Directed by Idiots!
Written by Fucking Idiots!
Based onSevere butchering of beloved stories and characters!
Starring Nobody that ever did anything significant ever again! (besides one little girl who co-started in a movie with William Shatner)
Release Date (more like inflicted!): November 18, 1972 (God have mercy on any child that had to see this in theaters!)
Running Time: Excruciating! Basically 1hr 35min (depending on the cut), but it feels 50x longer!
Rating: G (I assume for GOD AWFUL!)
The elves at the North Pole sing an awful song (the first of many in this movie!) wondering where the hell Santa Claus is, as Christmas is just around the corner. Then a drunk sounding narrator chimes in explaining that Santa and the reindeer where flying around for some reason, when the sled crashed on a beach in Florida. The reindeer left Santa’s fat ass behind because of the heat, and now he’s just baking in the sun complaining about his predicament.
Why Santa won’t move leave his sled and seek out help (or take his coat off to be more comfortable), I have no fucking idea. The narrator drones on and on about how it’s hot, as he just sits there like an idiot. I should also point out that the sled isn’t even partially buried in the sand! It’s barely covering the runners! There is no reason for it to be stuck, and no kid is stupid enough to believe otherwise! But this movie (specifically the filmmakers), think kids are idiots! It has ZERO respect for its target audience!
Santa eventually starts singing the next awful song! Not one song in this thing is good, they’re all awful, and Santa is probably the worst singer of the bunch. He’s also very clearly dubbed over! The whole movie I’m guessing was filmed with no sound, and you never see his mouth move (you can’t really see it behind his “totally real” beard), and the “actor” playing him was just told to move his arms around like he was conducting till it was over. While he sings, we cut to a bunch of kids doing kid things (wrestling in the yard, throwing a frisbee, skipping rope, jumping off roofs with lawn umbrellas!), and they all get frozen in place(?) for some reason. I honestly don’t know why this happens, which will basically be a running theme throughout this thing…
Once Jolly Ol’ St. Shithead is done warbling out this oh so amazing tune, he collapses back onto the seat of the sleigh and appears to pass out (as evident by his overdubbed snoring). He then seems to telepathically call out to all the random children who were frozen in time earlier (saying some by name, then just girls, and kids), and they all go rushing towards his location. How far some of them are from said beach I have no idea (or care), but it seems in the 70s parents weren’t as concerned about their kids running off to random places on their own. A much simpler, stupider time, folks!
Meanwhile Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn are riding in a raft nearby when they hear all the commotion. I’m not joking! Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn! On a raft, with a raccoon, drifting around the nearby waters! While a kazoo rendition of “Old Man River” plays! [So, apparently the guy in charge of this whole wretched production, Barry Mahon, was attempting to make his own movie with these two characters, but gave up after one day of filming (what a pro!), but had this footage of them inserted into the film to make some use of it I guess, hence why you never actually see them interact with anyone else.]
How the hell did they get there!? Forget the fact that they’re fictional literary characters for a moment (we’re dealing with a movie where Santa Claus is stuck on a beach, all bets are off here!), the Mississippi River is over 100 miles from the nearest Florida beach! Also, they’re in a flimsy raft that would most likely be swept out to sea! This is one horrible aspect of the public domain! When classic characters get put into pieces of shit like this! Also their stories are set in the 1800s!
Anyway! The kids that actually appear in the footage with Crap Kringle show up to ask him what the fuck he’s doing there (not in those exact words I assume, but the movie is dubbed so they could’ve been cursing the whole time filming. I would be!), and I’m not sure which kid is talking at at any point in this (because of the dubbing), as you’ll see multiple kids talking while one voice speaks. One kid suggests hitching a ride on a plane (that’s how that works!), but Dumbass Claus points out what will he do about his sleigh? Um… just make a new one? You have a whole bunch of (I assume) free labor (most likely slaves) back at the North Pole! If they can manufacture toys then I’m sure they can build a sleigh! But what the fuck do I know!? I’m not a professional screenwriter! The kids run off to get some sort of help, while Imbecilniklaas sits in the sleigh complaining more about how fucking hot it is! He gets out at one point to attempts to dig his sleigh some out of the sand, but he can’t possibly dig it out of those few centimeters of goddamned sand! So he naturally gives up and continues to bitch about the heat!
Eventually (after what feels like an eternity, a running theme here), a kid returns with a totally real gorilla (and not a random homeless junkie in a suit), in the first of many excruciatingly long scenes of trying to pull the sled out of the few inches of sand. By god, we will get this shit to feature length! That fails, so they try using a pig (all other animals at this point are real), then a mule, then a horse, maybe some other animals and in different orders too, I’m really not sure. Your brain starts shutting off and on watching the monotony occur, that you forget exactly what all happens.
One thing is for sure, these animals are not happy to be here! I can’t blame them! I feel the most sorry for them, even more so than than the undoubtably miserable kids forced into this! They at least have some idea of what the fuck is going on! The animals meanwhile are just wondering why they’re being pulled around on a hot ass beach, being pushed around by random kids! I’m shocked none of them went crazy and started trampling some folk! Also, when Santa attempts to push an animal you can see the bottom of his pants, and I’m almost positive that he shit his britches! I’m not trying to be funny here (well, maybe a little), there’s some kind of dark stain there on his ass! I know I’m not the only one thinking it!
So yeah, the animals are a bust (that sled apparently weighs several tons), and Papa No-way-in-hell-am-I-moving starts complaining some more about the heat! The narrator chimes in again talking about “poor Santa” (fuck this old bastard) and what they were goin to do. All the kids are now seated in front of the sleigh, looking even more miserable than before. Father Shitsnas says they can’t give up hope, and that he’s never let them down (tell that to any poor sonuvabitch that had to sit through this!), and decides to tell them a story that will relate to not giving up Spoilers! This has NOTHING to do with anything related to our so called story!
And this is where the movie cuts to a completely different movie, which (depending on what cut you’re watching), features a bastardized adaptation of Thumbelina or Jack and the Beanstalk. Neither connects to the main story in any way! The guy dubbing Santa isn’t even narrating either story. In fact, Jack and the Beanstalk has no narration, so in that way it’s has a “better flow” to it. Because of how Thumbelina was edited in, it leads to even more what the fuck situations. I shall explain in my descriptions of each version, starting with… [I don’t want this review to be as crazy long as it is already, so the reviews involving the two fairy tales will be separated into different entries.]
That Geek With The Clip-Ons 