toys, could be the most PedoErotic scene in cinematic history.
- Lupita and her Doll-This little ruthless tyke not only gave the audience a crotch shot (shocking!) but at least was accurate enough to thank Santa for the doll, and not Jesus, like her mother did. Unphased by the terrifying dance of the bad dolls, she never quit until she got the Christmas goods. She made Ralphie in A Christmas Story look like a rank amateur. The doll that Santa left on her doorstep was lifesize and even creepier than she was. The dream scene with the ragdolls coming out of the coffin-like boxes is just inexplicable, but unlike a normal kid who would have been scared shitless, she remains unimpressed.
Quotable Quotes:
- “The devil loves rude little boys.” -Pitch
- “If you do not succeed in making all the children on earth do evil, you will be punished. Instead of red-hot coals you will eat chocolate ice cream” -Lucifer
- “We can make him our slave and take all his toys and candies” -Bad Boy (referring to Santa)
- “What food do they eat on earth.” -Pedro  “Oh, everything in sight! They eat most of the animals, the plants, the flowers, the roots, birds, even smoke and alcohol!” -Santa
- “Santa Claus, Santa Claus, Santa Claus, Santa Claus…More Santa Claus?…More Santa Claus!” -The Mexican Postal Service.Â
- “Into the liar’s box!” Â -Santa
Special Ruthless Ratings -or- What I learned from Santa Claus (1959)
- Santa and his reindeer are really vampires
- If you wander out at 5 AM looking for a job, you probably won’t find one
- Pitch doesn’t like frozen meals because they are bad for his digestion
- Santa uses wind-up cats to distract vicious dogs
- The number of times the movie was paused. Â Zero, this was the longest 93 minutes of my life.Â
- Overall rating? Â 0/10
- Come on! Â Was there nothing? Â The vicious dog chasing the wind-up cat was hilarious.