The Christmas Martian | |
Native Name: | |
Director: | Bernard Gosselin |
Producer: | Rock Demers |
Starring: | Marcel Sabourin |
Music: | Jacques Perron |
Cinematography: | Alain Dostie |
Editing: | André Corriveau |
Studio: | Faroun Films Les Cinéastes Associés |
Runtime: | 65 minutes |
Country: | Canada |
Language: | French |
The Christmas Martian (French: Le Martien de Noël) is a Canadian children's Christmas comedy film, directed by Bernard Gosselin and released in 1971.[1] The film stars Marcel Sabourin as Poo Flower, an extraterrestrial being from Mars who lands his spaceship near a small town in Northern Quebec during the Christmas season, befriending the local children but alarming their parents.[2]
The film's cast also includes Catherine Leduc, François Gosselin, Guy L'Écuyer, Roland Chenail, Paul Hébert, Louise Poulin-Roy, Paul Berval, Ernest Guimond, Yvan Canuel, Yvon Leroux and Reine Malo, as well as narration by Marc-André Coallier.
It was the first children's film ever made in Canada by a commercial studio independently of either the National Film Board of Canada or the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.[2] After producer Rock Demers launched the Tales for All series of children's films in the 1980s, the film was retroactively incorporated into that series.[3]
Canuxploitation, a film blog devoted to Canadian B-movies, wrote that the film was "easily the most insane example of Canadian children's cinema ever conceived. Nonsensical and embarrassingly low-budget, Le Martien de Noël wildly bounces from wacky action sequences to unrelated tangents, all highlighted by special effects even the most distracted seven year-old could see through. In other words, it's great!"[4]
The film has occasionally been rebroadcast on television during the Christmas season, most commonly on science fiction channels.[5] RiffTrax released a version with a mocking audio commentary track on December 15, 2023.