Truly Dreadful Film

I'll tell you why so serious

Best movie of this year hands down!

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

A miserable conman and his partner pose as Santa and his Little Helper to rob department stores on Christmas Eve. But they run into problems when the conman befriends a troubled kid, and the security boss discovers the plot. Bad Santa is easily one of the funniest Christmas movies ever made next to Home Alone 1 + 2 and Jingle All The Way although it's not for kids and people who really complain about it maybe they didn't get the message because this movie it's just a masterpiece with Billy Bob Thornton giving an amazing performance alongside Brett Kelly as The Kid who is easily the biggest highlight of the movie, Lauren Graham was also really good and i hope that the sequel is as good as the original because i'm gonna be disappointed if it's not. This isn't a film for kids it's a film for adults with some great humor and even tho it gets a bit over the top at times with a lot of bad language and some sex scenes still it's way better than half of this movies that everyone calls a "comedy" this days it has a good script, a great cast and hilarious performances and you won't be disappointed i'm going to give Bad Santa an A+

Sometimes genuinely obnoxious movies can prove entertaining. "Ghost World" director Terry Zwigoff doesn't pull any punches in his sarcastic, sacrilegious, but sizzling saga about a pair of thieves that dress up like Santa Claus and his Elf accomplice and rob a departmental store of everything at Christmas time. The first thing that is going to rile prospective spectators is the abundant profanity. According to the Kids-in-the-Mind website, the F-word or its derivative is uttered 130 times. This should slash a third of the audience for this interesting, artsy, crime thriller/ character study. Oscar winning actor Billy Bob Thornton is thoroughly persuasive as a down-on-his-luck individual who has dedicated himself to a life of debauchery and wound up masquerading as Santa Claus once a year as part of an elaborate crime. Willy (Billy Bob Thorton) is not the brains behind this skulduggery. Instead, Marcus Skidmore (Tony Cox) organizes everything. Marcus is as ruthless as he is short. He is a small person. Nevertheless, nobody should let Marcus' lack of height lull them into a false sense of security. He uses Willy to break into the safe so they can loot it for an eleven-month holiday until time comes for them to look for a new target. This time, they run into a challenging adversary, a Department Store Security Chief (Bernie Mac") who is as smart as he is cunning. In one of his final theatrical appearances, John Ritter plays a sensitive story supervisor who discovers Willy having anal sex with a customer in a ladies' dressing room. The second reason you won't like "Bad Santa" is the amoral behavior of the hero. He drinks himself into a stupor and often winds up bedding down a single girl. His only dictum is that she must cry "Santa" during their sexual follies. "Bad Santa" is a crude, rude, lewd character study with a surprise ending for what is basically a matter-of-fact crime comedy.

I know it's still only early November as I type this, but the ads on TV are already gearing up for Christmas, so what the heck… a big dose of seasonal humour in dubious taste is just what I need to help get me through the imminent long dark winter. Unfortunately, Bad Santa is not the film to fill me with cheer: despite critics claiming it to be uproariously funny, the film delivers about as many laughs as a double bill of Leaving Las Vegas and Requiem For A Dream.Billy Bob Thornton plays low-life drunken conman Willie, who teams up with 'little person' Marcus (Tony Cox) to pose as Santa and his elf to rob department stores on Christmas Eve. When Willie meets a troubled kid at his grotto, it looks a though this might be a turning point for the booze-addled screw-up, but no… he continues along his self-destructive path, being thoroughly obnoxious and foul-mouthed for the entire movie. Thornton's grouchy, abusive, misogynistic, self-destructive Santa is the be all and end all of the entire film—a one-note joke that isn't funny in the first place.

Bad Santa (2003): Dir: Terry Zwigoff / Cast: Billy Bob Thornton, Tony Cox, Brett Kelly, Lauren Graham, Bernie Mac: Unbelievably vulgar Christmas comedy about deceit or the wolf in sheep clothing. In this case it is the con artist dressed as Santa who appears with his trusty dwarf dressed as an elf to spread Christmas cheer before robbing the store. Billy Bob Thornton is hilarious as a bitter alcoholic who hates the holidays, which results in numerous amusing drunken outbursts in front of children. Tony Cox plays his midget partner fed up with Thornton's drunkenness, and practically runs an obstacle course just to defuse the alarms. Brett Kelly plays a naïve kid whom Thornton shacks up with when police search his hotel room. Kelly lives with his senile grandmother while his father serves time in prison for tax fraud. Bernie Mac steals scenes as a corrupt security officer. Lauren Graham plays a bar waitress who has a Santa fetish. John Ritter is featured in his final role as a squeamish mall manager. Superb setup that becomes a well written screenplay that may strike a note of truth to some. Director Terry Zwigoff who made Ghost World, takes a chance in a daring conclusion that works all the better because it doesn't play to the typical happy ending with a give and take. Not for families but it does stress the need to turn the bad into good. Score: 9 / 10