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A Buena Vista release. Written by Glenn Ficarra and John Requa; directed by Terry Zwighoff; starring Billy Bob Thornton, Tony Cox and Bernie Mac. Released to DVD on June 22, 2004. After a number of valiant tries to come up with a meaningful opening paragraph for my review of director Terry Zwighoff’s latest film, Bad Santa, I finally gave up. My attempts to reference the prevailing Hollywood logic and the craft of creating a blockbuster just didn’t fit with Bad Santa’s
Bad Santa is funny and, at times, so wrong that I wondered how the jokes could have slipped by the studio executives. Like when the little kid asks Billy Bob Thornton’s department store Santa what happened to his beard and Thornton replies, “The hair fell out because I loved a woman who was not clean.” “Mrs. Claus?”the wide-eyed tyke questions. “No,” Thornton responds, “Mrs. Claus’ sister.”
Thornton stars in Bad Santa as Willie, the worst department store Santa Claus ever. Willie is, as his friend and elf-colloborator Marcus (Tony Cox), consistently points out, ugly through and through. There isn’t a single positive trait to Willie. He drinks, he smokes, he is late to work (when he shows up), he steals, he swears incessantly, he is positively horrific to the children and he has a severe anger problem. When Willie meets and unexpectedly begins to form a friendship with a young boy with the unfortunate moniker of Therman Merman (Brent Kelly), his horizons begin to broaden. Slightly.
Prior to screening Bad Santa, I wasn’t exactly sure what to expect. I’d heard some good buzz about the film during its pre-release schedule, but also remembered Disney president Michael Eisner doing his best to distance himself and his company from Zwighoff’s film. Less than five minutes into the movie, I quickly came to understand why Eisner was tap-dancing. The film’s title card comes up as the red-suited and drunken Thornton is propping himself up against a wall, vomiting into a snow covered alley and the movie’s introduction to Willie’s work habits comes when Willie decides to soil himself in full view of numerous people rather than get up and use the bathroom.
Despite its well-written script, disgustingly three-dimensional characters and Zwighoff’s Picasso-like perspective of Christmas in America, Bad Santa would have been doomed for mediocrity without the presence of Thornton in the lead. Few actors have ever seemed as perfectly cast in a role as Thornton did here. Perfectly embodying Willie’s slouched, defeated frame, Thornton did the unthinkable in the part: he made the most horrifying, sickeningly immoral and loutish man in recent cinema history likable.
Whether Willie is chewing out the mothers of young children with food falling out of his mouth, taking advantage of senior citizens or offering his supervisors suggestions as to what they can do with their opinions, Thornton has given the audience no choice but to like his character. For better or worse, we are on Willie’s side. He has a teddy bear-like charm that, like that doe-eyed puppy, is hard to rebuke. Thornton accomplishes this Herculian task by instilling a subtle sense of sorrow and self-hatred in Willie. It’s hard to dislike a man who already thoroughly hates himself. When people tell Willie that he is an abomination to mankind, Willie starts nodding in agreement. The result is one of the most unique characters of the year.
Bad Santa is offensive, vile and surprisingly cartoonish… and those are its main selling points. Thornton is simply perfect in the lead and the mayhem he and Cox create on-screen some of the most enjoyable, entertaining and funny cinema in ages.
chris neumer yes, it's true: The idea for Bad Santa was conceived of by the Coen Brothers. |
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dark and irreverent tone.
Carefully shot and designed in the same style as the more family oriented Christmas movies Hollywood has to offer, Zwighoff created an eerily familiar setting in Bad Santa