Le Martien de Noël [The Christmas Martian] (1971)

Okay, here's the disclaimer: I watched the version of The Christmas Martian that was readily available to me on streaming, which was a mangled, outdated US release. In addition to being badly dubbed, this version features scenes with what appear to be jaw-droppingly bad exposure, washing out entire sequences to the point they're barely discernable. There is now a better option - the movie has been remastered and released on blu-ray through Vinegar Syndrome, and if you're planning to watch this...

Actually, why exactly are you determined to watch this?

I don't mean that in a snide way way. Literally, what is inspiring you to track down this micro-budgeted, presumably drug-fueled children's movie (or maybe special) from Canada? Because if this is something you remember from your childhood or want to see for academic reasons or anything of the sort, by all means spend the money to get the good version - because it absolutely matters. But if you're looking for something to laugh at or watch with friends or something, maybe just stream a free or cheap copy and buy something better from Vinegar Syndrome. You can always watch the remastered trailer on YouTube afterward to see what you were missing.

If you clicked on that without any background with this thing, be aware it's looks exponentially better than what I just watched. Not that I think it matters, because - as you can see - this still looks cheaper than virtually anything made for television in the past five decades. And, more importantly, the look of the movie is less distracting than the pace and story (or lack thereof). Either way, you're watching an hour of basically nothing, through the filter of bad children's entertainment. It's just a matter of what level of cheap visuals you're willing to accept.

Let's back up. I found this listed in Alonso Duralde's Have Yourself a Movie Little Christmas in the "Worst Christmas Movies Ever" chapter. Unsurprisingly, it's included for a reason. Multiple reasons, in fact.

Which isn't to say there's nothing here that's interesting. The dated sci-fi designs for the alien spaceship are occasionally fun, if unoriginal, and the movie absolutely delivers on its weird-for-the-sake-of-weird reputation, with bizarre non-sequiturs, baffling asides, and other choices that will make you wonder whether the bulk of this thing's budget was spent on drugs, candy, or a crane rental.

The plot is...

I mean...

Does it have a plot? A couple kids in Canada find an alien in winter. They hang out with it for a day and help it fix its spacecraft while the locals try and track it down. When the ship is fixed, it takes them on a joyride somewhat similar to sequences in The Flight of the Navigator in the 80s, albeit with much cheaper visual effects. Then the police chase the alien around a while, but it uses magic space tech to evade and mock them. Then it goes home.

That's it. That's the whole hour. Nothing else of significance occurs, unless you count the kids and alien "borrowing" a snowmobile, plow, and stealing their parents' Christmas dinner. You shouldn't count any of that as important, by the way. Hell, you shouldn't count the above paragraph. It's all just kind of badly shot nonsense, like someone who's never heard of postmodernism reinventing postmodernism in real time.

Thematically, this peppers in rote liberal ideas from the era: there's a line or two about environmentalism, the usual lip-service towards getting along with those different than you, and... I guess no one thought to tell them having the alien briefly dress up as a native American was in poor taste? Did they know that was in poor taste in 1971? They damn well should have.

Honestly, there's not much more to say about this. It seems to have a reputation for being so bad it's good, but - for me, at least - it doesn't clear that bar. It's bad enough to be intermittently interesting, I suppose, the kind of thing you gawk at in disbelief as it spends its runtime not telling a story. But the bad media I've found most rewarding tends to have a sort of madcap energy that makes it compelling and fun. This was the wrong kind of incompetent filmmaking.

Your mileage may vary, of course. What makes bad Christmas movies and bad sci-fi movies interesting is subjective - I can easily imagine someone viewing this through a more favorable lens than mine. But unless you're a connoisseur of bad movies, you're probably better off skipping this. Don't think you're getting another Santa Conquers the Martians here: this makes that look like an Academy Award winner.