Bad Santa

Bad Santa is a 2003 American Christmas black comedy film directed by Terry Zwigoff and written by Glenn Ficarra and John Requa. It stars Billy Bob Thornton, Tony Cox, Lauren Graham, Brett Kelly, Lauren Tom, John Ritter, and Bernie Mac. It was Ritter's last live-action film appearance before his death on September 11, 2003 (his remaining final films, Clifford's Really Big Movie and Stanley's Dinosaur Round-Up, were animated films); the film was dedicated to his memory. The Coen brothers are credited as executive producers. The film was released in the United States on November 26, 2003, and was screened out of competition at the 2004 Cannes Film Festival.[2] It received positive reviews and was a commercial success.

For the basketball player known as "Bad Santa", see Kenny Brunner.
Bad Santa
North American theatrical release poster
Directed byTerry Zwigoff
Produced by
Written by
Starring
Music byDavid Kitay
CinematographyJamie Anderson
Edited byRobert Hoffman
Production
companies
Columbia Pictures
Tryptich Pictures
Distributed byDimension Films
(North America)
Columbia TriStar Film Distributors International
(International)
Release date
  • November 26, 2003 (2003-11-26)
Running time
91 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
Budget$23 million[1]
Box office$76.5 million[1]

An unrated version was released on DVD on March 5, 2004, and on Blu-ray Disc on November 20, 2007, as Bad(der) Santa. A director's cut DVD was released in November 2006; it features Zwigoff's cut of the film (including an audio commentary with him and the film's editor), which is three minutes shorter than the theatrical cut and ten minutes shorter than the unrated version. A sequel, Bad Santa 2, was released on November 23, 2016.

Plot

Willie T. Soke (Billy Bob Thornton) and his dwarf assistant Marcus Skidmore (Tony Cox) are professional thieves. Every year, Willie gets a job as a department store Santa Claus and Marcus as an elf to rob shopping malls at night, with Marcus' wife Lois (Lauren Tom) as their getaway driver. Marcus takes his elf duties seriously, but Willie, a sex-addicted alcoholic, is gradually unable to perform with children, also affecting his safe-cracking abilities, much to Marcus's displeasure. When they are hired at the Saguaro Square Mall in Phoenix, Willie's vulgarity shocks the prudish mall manager Bob Chipeska (John Ritter), who brings them to the attention of security chief Gin Slagel (Bernie Mac).

At the mall, Willie is visited by Thurman Merman (Brett Kelly), a friendly but exceedingly gullible, dimwitted overweight young boy who assumes Willie is really Santa, and is constantly bullied by a teenage gang of skateboarders. At a bar, Willie meets Sue (Lauren Graham), a woman with a Santa Claus fetish, and they begin a sexual relationship. After some casual sex with Sue in Willie's beaten-up Impala SS, Willie is harassed and attacked by a man he had encountered earlier at the bar, but Thurman intervenes. Willie gives Thurman a ride home, where he lives with his senile grandmother (Cloris Leachman). Thurman reveals that his mother died and his father, Roger, is "exploring mountains"—actually in jail for embezzlement. Willie tricks Thurman into letting him rob the house safe and steal Roger's BMW 740iL (E38).

Bob informs Gin that he overheard Willie having sex in a dressing room and Gin starts to investigate. Willie sees his motel room being raided, and moves in to Thurman's house, much to Thurman's delight. Marcus is angry at Willie for taking advantage of Thurman, and states his disapproval of Willie's sex addiction when Willie makes a rude remark about Thurman's grandmother.

Gin visits Roger, who indirectly reveals that Willie is staying with Thurman illegally. Gin confronts Willie and Marcus at the mall, and takes them to a bar. There, he reveals that he has figured out their plan, and blackmails them for half the score to keep silent. Willie and Marcus’ partnership begins to falter, further exacerbated when Willie shows up to work drunk and destroys the Santa attraction, to Marcus' and Gin's shock.

Willie attempts suicide by inhaling vehicle exhaust fumes. He gives Thurman a letter to give to the police, confessing his misdeeds and the heist planned for Christmas Eve. Willie notices Thurman's black eye, and abandons the suicide attempt to confront the skateboarders; he assaults their leader, intimidating them into leaving Thurman alone.

Furious at Gin's blackmail, Marcus and Lois set a trap for him. Feigning the need to jump start their vehicle, Lois hits Gin with the car, Marcus incapacitates him via electrocution and then kills him by running him over with their car. Willie and Thurman prepare for the approaching holiday with help from Sue. On Christmas Eve, Willie, Marcus, and Lois burglarize the mall. Although some technical difficulties arise, Willie is successfully able to crack the safe. Meanwhile, he also gets a pink stuffed elephant that Thurman had wanted for Christmas. However, Marcus reveals to Willie that he intends to kill him, fed up with his increasing carelessness. As Marcus is about to execute Willie, the police unexpectedly swarm in, tipped off by the letter Willie gave Thurman. A fire fight ensues between Marcus and the cops while Willie flees. Determined to give Thurman his present, he leads the police on a chase to Thurman's house, ignoring their orders to freeze. He is shot repeatedly on Thurman's porch, but survives.

The epilogue is told through a letter from Willie, recovering in the hospital. He expresses his gratitude to Thurman, and reveals that he was cleared of the robbery—the shooting of an unarmed Santa embarrassed the police—and will be working for the police as a sensitivity counselor. Sue is granted guardianship over Thurman and his house until his father's release. Marcus and Lois are in prison; Willie ends the letter by hoping that Roger will avoid them and telling Thurman that he should be out of the hospital soon and to be ready for his return. When the lead skateboard bully harasses Thurman again, Thurman finally stands up to him by kicking him hard in the crotch and riding away on his bike giving the finger to the downed bully.

Cast

Production

In January 2002, Variety announced that Terry Zwigoff would be directing Bad Santa (his fourth picture following Ghost World) under Dimension Films, with Glenn Ficarra and John Requa writing the screenplay and the Coen brothers serving as executive producers.[3]

The Coens had developed the concept for Bad Santa, before eventually hiring the writing team of Ficarra and Requa to bring the story to life.[4] The Coens told Ficarra and Requa that the story would center on an alcoholic "bad Santa" who seeks redemption very later on; additionally, they wanted it to be as funny as The Bad News Bears. Afterward, Ficarra and Requa completed what they described as a "really crass script", with the Coens adding "a bunch of crass jokes".[4] When the script's final draft was sent to Universal Pictures, the studio rejected it on the grounds that "[I]t was the most foul, disgusting, misogynistic, anti-Christmas, anti-children thing we could imagine," all of which influenced Bob Weinstein of Miramax to give it the green-light.[4]

Casting

The Coens initially tailored roles for specific actors, such as James Gandolfini as Willie (since they had worked with him on The Man Who Wasn't There), Danny Woodburn as Marcus, and Angus T. Jones as Thurman.[4] Bill Murray, Jack Nicholson, and Robert De Niro were also considered for the role of Willie, but it eventually went to Billy Bob Thornton. Zwigoff cast Tony Cox for the role of Marcus and Brett Kelly for Thurman, which led to disagreements between himself and the producers.[4] Upon learning of Cox's casting, the Coens' told Weinstein that they "hate" him, and according to Zwigoff, Dimension was pining for "a more Disney-like generic cute kid" to play Thurman. "Maybe there are other actors who could do a great job with these parts. But Tony and Brett are just funny. They are these characters," explained Zwigoff.[4]

Filming

The movie was filmed in various parts of California. Filming began on July 8, 2002, and ended in September 2002. The "Miami Beach" sequence at the beginning of the movie was filmed in Long Beach, while all of the scenes at Thurman's house were filmed in West Hills. All of the Saguaro Square Mall scenes were filmed entirely in the northeastern wing of Del Amo Fashion Center in Torrance, particularly in the former Montgomery Ward building, which was used for the mall's fictional anchor store, "Chamberlain's." The store and the entire wing were both vacant at the time of the movie's filming. The wing and building where the movie was filmed have since been demolished and replaced with the mall's new open-air lifestyle center.

Reception

Box office

The film grossed over $60 million domestically and more than $76 million in total worldwide.[1]

Critical response

On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has a 79% rating, based on 220 reviews, with an average rating of 6.8/10. The site's critics consensus reads: "A gloriously rude and gleefully offensive comedy, Bad Santa isn't for everyone, but grinches will find it uproariously funny".[5] On Metacritic, the film has a score of 70 out of 100, based on 38 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".[6]

An editorial in The Washington Times likened the movie to an "evil twin" of Miracle on 34th Street and chided The Walt Disney Company for allowing such a beloved figure as Santa Claus to be trashed by Miramax Films, then a Disney subsidiary.[7]

Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times gave the film ​3 1⁄2 stars out of four, writing how Bad Santa was a "demented, twisted [and] unreasonably funny work of comic kamikaze style".[8]

Home media

In the United States, a theatrical version, an unrated version, a director's cut and a Blu-ray Disc version (which includes unrated and director's cut) have all been released. According to dvdtown.com, the special features for the theatrical cut of the film included: a behind-the-scenes special, outtakes, and deleted scenes. The unrated edition was released on May 18, 2004 and had all of the above plus a 'Badder Santa' gag reel and over seven minutes of unseen footage. The director's cut was released October 10, 2006 and contained the new version of the film (as Zwigoff originally intended it). It also had a new commentary (in addition to the rest of the features: outtakes, deleted/alternate scenes, and the behind-the-scenes feature). The Blu-ray Disc version released November 20, 2007 contained the unrated version and the director's cut of the movie. Among its special features were director's commentary, an interview with Zwigoff and editor Robert Hoffmann, along with other features ported over from the previous unrated version's release in addition to a showcase feature.

Sequel
Main article: Bad Santa 2

On October 29, 2015, it was announced that Billy Bob Thornton would return for Bad Santa 2, and that filming would begin in Montreal in January 2016 for a scheduled release of Christmas 2016.[9] On November 3, 2015, it was announced that Mean Girls director Mark Waters would direct the film.[10] On November 19, 2015, it was announced that Kathy Bates would join the cast as Willie's mother, and that Brett Kelly and Tony Cox would reprise their roles from the first film.[11] On December 21, 2015, it was announced that Bad Santa 2 would be released on November 23, 2016.[12] On January 6, 2016, Christina Hendricks joined the cast.[13]

References
  1. "Bad Santa (2003)". Box Office Mojo. Retrieved 2012-07-06.
  2. "Festival de Cannes: Bad Santa". festival-cannes.com. Retrieved 2009-12-05.
  3. Dunkley, Cathy (January 29, 2002). "Dimension Films more than naughty". Variety. Retrieved June 1, 2019.
  4. Fretts, Bruce (November 2, 2016). "How the First 'Bad Santa' Boozed Down the Chimney". The New York Times. Retrieved June 1, 2019.
  5. Bad Santa at Rotten Tomatoes
  6. Bad Santa at Metacritic
  7. "Bad Disney". The Washington Times. Archived from the original on 2005-05-01.
  8. "Bad Santa :: rogerebert.com :: Reviews". Rogerebert.suntimes.com. 2003-11-26. Retrieved 2012-07-06.
  9. McNary, Dave (2015-10-29). "Billy Bob Thornton Returning in 'Bad Santa 2'". Variety. Retrieved 2015-11-21.
  10. Gettell, Oliver (2015-11-03). "Mean Girls director Mark Waters to helm Bad Santa 2". Entertainment Weekly. Retrieved 2015-11-21.
  11. Kit, Borys (2015-11-19). "Kathy Bates Joins Billy Bob Thornton in 'Bad Santa 2' (Exclusive)". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved 2015-11-22.
  12. "'Bad Santa 2' to Hit Theaters in Time for Holidays". Variety. Retrieved December 22, 2015.
  13. "Christina Hendricks Joins Billy Bob Thornton in 'Bad Santa 2'". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved January 7, 2016.
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