Santa Claus The Movie
(1985)
For the second night in a row, I watched a movie titled Santa Claus. Technically, this one is titled Santa Claus The Movie. This movie was released in 1985, when I was seven years old. I remember seeing it in the theater. This movie brings back so many memories for me, even though I didn't remember much about the movie itself.
The movie starts out giving us its version of Santa's back story. In fact, the whole first half of the movie takes us from Santa's beginnings up until the mid-80's. When the movie hits this point, things really start to get good. And by good, I mean, well, 80's. We see kids being jerks. Like the little diva ballerina girls who pick on the girl being raised by her aunt and uncle. During an argument about Santa leaving bad toys, we get great line of dialogue:
"My parents gave me a doll that says full sentences on cassette. You don't have any parents!"
Then the other little girl punches her.
The scene right before this is gold as well. It's actually the scene that leads to the argument about Santa's toys being pieces of crap. Patch the elf wanted to show Santa he could be a good assistant, so he figured out a way to mass produce toys. This didn't turn out well, and we see the toys breaking while the children are playing with them. The best part of this scene is the little boy with the wagon. The handle breaks off, and the rest of the wagon rolls down the street, where it gets run over by a bus. The way the kid screams, you would think he just saw a dog getting hit.
We also get to see John Lithgow as sleazy toy maker BZ, who makes dangerous toys. In fact, he's in the middle of a trial in front of the Senate sub-committee in toy safety for making them. They show a doll instantly going up in flames when a lit cigarette is held near it. They rip open a stuffed bear to find it filled with sawdust, broken glass, and nails. Her needs to clean up his image with the public to start making money again, and just happens to be visited by Patch (the elf responsible for the previously mentioned crappy toys), who thinks he is going to get in Santa's good graces. They make a special lollipop to give to all of the children on Christmas. BZ agrees to this to take the tarnish off of BZ Toys and to try and put Santa out of business.
Anyway, the special Puce Pop has a secret ingredient: the same stuff that makes reindeer fly. This, of course, makes the people who eat them able to walk on air. BZ wants to capitalize on the popularity by making them into candy canes and selling them on Christmas 2 (yes, Christmas 2). Oh yeah, did I mention that the candy canes are explosive?
I'm going to stop there, because I don't want to spoil anything else. You really need to watch this movie though. It isn't the best Christmas movie ever made, but it has just enough of the bizarre stuff to make it rather entertaining. It's up on Netflix Instant, so promise me you will watch it.
PROMISE!!
