Tagline: Santa brings Christmas Fun to Mars!
Curiosity: It’s such a legendarily awful Christmas movie.
Plot: Troubled that his children are losing their identities due to Mars’ increasingly technology-based society, Kimar (Leonard Hicks) travels to Earth to capture Santa Claus (John Call) after seeing an interview with him on Earth TV. He successfully kidnaps St. Nick, as well as two human children, Billy (Victor Stiles) and Betty (Donna Conforti). On the way back to Mars, the traitorous Voldar (Vincent Beck) tries blasting Santa out the airlock (like in Alien!) only to realize THAT HE CANNOT BE KILLED. Santa survives the trip to the Red Planet and forces Kimar’s kids into fits of uncomfortable, troubling laughter. But all is not well, as Voldar plots to kill Kris Kringle.
Thoughts: I’ve seen some ludicrous motion pictures in my day, but Santa Claus Conquers the Martians might be the most preposterous (Preposterous I say!). The Martians all speak English, their technology makes no sense, and the ease with which Santa teaches Martian children to love makes me wonder why Kimar traveled to Earth in the first place.
This is also one of the creepiest movies I’ve ever seen. Maybe I’m just put off by Santa thanks to working near drunken imposters in my days as a mall employee, but John Call’s interaction with the child actors here is damn off-putting. Fast-forward to 6:40 and try not to be skeeved out:
Santa Claus Conquers the Martians - MST3K
by SFLTV
WHY ARE YOU LAUGHING? DAMN YOU.
At the same time, though, I have overflowing love for Kimar’s bungling robot from the film’s North Pole scenes. I also found his freeze ray interesting, in that no beam/special effect occurs whatsoever when it fires at a person. I like to think it emits a signal that induces a brain fart or something, providing the one kernel of plausibility in this Christian sci-fi epic.
Reflection: Voldar is a lousy terrorist. Also, ya know what, here's the whole MST3K episode. Happy holidays:
No comments:
Post a Comment