Mystery Science Theater 3000: THE CHRISTMAS THAT ALMOST WASN'T

July 6, 2017 12:04 AM - Season 11, Episode 13

aka "Il Natala Che Quasi Non Fu." Mr. Whipple (not the Charmin one) is a lawyer with a case that may have far-reaching consequences: he's defending Santa Claus from being evicted by his evil landlord. Wait, the North Pole is ownable property? Isn't it just an ice floe? The promised Christmas episode the Kickstarter funded. As the Mads note, most people will be watching this nowhere near Christmas. Like on July 6th or around then. In subplot news, events are rushing towards Kinga's wedding at the end of the season... next episode. Movie in the hole! Episode 1113 is on Netflix.

Episode 1113 THE CHRISTMAS THAT ALMOST WASN'T
MST3K Wikia (as Il Natala Che Quasi Non Fu) - MST3K Discussion Board - TVTropes

Paste Magazine rates it 4th among Season 11.

Movie
Rotten Tomatoes (Critics N/A, Viewers 39%) - Wikipedia - TVTropes
IMDB (1966, 4.1 stars)
"Santa has to get a job as Santa to earn money to pay his overdue rent bill."
Directed by Rossano Brazzi. Written by Paul Tripp and Rossano Brazzi. Starring Paul Tripp, Lydia Brazzi and Alberto Rabagliati.

Notes:
The policy of some MST sites is to title a movie based upon what's shown on the title card of the film (if any) in the episode, hence "Attack Of The The Eye Creatures." That causes some issues with this movie though, where the movie's title card wasn't translated from its original Italian. So, some sites like the MST3K Wikia are going to list this one as "Il Natale Che Quasi Non Fu." Me? While I did title Eye Creatures with the duplicated "The," I'm not going to go so far with this one, and am sticking with the English title.

posted by JHarris (13 comments total)

how about "The Christmas That Almost Wasn't In English"?
posted by oneswellfoop at 12:58 AM on July 6, 2017 [2 favorites]

This movie makes a lot more sense once you find out what the deal was with the actor who played the lawyer.
posted by CheesesOfBrazil at 2:57 AM on July 6, 2017 [4 favorites]

It's kind of amazing how quickly Carnival Magic lost its bid to be the movie that I found most deeply unsettling of the season. Virtually every scene of this movie tickled my fight-or-flight instincts.
posted by Parasite Unseen at 8:22 AM on July 6, 2017 [2 favorites]

When they mentioned "Hark, A Vagrant," I knew this was my MST3K.

The whole I'm a little baby riff was hilarious to me, especially since it was built off such a small moment in the film.
posted by drezdn at 11:07 AM on July 6, 2017 [2 favorites]

Reminded me a bit of the Christmas cartoon with the mouse.
posted by Chrysostom at 11:53 AM on July 6, 2017 [2 favorites]

Here's the showing info--

Every Thursday, MST Club shows an episode a week on our long tour through the series. Lately we've been showing two a week, to get through Season 11. This week is one of those. Actually, it's the next-to-the-last of those, the week after next we'll be going back to normal pre-roll shows and cy.tube.

This week, the show is still on rabb.it, at https://www.rabb.it/rodneylives. Here is tonight's schedule (all times are Eastern/Pacific):

7/4 PM: 1113 THE CHRISTMAS THAT ALMOST WASN'T (next-to-last Season 11 episode)
8:30/5:30: YouTube Potluck Intermission (people contribute videos for the group to watch)
9/6 PM: 806 THE UNDEAD (Roger Corman directed!)

We hope you can make it!
posted by JHarris at 12:41 PM on July 6, 2017

Did anyone else feel a sort of Marxist vibe to the plot of this one?
posted by codacorolla at 7:26 AM on July 7, 2017 [3 favorites]

There was the fact that Mr. Whipple appears never to have billed anyone for his services, that he and Santa attempted to resolve the issue through labor, that their efforts were multiply thwarted by Mr. Prune, one time through his co-opting of a supposedly friendly property owner by purchasing his department store, and there's the fact that the eskimos (movie's usage) selling out to Mr. Prune was what put Santa into this situation in the first place.

The good guys care for money only as long as it helps them against the bad guy, who uses it as a tool of control, to stop behavior he disapproves of.

It's not particularly favorable towards capitalists.
posted by JHarris at 1:20 PM on July 7, 2017 [1 favorite]

I'm glad they stuck with the adult baby bit. I was kind of put off by it at first, but I fully bought into it by the end.
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 1:22 PM on July 7, 2017 [2 favorites]

This week in YouTube Potluck heavily favored my own contributions, I'm sorry to say. I did have an unusually large amount built up from the proceeding week though:

• An extremely creepy Andy's Gang bit where animals listlessly play "Jesus Loves Me" while Andy Devine tunelessly sings along.
• A clown hawks Post Sugar Rice Krinkles. He says, "It's sooo good, I krinkle every time I eat it!" Let that sink in for a second.
• Top 10 Failed McDonalds Products seems factually dubious, to me anyway. I'm still not sure if it meant the top 10 biggest failures, or the most popular products that failed. #1 was McPizza, sorry for spoilers.
• On The Ghoul and Froggy, I believe it was Foop who contributed this, a more recent appearance by Froggy the Gremlin, or rather a squeaky toy licensed product, getting destroyed by a gleeful maniac wielding a power drill. Noooo Froggy!
• Flintstones for Winston Cigarettes, one of the animated segments from the original broadcast of The Flintstones where they earn their keep by moving tobacco product, some time before the animated Joe Camel.
• Mysteries From Beyond the Other Dominion holds a special place in my part. Hosted by Dr. Franklin Ruehl, first on public access, then for a brief but memorable run on the Sci-Fi Channel in the pre-MST age, this early bastion of pseudoscience was held together by the personality of its host, who, though his mannerisms are perhaps a bit unusual (arm swing!), had a certain likeability about him, even as he pokes straws into a potato while shouting 'GUY-EEE!'
• Fred & Barney for Busch Beer Part 1 - Part 2: An internal promotional short bit made for Busch, this basically takes the form of a Flintstones episode where Fred and Barney get fired and end up selling Busch beer for the day, which makes a ghostly woman's hand emerge from the wall (or alternatively a cloud), caress male heads, and coo at them that life's going to be fine. The whole thing's like 20 minutes in all, but there's so much inexplicable stuff along the way. The narrator of the bit, by the way, seems to be the same one from The Selling Wizard!
• Nesbitt's Orange is a short whimsically animated bit foop dug up.
• Foop also found Time for Timer: Hanker For a Hunk of Cheese, from ABC Saturday Mornings! Look, a wagon wheel!
• And Snek contributed 2nu's funky Spaz Attack, a word of which ("spaz") I have since learned is considered offensive in Britain. Ah well. Snek also brought up Frank's Chair, but we didn't have time for it this week.

posted by JHarris at 1:58 PM on July 7, 2017 [2 favorites]

I'm still thinking about how The Regifter works.
posted by rodlymight at 10:37 AM on July 10, 2017 [2 favorites]

The actor who played the lawyer also at one time played a character called Mr. I. Magination and there was no crossover with Mr. B. Natural? Heresy!!
posted by ilana at 2:41 PM on July 19, 2017

You're never going to convince me that this Santa Claus was "given" the North Pole by the Eskimos. If they liked him so much, why'd they sell out to Prune?

No, I'm pretty sure the whole North Pole thing was some colonialist takeover thing that Santa got up to. The Eskimos haven't done anything before now because there wasn't much point. But the second somebody offers to pay them for the land and stick it to that Santa asshole in the process, they're all for it.

My question: how the frig was Prune getting to the North Pole anyway?
posted by tobascodagama at 2:48 PM on September 25, 2017 [1 favorite]