By Geno McGahee
I’m a big fan of Bryan Cranston. He is always bringing a great performance to every role that he takes and he has great range, doing drama to comedy and all in between, but the 2001 Disney film “TWAS THE NIGHT”, proves that even a great actor like Cranston can stink up the screen if the story and screenplay suck donkey dong.
Nick Wrigley (Cranston) is a scammer that is estranged from his family, for the most part. He has recently screwed over a couple of guys and owes thirty grand to make it right. When they threaten him with a beat down from a goon, he goes on the run and wears a disguise to escape. Since this is a holiday movie, he dresses as Santa, of course.
Nick’s brother, John (Barclay Hope), wants nothing to do with his brother and thinks that he’s had some negative influence on his son, Danny (Josh Zuckerman). Danny has been doing what he can to make money, including tricking his younger brother, Peter (Rhys Williams), out of cash. When Danny brings up that his Uncle Nick makes a lot of money through sales, John has none of it, calling his brother a scammer but I could see that he wanted to say more but kept thinking “damn, this is a fucking Disney film. I can’t call him the cocksucker he is.” I hope they have an unrated version.
When Nick arrives at the doorstep of the Wrigley home, he is not met warmly by John, but the rest of the family seems happy to see him. This seemed odd. I would look for a united front if I were John, rather than his family, even his wife, giving Nick hugs and love when he walks into the home. They don’t say what Nick did to his brother, but I gathered he must have fucked him out of money. I would have thought that John would have erupted with anger on his family the moment they started hugging Nick and screamed: “You freaking cocks are kissing his ass when he fucked me out of money and fucked me in the ass? He’s the sort of asshole cock that ruins Christmas and you’re kissing his ass? I am done with all of you.” John should have said that. He just sat there like a quiet little bitch.
Remarkably, John and his wife, allow Nick to watch the children as they go out. During this time, Santa crashes and ends up in their house and gets knocked out. Nick figures out how to use Santa’s magical ball and they decide to take the sleigh and deliver the gifts to save Christmas. At least that’s what Nick told Danny. He really was going to steal a bunch of shit while Danny thought he was being a good guy.
Santa awakens with Peter and his older sister, Kaitlan (Brenda Grate), staring at him. He’s tied to a chair, but soon gets released, convincing the two kids that he is Santa. They hit the road with Santa driving their car and it doesn’t take a long time for him to learn how to drive. He soon drives to the bad part of the city and they encounter a bunch of criminals. When they cause trouble, Santa decides to tickles them. The look on Santa’s face was disturbing. He looked like he was getting off on it.
The more that Nick and Danny talk, the more Nick begins to see the error in his ways. He starts talking about how his brother John got everything he ever wanted and he didn’t get shit. What the fuck? The guy is in his fifties and he’s still crying about his childhood? A jobless scammer crybaby…nothing worse.
Nick and Danny return home and Santa and the two kids are there and so are the three bad guys. Nick faces them and chases them off and now Santa can look at him in a new light and take him off the naughty list.
Christmas day arrives and the family is all together and Nick is accepted, even by his brother. How did we get to this point? OK, I get that Danny and the young kids being really cool with Nick after the Santa situation, but there is no way that John would believe it. So, he is either just giving up and just hoping that his shithead brother leaves after the holidays. He probably doesn’t want to fight it out with the family anymore. His will is broken. He’ll most likely kill himself before the next Christmas.
TWAS THE NIGHT is really shitty and hard to get through. Cranston, to his credit, tries to make it work, but he has nothing to work with. I wonder if this is a Disney production or if they just bought it and put it in their catalogue. Whatever the case, avoid this one.
