Rating: 
Summary: Raunchy, funny, but repetitive. And not for the kids.
Review: "Bad Santa" is a movie from that dirty magazine row tucked in the back of gas stations: It is thrilling, and funny, and eventually a little tiresome and disappointing, to watch Billy Bob Thornton play a degenerate, drunk thief masquerading as a department store Santa Claus. Appropriately named Willie T. Stokes, Thornton achieves a kind of white trash zen, slurring, stumbling and cursing his way through nativity sets.And Willie's just the jumping off point. "Bad Santa" is a comedy cast like a noir picture, where every player reveals a touch of the bizarre. There's Willie's dwarf partner (Tony Cox), a fat kid who takes to Willie as a father figure and Willie's Jewish girlfriend (Lauren Graham), who has a Santa fetish. Bernie Mac and John Ritter have smaller, goofy roles as department store employees; the late Ritter, sadly, is again cast as a nebbish, probably gay man for no particular reason and to little avail. The humor is repeatedly pitched at basic crassness, or maybe just a notch above, as Thornton and his co-stars run the same gags into the ground; there are only so many ways the dwarf can verbally dress down Willie, or Willie dress down the kids. Some scenes border on scatological "Who's On First?" routines. Terry Zwigoff's direction is painfully flat and amateurish for a guy who made "Ghost World." The idea, of course, is to offer perfectly intelligent, affluent adults a bargain-budget 90 minutes to indulge in the communal loathing of precious tykes and holiday materialism while extolling the virtues of loose women, cheap whiskey and stone cold burglary - essentially a middle finger to the very suburbanites that will be among its biggest fans. If your SUV can handle an evening in the cold, there are worse ways to get over yourself. Note: "Bad Santa" has drawn some fire from Christian conservatives for debunking that long held Christmas myth that, apparently, Santa and Jesus are long lost buds. That couldn't be better publicity for a movie like this.
Rating: 
Summary: This ain't no "Miracle on 34th Street"!
Review: "Bad Santa" is perverse, subversive and amoral. It is also outrageously funny. A true 'adult movie', it's not anything most parents would want their kids to see, but, then, I doubt it's something the people who made it would want THEIR kids to see either. After all, there IS life after the kids go to bed. The movie is like "Miracle on 34th Street" on booze. In that classic holiday tale, a drunken Santa Claus is replaced by the REAL Santa and everything turns out fine for everyone. But what if the drunk wasn't replaced? What if he had a partner, an adorable dwarf dressed up as an elf, and they had an ulterior motive, as in robbing the mall by which they were employed? What if the kid who doesn't believe in Santa but wants to isn't the sweet Natalie Wood of "Miracle" but a kid so lonely and so demented he makes your hair stand on end? Billy Bob Thornton plays Willie, the drunken, totally unredeemable Santa, brilliantly. It is a role many actors of his stature - not to mention many beneath his stature - would have been terrified to take on. He is truly one of the great character actors of his generation. He seems almost fearless. Tony Cox is remarkably funny as Marcus, the elf. In a world full of movies which play to audience expectations, it is refreshing to see one that seems to care less whether people like it or not. "Bad Santa" remains true to itself and, in doing so, takes no prisoners. It is a remarkable movie and, to me, remarkably funny one, too.
Rating: 
Summary: Too Much Good In A Bad Movie
Review: "Bad Santa" isn't really a good movie. It thrives on its mediocrity, which is odd considering that it was produced by the Coen Brothers, directed by Terry Zwigoff("Ghost World") and stars the ever versatile Billy Bob Thornton.
For the most part "Bad Santa" is a one joke movie. Santa gets drunk and curses at small children. Santa has sex with women. Santa beats up a paper mache reindeer. The joke is funny for a little while, but stretched out over an hour and a half, it becomes a little groan worthy.
Then the movie decides to put both Bernie Mac and the late John Ritter, both funny dudes, in thinkless roles with little too do, funny or not.
BUt the movie is worth seeing for Billy Bob Thornton, who once again proves he is one HOllywood's most versatile actors. When the sight of Santa stumbling around has long worn out its joke, he still sells the moments in a bit of meloncholie.
"Bad Santa" is neither great nor awful, but you would be well advised to wait for video
Rating: 
Summary: IT'S REALLY A PRETTY SWEET SPIRITED MOVIE!
Review: (...)Bullies pick on the little boy (and it's pretty obvious WHY they do), but eventually Bad Santa comes to the rescue. It is (seriously) heartwarming to see the bad little demon spawn brats get put in their place by SANTA! Cloris Leachman was in great form as the nutty grandmother left to care for the little boy. It's sad when you realize that he's being cared for by a senile old woman, and is effectively taking care of himself. One of the redeeming qualities of the movie is that Santa and his new woman friend look after the boy (okay, Santa's motives aren't purely altruistic, but he DOES end up taking care of the little fellow). I'm a sucker for a story about a misfit child, have been rather nerdy myself growing up. I was almost in tears ONCE during the movie, when Santa was mean to him. But, the end was well worth the watery eyes. This movie actually has a HAPPY ENDING. Yes, I said a HAPPY ENDING!(...)
Rating: 
Summary: don't waste your time!!!! Unless you like DARK COMEDIES!!!
Review: 1st of all I rented this movie as it was supposed to be this hysterical comedy. This movie appeals only to people who like DARK COMEDIES. I chuckled about 4x during the movie. It was so depressing, boring, stupid, and just plain unfunny. And even though I like crude humor, the jokes weren't that funny. What a disapointment! Bernie Mac plays a straight man, so if you like his humor you'll be dissapointed yet again w/ this movie. If you like movies like Brazil, After hours, and war of the roses, you probably will like it, but if you want a sidespiltting, well written funny movie this one COMPLETLY misses the mark. Don't waste your time with this movie like I did!!!! I wish I could give it no stars!!!! but 1 is the least you can give it.
Rating:
Summary: Use a little common sense, people!
Review: A couple of the above reviewers stated that they were offended by this movie. Well, don't you people watch trailers or read reviews? One can tell that this is an "offensive movie" from the TV spots. If not, then perhaps the R rating should be a tipoff. For those of you who are not easily offended, hate the holidays, and love black comedy, leave the kiddies at home and go see this film today. One of the darkest, funniest movies in years!
Rating:
Summary: funny, but empty
Review: A film by Terry Zwigoff I am not convinced that "Bad Santa" will be the new holiday classic, or even the new anti-classic (such as "The Ref" is). On the other hand, there is nothing quite like this movie available, especially not a holiday movie. "Bad Santa" is funny and profane and depending on your tastes, may be worth a look. The movie focuses on Willie (Billy Bob Thornton), a safe cracker who only works during the Christmas season. He works as a Santa in a department store, and with his partner, Marcus (Tony Cox), proceeds to rob the store's safe and set himself up for following year. Marcus is a midget, and he plays the role of the Elf when they are working the malls. Marcus also seems to be the brains of the operation since Willie is a walking drunk who is drowning who knows what in alcohol of any kind. Willie is a miserable individual and he is becoming less and less reliable. As Willie is playing Santa he encounters a kid (Brett Kelly). We never really learn his name and it doesn't really matter. The kid, however, attaches himself to Willie. He doesn't have any other friends and is a huge pushover, always getting picked on by everyone. Since the kid lives with his ailing grandmother, Willie decides to stay with them, too. As the movie progresses, we see more of the relationship between Willie and the Kid, and we also come closer to the conclusion of the heist. It seems like every third word was ... this and ... that. The humor in "Bad Santa" was more in the profanity than in being clever. I'm not going to deny that I laughed quite a bit, or that there were not scenes that were very funny, but by the end of the movie, it just felt somewhat empty, like nothing real happened. The characters were profane for the sake of being profane and I think that sometimes the movie just went too far. A scene would be funny, but the profanity kept coming on strong and it was just overkill. The other main flaw of the movie was that it seemed to be giving us the same joke over and over again. The bottom line is that "Bad Santa" is a funny movie, but not one that I can really recommend. After Zwigoff's previous movie, "Ghost World", I had higher hopes for this movie and those hopes were not met. You'll laugh and then forget it the next day. "Bad Santa" also features Bernie Mac and the last film role of John Ritter.
Rating:
Summary: Blood soaked wooden pickle steals the show
Review: After seeing The Matrix: The Sucking Return of Neo and his fake love affair with Trinity, I was on a quest to find something that didn't make me want to stick a pen in my eye. Unlike most of the crappola coming from the Hollywood Sewer these days, Bad Santa was worth $7. This is Oceans Eleven meets A Christmas Story meets Leaving Las Vegas meets The Wiz and is so ridiculously funny that your face may seize up from laughing so hard. Leave your prudish Grandma at home with her doilies and knitting because she'll just complain about the cuss words, which is what makes the movie hillarious and will force you to say "Grandma, this isn't the Victorian era anymore. People cuss now. That's what's funny, not some stupid joke about chickens crossing the road." Bad Santa has this incredible fat rich kid who wears 70s shorts and gets beat up by Mallrat skaters until he befriends Drunk Santa Billy Bob. The fat kid eats chocolates and invites Billy Santa to spend the night, Michael Jackson-style but without all the rubba rubba. Why? Because the fat kid is also pretty gullible and thinks that Drunk Billy is really Santa. The fat kid might have believed that because Billy is friends with this real life elf who he robs department stores with. This ragtag bunch of loveable misfits has some pretty madcapped adventures drenched in booze and deception. But the fat rich kid is trying to teach Drunk Billy Claus about the spirit of Christmas, which is kind of lame until the fat kid gives Billy a special present, a blood-soaked wooden pickle, which is so sweet it almost made me cry like a little girl baby with sticky fingers caked in melted chocolate and chewed up Dots and clad in a pink dress.
Rating:
Summary: My favorite Christmas movie
Review: After seeing this film I would have to say that this is my favorite Christmas film ever made. Yeah, it is offensive in so many ways; but honestly, it's great to see that. Billy Bob Thornton is great in this film and it is fun for the audience. I can not give enough praise for this film. I plan on getting it on Dvd and watching it every Christmas. People are complaining that it ruins or demeans Christmas, but to be honest what does Christmas mean anyway? I know the answer that we are supposed to give; but it seems that all Christmas is about now is holiday shopping, false sentiment, and over-used themes which make people "feel good." It's refreshing to see someone take a motif that has been pounded into our heads since childhood and tear it apart. I would say that we need more films like this; we are too safe and secure in our movies. Perhaps in some ways this movie attempts to destroy that feeling of safety by demolishing our notions of what a Christmas films should be. I love my new foul-mouthed, drunk, horny Santa....and how could you not?
Rating:
Summary: so wrong but so right
Review: anyone who says this movie was bad really needs to get a sense of humor. now ill admit this isnt the BEST movie ive seen, but it is incredibly funny and incredibly offensive, but in a good way. totally worth watching, especially with the holidays upon us.
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