Santa Claus Conquers the Martians

This is one of those really dorky movies - extremely geeky! Yet it's fun, cute and a bit sweet... a little bit on the freakishly cool side too. It's one of the oddest movies ever made. It's very much kid friendly so if you have youngsters and are looking for a different kind of holiday film then you might want to try this movie. It's not great at all but it is one of those "so bad it's good" type of holiday family films.

I acquired a copy of this movie through the Sci-Fi Classics 50-Films Pack put out by Mill Creek. I'm very glad they added this one - it's a refreshing change. I've just finished re-watching this film and I'm reviewing it just about 2 1/2 weeks before Christmas. It was great timing for me to get this film pack and I had no idea this movie was in the batch of films until I received it.

4/10.

I really enjoy this silly little holiday flick. A bunch of serious Martian adults are afraid that their serious Martian children are too serious, so they go to a serious Martian senior citizen. The old guy tells them that the children need to be taught how to laugh, and then he explodes for no reason. The only logical thing left to do, of course, is go to Earth and kidnap Santa Claus, who we meet as he is being interviewed by the Rip Taylor-like Andy Anderson. I liked how in the movie's universe, Santa is unquestionably real and everyone knows about him. He really does deliver toys to everyone, toys made by a dozen elves (who all look like they're suffering from mini-seasonal depression). One toy shown is a toy rocket that runs on "real rocket fuel", Santa proudly explains. I would ask, "Where do little kids get rocket fuel?" The details of Santa's amazingly speedy mass distribution methods are not brought up, but it's probably black magic-related.

The Martians nab Kris Kringle and two little Earth children, who seem to live alone in the woods with no parents or family but are clean and well fed. The Martian leader forces Santa and the children to run their soulless toy machine (Soulless Toy Machine would be a good name for a band). Despite the numerous violations of human rights, it's all in good fun and everybody is nice and happy, except for one mean Martian (with a disturbing droopy mustache and a sidekick that looks like Jamie Farr) who plots to kidnap Santa (even though he's already been kidnapped). Santa encourages the kids, even the Martian kids who have now learned to have fun, to hurl lots of heavy mid-sixties toys at the bad guy's skulls. Through this display of parental negligence and bad music the evil is thwarted, and Santa is permitted to go back to Earth, letting the mewling half-wit comic relief Martian named Droppo take over the reigns of the Martian Toy Empire. (The Martians are out-of-shape guys in tights and helmets with antenna sprouting out of them, and what looks like diarrhea smeared across their faces. Imagine a guy dressed like that mugging worse than the teacher guy in Juan Piquor Simon's "Monster Island" and that's Droppo).

How can you hate this movie? If I were a little kid in 1964 I'd be enthralled. They packed this movie with nutty stuff. Elves get shot with freeze rays. Mrs. Claus is a frantic goofball. The Martian children sleep under strange lights and eat only pills. The bad guy's hideout looks like that one King Crimson album cover. I loved the part where the villain tries to shoot Santa and the kids out of an airlock, and the part where the bad guys meddle with the toy machine and the toys come out all mixed-up. There's a guy in a goofy robot costume, and a guy in an even goofier polar bear costume. And that deliciously idiotic theme song- "You spell it S-A-N-T-A C-L-A-U-S, Hooray for Santy Claus!" Oh, it's so good!

I sincerely feel the people making this had the best intentions, and while they didn't have a huge budget they made a fun, silly kids movie. If it was the same exact movie but done in Rudolf-style stop motion animation it would be a regular holiday viewing tradition.

Oh, yeah, and Pia Zadora is in this, as if anyone cares.

This has been ridiculed on "The Canned Film Festival", "Mystery Science Theater 3000" and "Cinematic Titanic": the only three to be mocked on all three bad-film programmes. Everything about it is so tacky that you can't help but laugh: a Santa Claus with a pipe who says "No Sirreee", a melodramatic Martian ruler, a polar bear that would be unconvincing in a pantomine. Still, the fact it makes you laugh means that it's not that bad. It wouldn't been on all three of those programmes if there were not a lot of fun to be had from laughing at it. I'd rather own something like this than, say, Richard Harris's first film "This Sporting Life", which is so boring that there is no way of getting any enjoyment from watching it. This is a bad film with a bad plot and it does get boring in parts, but it'll cheer you up on a bad day.

Maybe I have a soft spot somewhere in my heart for poorly written, badly conceived, silly 1960s children's movies - but I really can't understand why Santa Claus versus the Martians is in the worst 100 movies of all time here on IMDb. Sure, most viewers will breathe a sigh of relief when it ends, but this film really seems downright harmless compared to the six month old Kennel Ration Hollywood has been feeding us as commercial film for the last ten or so years. Hey, at least it's not a remake, a sequel, or a 2 hour long CGI cartoon with a few human faces tossed in for effect.

Santa Claus gets kidnapped by distraught martians (white guys with bad green makeup and a few dishwasher parts glued to their heads, as well as inexplicable capes), who want to rescue their depressive, antisocial children from the doldrums by giving them all toys and a big red-suited guy with a beard to laugh at... err... with. Santa adapts to life on Mars very well and starts cranking out the toys with the help of Martian machines, but political controversies surrounding his activities soon threaten the fabric of Martian Society.

I'm not kidding.... really.... this is the plot.

Aside from the ludicrous plot and mediocre acting (Bill McCutcheon gives the only really enjoyable performance in this film, though Pia Zadora and Vincent Beck are not too bad), this is no worse than many of the kid films of its time. In the age of ADD and general impatience, however, this film is more than a little dated. The only modern kid I can imagine enjoying this film is one with an extraordinarily great attention span and a penchant for B-films. In terms of production, this film has the feel of a 2 hour, 1960s low budget TV show, and is almost as clever.

I would recommend avoiding this film unless you're compelled to watch films which go to extremes. I found it cute, funny, and more than a tad ridiculous. To most people, it's a film version of your great Aunt's wallpaper - it's just there on the TV, while far more interesting things are happening in the carpet below your feet.

This is certainly a consensus pick as one of the worst (if not the worst) movies ever made - and for that very reason I've always wanted to watch it. Now I have, and my suggestion to everyone is - lighten up. Yes, it's bad. The sets are dreadful - worse than you used to see on Saturday morning kids' shows. The special effects are weak - although to be honest I've seen worse portrayals of space flight. And the costumes are hilarious - especially the polar bear and the robot. But come on - you have to admit that there's a certain "cuteness" to the story of Martians coming to earth to kidnap Santa Claus so that he can bring happiness to their children. All the characters are pretty one- dimensional. There's good guys and bad guys and fun guys and kids from both Earth and Mars. No one gets particularly well developed. And then, of course, there's Santa. In all honesty, I thought John Call did a decent job as the jolly old man. In this age of high tech special effects and big budget movies there's no doubt that this looks pretty weak - and even by the standards of 1964 it was still pretty weak. But it's good fun, and for the fun alone I don't think it deserves its reputation as one of the worst movies ever. What's left to say, except - "Hurray for Santy Claus!" 4/10