Santa and the Ice Cream Bunny

     Yes, the title of this post is a real movie. Can a movie possibly be as ridiculous as that? The answer, quite frankly, is yes... yes it can. And the best part is, it is not a (intentional) comedy! It is a kid's movie.

     Here's a little bit of history about the making of this film, before I go into the movie itself. In the early 70's, Pirate's World (located on current, unused Disney property in Florida) was not doing well. So, the company decided, as a last resort to make money, produce a film. "Santa and the Ice Cream Bunny" was the offspring of this joyous idea. I feel like knowing this helps one to fully appreciate this movie for what it is.

One of Santa's few times getting out of his sled

The movie starts at the North Pole in Santa's workshop as elves (kids in costumes) slave away at making toys. They sing a song that I do not remember a single lyric to, one of the many forgettable songs. Suddenly, an elf looks outside to see ( in a nature shot) "rein"deer, but no Santa. This makes the elves concerned, so they sing about it. Then, we cut to Santa, who was dropped off (sled and all) by his reindeer because they were too hot, I think. Santa's sled is stuck in the sand For at least 3 minutes, Santa sings a song that is mostly complaining about the hot Florida sun. This is interjected with various shots of children playing and being froze mid whatever they were doing. By the end of the "song" the kids unfreeze and (through the powers of mind control) all walk to Santa's side. The kids then proceed to try to help Santa, using various (obviously ineffective) animals to pull the sled out, including a gorilla, well a man in a gorilla costume. All of the other animals were real, and I can imagine many children were harmed in the making of this film because they were handling these animals with almost no help. For this whole part, Santa's fat ass stays in the sled except for two times (maximum) when he gets out to "help" the children. After all of this hard work, they give up and magically convene. Guess what? It's story time with Santa!! This is easily the most baffling part of this movie, and almost of any movie I have ever seen.

The following is all the story Santa tells the kids (it's a whole other movie!):
     A girl is walking through Pirate's World, an empty and dangerous "amusement" park that I can picture not being very amusing. She keeps walking until she walks into the room with a diorama and narration to describe. Here begins the story of Thumbelina. Yes, a story inside a story inside a movie. Very deep. This segment is all how the girl pictures the story of Thumbelina while looking at the diorama and listening to the narration.
     A lonely woman, who has not married and has no children, wanted a child. So, she does the natural thing to do: go to a witch to produce a child. I guess adopting is too mainstream. The witch then performs a song that I would easily call the most pointless song in the whole movie. It is also probably the longest song in the movie. It drags on and on and serves absolutely zero purpose, especially when (after dancing, mixing, and doing a lot of witchy things to a cauldron) the witch solves the woman's problem by pulling out a seed from a jar and giving it to her. This is the seed of life, bringing Thumbelina into the world. This was beyond creepy.
    Now, Thumbelina is alive. I can't even sum up the rest of her story it is that crazy, but I'll try. For some reason, T. leaves her house (I forgot why) and ends up spending a whole winter freezing outside. I really thought she was going to die. Suddenly, she gives decides that she should seek help, so she finds a house that belongs to a mole widow. I think somewhere in there I missed frogs that wanted to marry and rape her. At this mole's house, T. stays safe and sound until she meets another suitor: an older mole. After meeting, he takes her back to his home, a dark cave. Did I mention how creepy the mole costumes are? Well, they are. The mole proposes to her and she says yes. I thought she was going to get raped. The woman mole is very sexist and demands that women stay in the house, get married, etc. On T.'s wedding day, she gets cold feel and leaves. There is also a bird who T. saved somewhere during this.
     This is arguably the best part of T.'s story. After she leaves the moles, she finds other small humans. Of course, since she is Thumbelina, the prince instantly wants to marry her... a minute after meeting her. She says yes and they get married in flowers and they sing a song that sounded like it was on repear. I don't know... I gave up at this point. The End to Thumbelina's movie.
     Remember the girl walking around Pirate World? She leaves the diorama room and walks through the park again and sees her boyfriend (?) and they walk away.
     That's the end of Santa's story to the children.

     (At this point in the movie, an hour had passed. If you look at the title, you would see that one of the title characters has yet to be seen, mentioned, or even remotely hinted at.)
     Santa is still pretty depressed about not being able to move his sled, and the kids leave Santa - they just walk away. Then, comes the most epic entrance ever: the first showing of the Ice Cream Bunny (a man in a creepy disturbing costume)!!
     He is first seen driving a car, almost a pickup or fire truck I think. That's not even the best of it, there are children in the vehicle that a costumed man bunny is driving. Kids are hanging off the truck, literally!! This sequence goes on for almost five minutes, all comprised of either the bunny driving or Santa looking concerned. At one point, a dog almost gets hit by the bunny, and in the next shot, the dog is in the car. The bunny keeps driving, even through Pirate World at one point (it was dirty). This makes me wonder, why didn't Santa walk to Pirate World? It didn't seem that far. Eventually, the bunny shows up to aid Santa. After some "dialogue"/noises, Santa rides off with the bunny without the kids, leaving them stranded exactly where he was. The children all wave off into the distance as Santa and the bunny drive away, until they realize that they're screwed. Out of nowhere, the sled (the source of Santa's struggles disappears, presumably to the North Pole. The kids are like "WTF!" Then, over a shot of the bewildered children, a nice little Christmas message is added. This was the most un-Christmasy movie about Santa I have ever seen.

The Ice Cream Bunny's arrival

     Keep in mind, this was not a well-made film. It was one of the cheapest movies I have ever seen. The acting was horrendous, the costumes were ridiculous, the "plot" was pointless, and it was just creepy. This was just a hilarious, horrible, and horrendous, movie.

P.S. If you watch this movie, watch the RiffTrax version. It is hysterical and makes this train wreck watchable. As a matter of fact, this was one of the funniest things I have ever seen.

RiffTrax Cover

P.P.S. The Tumbelina segment was originally made for Pirates World and just added into the middle of this film for no reason. It is literally a separate film (with title credits and "The End") added into another film.