Earlier this holiday season, I reviewed Elf, a warm and funny family comedy that embodied the spirit of Christmas through its adept capturing of child-like innocence and sense of wonder. But what about the children who don't always get to have a merry Christmas each year; the ones who've celebrated the holiday but haven't, for whatever reason, had a visit from "Santa" in a few years? Maybe their parents are abusive or in jail or something that the characters in the blissful wonderland of Elf would never even have to think about for a moment. Part of what makes Bad Santa so very, very good is that it doesn't hide, push aside or ignore all the pain and misery that can surround a holiday that's meant to be jolly; it's all brought to the forefront. Bad Santa is full of swearing, stealing, drinking, fighting, abuse, neglect, greed, double-crossing, perversion, sodomy, puking, pissing, suicide and murder. Yet despite all these things--or perhaps even because of them--the film achieves a heart-felt and touching embodiment of the spirit of Christmas to an extent that all the family-oriented Elfs could never possibly achieve, largely by contrasting it against many of the ugliest aspects of humanity. Bad Santa shows you the "rough," then slowly and subtly reveals the Christmas spirit "diamond" amongst.

Now, I'm not here to downplay Elf, I'm just using it as an example of your typical feel-good holiday movie. Director Terry Zwigoff doesn't make those kinds of movies. He has no interest in the "normal" or "feel-good" as is apparent in his previous film Ghost World about two loner girls fascinated with society's oddballs and outcasts. The same fascination could be said to hold true for Zwigoff. Bad Santa's cast of characters is a very motley crew. Billy Bob Thornton plays Willie, a drunken loser so miserable and disgusting that he doesn't even get up to go to the bathroom while working as a mall Santa, he just pisses right in his costume. When a boy pulls his Santa beard off he doesn't even try to put forth any effort to stop him. He doesn't care. The only reason he plays Santa is because he's got a scam going with partner Marcus (Tony Cox), a dwarf who plays Christmas elf to Willie's Santa, wherein they rob each mall they work at on Christmas Eve. Their ill-gotten goods always last just long enough to make it to the next holiday season when they begin anew at another mall in another part of the country. There's also Sue (Lauren Graham), a barmaid with a "Santa fetish", and a handful of other eccentric characters, but the true standout is a kid played by Brett Kelly. "Pudgy" doesn't even come close to describing this poor soul who wouldn't last two minutes on a playground without finding himself picked on by even the nicest of kids. It gets even worse when we learn that his mom's dead, his father's "away" and his grandmother (Cloris Leachman) is so old and senile that when he cuts his hand open and is bleeding profusely, his grandmother offers him a sandwich. Oh, and by the way, the kid's name is "Thurman Merman." Yikes. With no one looking out for him, Thurman is left to fend for himself, so it's not altogether surprising when he latches onto Willie's "Santa" in a manner which could be considered "unhealthy" if it wasn't the best thing going in his life. Hey, at least this "Santa" talks to him!