Feature Commentary with Director Terry Zwigoff and Editor Robert Hoffman, deleted and alternate scenes, Behind the scenes special, outtakes

Rating: R for language, strong sexual content and some violence

When you think of Santa Clause, do you think of of A. Tim Allen or B. Billy Bob Thorton? When you think of elfs, do you think of A. Will Ferrell or B. Tony Cox? I know this may seem like a no brainer, but to director Terry Zwigoff, he took choice B. This is the third edition released of Bad Santa, and I would say three is enough. Originally there was Bad Santa, an R rated movie, and the unrated version Badder Santa was released the same time. This time the foul mouthed, chain smoking, sexaholic, alcoholic is back and in rare form. Thorton is hysterical as Santa who travels from state to state each Christmas with his traveling elf to work the malls and then rip them off. They get enough haul on Christmas Eve to not have to work again until the next year, then the cycle begins again. ****

In Phoenix, Arizona Thorton comes across a young boy (Canadian actor Brett Kelly), an overweight, snot nosed kid who befriends Thorton in spite of of his lewd behavior. Thorton gets thrown out of his apartment and tells the kid that "Mrs. Clause divorced him because he was sleeping with her sister," so he moves in with him and his senile grandma. There is not much to be said that has not already been said about this movie. Billy Bob Thorton is rude, he's crude, and he is sociallably unacceptable. There is enough bad words in this movie to fill a dictionary and yet it's so enthralling and funny I couldn't turn away. ****

This is the final performances of the late, great John Ritter, and every scene that he is in he manages to steal. His subtle, quiet humor is played in perfect contrast to the obnoxious Santa Clause. Bernie Mac is also key to make this sick, twisted film all tie together. He is the cheif of security in the mall, keeping both eyes on Billy Bob. The only strong female lead is Lauren Graham (Gilmore Girls) who plays a bartender with a sexual fetish for Santa Clause. I know, I didn't think it could get any sicker either. It's a good time though if you can stomach it, obviously not one for the kids. Image and Sound: The soundtrack of this movie "sleighs" me. Come on, that was funny. During this extremely uncouth movie, most of the background music is classical peices by Chopin. Of course there are the Christmas carols but they just make me laugh because as appropriate as they are to the movie, they seem completely innapropriate because Thorton and Cox are so aniti-Christmas. The film is in Dolby Digital so it's easy on the ears. Nothing new about this version visually from the last, still the same clear picutre. There are lots of bright reds and greens but that is to be expected for the season.

Only a few features on this version. I expected the directors cut to be jam packed but it was no big deal. There were deleted and alternate scenes. The deleted scenes would have definalty slowed down the flow of the movie so they were good to get rid of. The alternate scenes on the other hand were pretty funny because they replayed scenes and ad-lib another crude remark to outdue the last. The outtakes were funny of course but because this movie has so much language they didn't shock me. There is a behind the scenes special but that was just the actors and directors talking behind the scenes. The told of moments and scenes and the showed how they worked it out. The commentary was alright but it would have meant more to me if Billy Bob Thorton would have hopped in for a bit for a few words. At least I could hear the diaglouge when they stopped talking.

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