Fatman
Does Mel Gibson ring in a new Cult Christmas Classic?
Well, I’ll save you the suspense with the above question. The answer is no. But, while Fatman may not reach classic status, it’s a reasonably entertaining movie and worth a slice of your holiday cheer.
Fatman stars Mel Gibson as Kris Kringle AKA Santa Claus were he an embittered, gun-aficionado, Trump supporter pining for years gone by (sounds kinda like Mel) who no longer feels the joys of his job or the Christmas season. The kids these days, you see, just ain’t up to snuff and as a result of their epic naughtiness Santa’s gift giving has dropped precipitously. This lack of good boys and girls in turn has halved his U.S. government gift procurement stipend — like a federal Christmas stimulus program — Santa figures he adds three trillion to the U.S. economy — and he’s in dire straits financially and contemplating retirement. Luckily, Uncle Sam sweeps in with an offer to have the elves build weaponry during the slow months, which Santa reluctantly accepts.
You can pretty much forget that part of the movie though as the Army guys are totally unnecessary, and just added for some half-assed political commentary about the military industrial complex or something.
The real antagonist comes not from Santa’s budget, but from Walter Goggins, a Santa-hating hitman, who is hired by a disgruntled, spoiled child. Goggins, who I know best from The Shield — one of the first big anti-hero dramas — is pretty great, even if he’s a little all over the place, because the movie’s a little all over the place. Apparently his hatred of Santa is somehow the result of his abusive childhood — he asked Santa for new parents? — but this is never fully explained and like the Army bit is just kind of unnecessary backstory. Accept him as your weirdo hitman with a grudge against Santa — he needs no sadness or redemption. The kid who hires him is an acceptably clichéd rich, spoiled brat.
For an hour and forty minute action movie, it’s a bit slow at times, which is probably because it’s been padded out with unnecessary filler (some of which I mentioned above) which adds to the film’s tonal inconsistency — is this reality or over-the-top absurdity? Is it trenchant social commentary or holiday farce exploitation? (FWIW it can be both, it’s just not a A+ example — for better exploitative social commentary check out my last Movie Night post: Bacurau.)
Rather than adding yet another minor character or subplot, maybe the filmmakers could have spent a little more time digging out social themes they already established and/or just ditching them and adding a few more weird hitman scenes, or show some aspects of Santa’s Santa-ing on camera, though that may have been a budget constraint. Flying reindeer ain’t cheap.
All in all Fatman is a diverting enough way to spend a couple December hours and a film I could conceivably revisit next year during the Holiday season; I was reminded on Twitter the other day that Lethal Weapon is a Christmas adjacent movie — most all Shane Black movies are set during Christmas in fact — and come to think that could make a fine Mel Gibson Christmas double feature, would anyone ever want to watch a Mel Gibson Christmas double feature.*
*I actually did kind of do this as I watched Boss Level the other day, another recent Mel movie; it was okay and a fun idea for 15 minutes but meh.
