Un santa no tan santo

Willie, a grumpy drunk, and Marcus, a dwarf, work together as Santa and his Christmas elf in shopping malls. This is not for the love of the Christmas season but because they plan to rob the mall when the safe is full of Christmas takings. Each year they change names and cities. This year they are in Phoenix. Willie is drinking more than ever, swearing in front of the children and having sex in the changing rooms... Marcus thinks all of this is unprofessional as it nearly gets them fired before they can rob the mall. The manager asks the head of security to investigate. While on duty Willie is visited by a child named Thurman who seems to actually think he is Santa... which proves handy when Willie needs a place to stay! Before the day of the robbery Willie gets together with Sue, an attractive barmaid with a Santa fetish and helps Thurman deal with some bullies.

If you are after a Christmas movie for all of the family this is most definitely not it! Our protagonist is not only a criminal but also a total degenerate whose behaviour is almost always inappropriate. If you are not easily offended there are laughs to be had from start to finish. Most of these come from Billy Bob Thornton's eponymous 'Bad Santa'; he does a fantastic job making the character sleazy but without making him unlikeable. Tony Cox is solid as Marcus; Brett Kelly is great as Thurman, a character I initially feared would be annoying, and Lauren Graham was likeable as Sue. The story moves at a good pace with none of the scenes being dragged on too long. There are one or two surprises before the end but nothing that felt unlikely. Overall I'd definitely recommend this as an antidote to all those saccharine Christmas moves.

I saw the trailers and knew what I was in for when I went to see Bad Santa. It's not Nice Santa or Naughty Santa, but BAAADD SANTA, horribly drunk and disorderly Santa. Rude and Crude Santa.

I laughed until tears streamed down my face.

There is a lot of sexual situations and profanity, but you have to look past it. Those sensitive to foul language should not watch this movie nor FOUR WEDDINGS AND A FUNERAL. This is not a kiddie movie, but a movie made for adults.

Compared to ELF, SANTA CLAUSE, and a whole raft of other so-so Christmas related comedies, this is one of the best. Most holiday humor movies are always on the lightside with an eye to the children market during the holidays. This one ranks in there with A Christmas STORY and PLANES, TRAINS, AND AUTOMOBILES and THE GRINCH WHO STOLE Christmas (cartoon version).

BAD SANTA is Christmas at its darkest, full of profanity, bad people, and evil deeds. But at the heart of it is a small bit of caring by one Bad Santa.

This is one of the best Christmas movie of all times. The casting is brilliant, and the chemistry between all the characters is very much present.

Billy Bob Thornton was especially funny as the loser in life who dons the red suit every Christmas. Just seeing Santa behaving drunken and swearing every other word tells you how different this is from the typical Christmas family friendly movies.

Bernie Mac was funny in his supporting role, and Tony Cox was OK. Billy Bob was phenomenal.

I've watched this movie twice already this Christmas season, and I loved every minute of it.

I avoided this flic when it first came out due to the reviews which concentrated on the 'cynicism'and 'edgyness' of the effort. It is crude.It is rude.And is is filled with enough 4-letter words to be its own zone of bad taste. Know what else? Billy Bob Thorton is masterful as is the rest of the cast.There are no 'heroes',but Billy Bob is not exactly an anti-hero either.He portrays a broken,dysfunctional loser who holds nothing in contempt so much as himself.Desiring nothing so much as extinction,he rambles through life hating EVERYTHING. But it's Christmas,and even for losers third,fourth,fifth,or 50th chances sometimes show up.Watching Billy Bob's character 'grow-up'during the film is surprisingly heartwarming.For a broken man,he does the best he can once he allows himself to 'give-a-damm'. See this for his performance(and the rest of the cast),and be surprised.

He drinks and smokes and pukes and wets his pants and has sex in public places. He has a horrible attitude, a trash mouth, is mean to little kids, hates himself, and robs department stores. Ok, so he's not all bad, but he is without a doubt the worst department store Santa ever. There's not a lot of stretching required of Thornton to get into character in this flick which capitalizes on the grosser than gross sense of comedy/humor as it wends its way through a simple tale about a scamming Santa and his dwarf/elf sidekick who rip off a department store a year to avoid honest toil. A mildly creative love it or hate it flick which tries as hard to be disgusting as funny, "Bad Santa" has, for obvious reasons, received mixed reviews. Only for the thick skinned who aren't easily offended by bad language, bad attitudes, or bad, bad Santas. (B)