So, back in September, the wife made me sit through a truly crappy horror movie called Antichrist. At that time I told her I was going to make her watch a crappy movie of my choosing sometime. The movie I chose was Santa Claus Conquers The Martians.
Well, that time was this evening.
I went through my collection but could not find the DVD anywhere. Checking my records, it unfortunately got purged when I was forced to jettison half my library.
Not to be deterred, I checked various streaming services and managed to find the movie on Amazon Prime.
I made dinner and we sat down to watch it. This is probably one of the cheesiest Christmas movies ever made. If Ed Wood made Plan 9 From Outer Space as a Christmas movie, it would have been Santa Claus Conquers The Martians.
I’ll give the folks behind this production props. I’m sure they meant well. They tried to put together a happy Christmas film for all ages. It was 1964 and the Space Race was on. We were trying to beat the Russians to be the first to land a man on the Moon. Astronauts were all the rage. They tried tapping into the public’s interest and put Santa and space together as themes and ran wit it.
This flick has terrible writing, terrible acting, the pacing is all wrong, and any conflict or tension is laughable. Was the public ever this horribly naive? (Don’t answer that).
The whole thing is terrible. It’s goofy enough that it almost reached the level of being so bad it’s good. Almost.
Not quite halfway through the movie the wife uttered the question that made it all worthwhile – “What did I do to deserve having to watch this?”
At that point I reminded her that she made me sit through the equally horrible Antichrist. I’m sad to say that Santa Claus Conquers The Martians is the more understandable of the two films.
I can only hope that the wife is more selective in her choice of movies in the future, especially if she intends for me to have to watch them. Of course, should she make me watch another really crappy movie, I’ve got one up my sleeve to make her watch. And I’ve seen more crappy movies than she has.
Maybe at this point we should be watching more traditional Christmas fare, like It’s A Wonderful Life, or Miracle on 34th Street, or Die Hard.
What’s your favorite Christmas movie, my Hordeling? Leave a comment and let me know.
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