Christmas on Mars (2008)

Directors:

Wayne Coyne
Bradley Beesley (co-director)

Writer:

Wayne Coyne (writer)

Genre:

Music | Sci-Fi

Tagline:

Eat your own spaceship.

Plot:

Major Syrtis goes insane as he tries to improve morale in an abandoned colony on Mars through a Christmas pageant, where the first colonist baby will be born. |

Plot Keywords:

Mars | Oklahoma City Oklahoma | Santa Claus

Cast

Steven Drozd	...	Major Syrtis
Wayne Coyne	...	Alien Super-Being
Steve Burns	...	Major Lowell
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Fred Armisen	...	Noachis
Scott Booker	...	Sirenum
Al Cory	...	Lucus
Dennis Coyne	...	Herschel
Kenny Coyne	...	Ed Fifteen
Mark DeGraffenried	...	Captain Icaria
Adam Goldberg	...	Mars Psychiatrist
Freddy Harth	...	Lunae
Peter Hermes	...	Arsia
Josh Higgins	...	Simud
Michael Ivins	...	Deuteronilus
Michelle Martin-Coyne	...	Solis Chryse
Mark Miks	...	Marc Four
Jimmy Pike	...	Jim Eleven
Mark Schaper	...	Huygens
Kliph Scurlock	...	Orcus
Mikey Thompson	...	Nili

Runtime:

83 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.78 : 1

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Certification:

Australia:MA | USA:Not Rated

Filming Locations:

Austin, Texas, USA

Trivia:

Elijah Wood and Isaac Brock recorded cameos that were left out of the final cut of the film.

Goofs:

Continuity: The Martian's forehead antennae change angles from scene to scene - sometimes they are nearly straight up, sometimes at a 45 degree angle, and in one scene one is wildly askew.

Quotes:

Major Syrtis: They look like two moths, hovering around that light. Two moths. That's always haunted me. I must've been ten years old. Two little moths, sitting together on the window sill. I don't know why I did it. They were just sitting there, trying to stay alive. Just trying to enjoy their existence. And I just squished them. I wish I could go back, and change it. But I squished them. They never knew some larger force in the universe could show mercy on them. I wish I would have.

Movie Connections:

References Santa Claus Conquers the Martians (1964)

a very strange treat

I'm no fan of the Flaming Lips, although I have heard their music for years. I was drawn to this, however, because I like odd Christmas films & this is about as odd as you can get.

We have a settlement on Mars where it's Christmas eve, and the personnel there are getting a bit loony, and starting to see things, and become unbalanced. Along comes a strange being (Wayne Coyne, singer & songwriter of Flaming Lips) who appears out of nowhere just as a suicidal Santa runs out of Hatch Number 1 of the building, to of course meets with a horrible death. What's left of Santa is dragged back in, along with the Martian, who speaks not a word and is stoic throughout his questioning by the redneck commanding officer.

Apparently one crew member is in charge of putting together a Christmas event for the rest of the crew, and the Martian is eventually volunteered to wear the Santa suit.

There's a lot of strange things going on within this little colony, and there are equipment failures and crew members with degenerating mental states to deal with, but the benevolent Martian ends up wandering and manages to put some of the equipment failures to right.

This is mostly filmed in black & white but some of the color sequences are pretty interesting, whatever we're meant to be looking at.

There seem to be quite a few influences for this, and I was put in mind of "Dark Star", "Solaris" (the Russian one), "Eraserhead", "2001", and "Tetsuo The Iron Man". The acting isn't the greatest but that doesn't really detract from the overall viewing experience. There's quite a bit of dark humor to this too. I was quite impressed, overall, and this even manages to have a rather magical and mysterious feel to it, and even a relatively upbeat ending.

If you like cheesy science fiction & non-traditional type Christmas films then check this out, I found it to be a rather fun and interesting experience & well worth seeing. Not for the kiddies though, by any means. 8 out of 10.