Review of Bad Santa (2003) by Haya B — 10 Mar 2011

Whenever you've had your fill of all the goopy Christmas movies, yo can always cozy up to Bad Santa. It's a new Christmas classic--one for the Scrooges. Billy Bob Thornton is at his hilariously nastiest as Willie T. Stokes, a smoking, boozing, hooker-loving department-store Santa who loathes all things children. So why the Santa get-up? He and his partner (Tony Cox) rob the malls every year and make off like bandits. Their new target is a store run by an uptight manager (the late, great John Ritter) and overseen by a hardass detective (the late, much missed Bernie Mac). But then things take a turn for the sentimental when Willie meets a kid (Brett Kelly) living with his senile grandmother (Cloris Leachman), and begins thinking it might be nice to settle down, preferably with barkeep Sue (Lauren Graham of Gilmore Girls fame) who has a thing for men in Santa suits.

But there isn't much to complain about from the script by John Requa and Glenn Ficarra, until the movie gets soft towards the end. But until then director Terry Zwigoff (Crumb, Ghost World) keeps the laughs and madcap revelry coming. But the movie is Thornton's show all the way, even in the bumpy spots. He's amazing.