Santa Claus conquers the Martians 1964 Review

Santa Claus Conquers the Martians

Beam me up, Rudolph 

Well, I woke up this morning and realized it had been a while since I talked to my old friend ‘reality’, but when I called that tricky mistress she just reminded me of the massive restraining order she had placed on me ever since I started to review movies, so here’s to the Christmas spirit: “Santa conquers the Martians” …in January.

Yes, I’ll have to apologies once more for my lack of reviews the past weeks, due to pesky family members and their silly traditions and habits, if you don’t mind, I’m gonna watch a movie about Martians kidnapping Santa.

Yes, this little trainwreck of a movie was introduced in 1964, and although the title is slightly misleading, it does involve space travel with the fatmeister himself, Santa Claus.

On Mars (never a good sign when a review starts with these two words) the Martian children are obsessed with earth’s broadcasts and culture, especially around Christmas when the good little boys and girls of earth get all kinds of goodies. The Martian adults are worried for the wellbeing of their children and decide that the best way to deal with this issue is to kidnap the fatman and force him to work on Mars to make toys.

Well, if you manage to read all that without banging your head against any kind of surface, you’ll notice that one, Santa doesn’t really conquers anything (well, technically he does, in a Christmas spirit kind of way), and two, this is in no way a horror/action or anything that I would normally review, but to be fair, I’m gonna make an exception for this one just on the name alone.

But yes, this movie is incredibly silly, but I get the idea that the creators actually meant for it to be a charming family picture, which makes me feel kind of bad for them when this movie had me laughing at just how incredibly bad it is.

At first I was hoping that they would go at it in a comedic angle, so that when they come to earth they pick up a mall Santa and highjinx ensue, but they actually kidnaps the real Santa, and two little annoying brats so the little drool-monsters watching this mess can identify I guess. And the whole world is in an uproar, meaning they knew Santa was real, so is this movie meant for children under the age of four? Well I sure as hell hope not, it’ll scare the living hell out of them when strange men painted green in thigh spandex and silly hats walk in the room with their robot made out of tin foil, oh wait, that’s just me and my very specific and somewhat disturbing phobia.

 But yes, the props and the effects are bad, and when I say that, I mean that the kindergarten plays next door looked more believable. But damn if it isn’t entertaining to watch.

At some point in the movie a guy with a long fur coat and a hat slightly resembling something that might have once been a polar bear costume walks in the set and we’re actually supposed to believe that it’s a bear?

But wait till you see the robot the Martians use to attack the north pole, he came in the night, two bright lights in the distance and walked toward the large papier-mâché rocks in all its cardboard glory as I fell to the floor gasping for air so I could somehow laugh harder. Sweet Jesus, if the props would be an actor, they’d be Tommy Wiseau, so bad it hurts in all the good places. I want to find the guy who made the costumes and hand him an award, because god knows we need the challenged persons to feel good about themselves.

Is Santa Claus Conquers the Martians any good? Oh god no, but that didn’t stop me from having fun. It’s a hidden cult classic that manages to do everything wrong and it’s damn enjoyable to see. You might think it’s strange but I actually do recommend watching it, then again, I like bad movies as long as they can keep me entertain.

So yeah, give it a watch if you come across it and feel bad for the people that actually put money into making this movie.

And merry Christmas guys, thanks for sticking with me and these silly movies.

Personal Rating: 6.5/10

Critical Rating: 2/10

Things I’ve learned from “Santa Claus conquers the Martians”:

- Santa bear is a 'thing' apparently.

- The fact that the Martians didn’t even ponder on the question of how Santa was going to breathe on Mars, let alone not explode smearing giblets of gory joy on the faces of the little Martian children quickly realizing something might be wrong, makes me wonder how the hell they even managed to build a spaceship, although then again, how hard can it be to make one out of  cardboard and tin foil.