Luke: In new anti-Christmas comedy, father goes on one-man crusade against most commercial time of year

It’s about that time of year again. A time when, slowly, steadily, but somehow always suddenly, signs of Christmas start to appear like snowflakes from a dark, cloudy sky. 

The dreaded shop-window changeovers seem to come earlier and earlier every year. I’ve seen with my own eyes Halloween decorations of cartoon ghosts in Santa hats out for sale on 1 August. 

And, for my own part, Christmas has always been a year-round concern for me. I recall many a scorching July day with The Muppet Christmas Carol beaming out of my grandfather’s tube TV. 

That delightful Dickens adaptation was one of a handful of videos available to rent from the newsagent in the village nearby. The other choices were Surf Ninjas, Que Sera! Sera! The Official Irish World Cup Video and Basic Instinct, which I was not allowed to rent.

Now, here we are in early July, and a Christmas-related film is set to premiere at the Galway Film Fleadh, with a wide release is forthcoming. Murphy Vs Christmas is a new comedy about a father on a one-man crusade against that most commercial time of year. 

Public enemy number one

Eoin Murphy (Johnny Elliott) is a struggling artist whose latest project, documenting the litter on every street in Dublin with his camera, has him looking down at the street, while he looks down on the world around him also. 

Eoin’s opening monologue is surprisingly poetic, and rehearsed, with the script keeping in on-the-fly rewrites of his bah-humbug take on Christmas time.

What is clear, from his words and these opening moments following Eoin, head down in concentration snapping close-ups of cigarette butts, cinema tickets and condom wrappers, as Christmas lights hang overhead and pedestrians hurry by, is that he’s bowed out of the festivities and merriment in such a determined way that it’s anything but the most wonderful time of the year. 

His is a wholehearted offensive that extends to treats and cakes too. Eoin refuses to make rice krispy cakes for a Christmas party his daughter Anna (Maisey Crowley) is attending, instead making granola and jam buns. The sad excuse of a tasty treat sits soggy in the paper tray and looks especially unappetising through the film’s black and white photography. 

Eoin’s mission to undermine the party atmosphere in any way he can. It’s in this sequence, as he stirs the jam and granola, that he is visited by a distressing vision of a ghost from Christmas past. 

Flashes of his late father (portrayed by John Connors), a hard man and taskmaster, still holds a heavy sway on Eoin’s current life and sense of self. Spilling over into  consequences for those nearest and dearest to him.

In a moment of clarity, or madness, and through the influence of his father’s voice urging his grown son to “be a man”, Eoin snaps. He tells Anna the truth about Santa Claus and when she tells her schoolfriends the same, upending their lives, Eoin is called in by the headmaster to answer for his actions. 

The headmaster is also played by Connors. He plays all of the authority figures in Murphy Vs Christmas, employing a variety of accents and hairstyles both good and bad. Eoin is talked down to and belittled as in the film’s numerous flashbacks to a turbulent childhood under his father’s roof.

His conversation with Connors as the headmaster does not go well. Eoin is steadfast in his belief that Christmas – its commodification, and Santa Claus in particular – is morally wrong. 

His next action is to take out a billboard advertisement outside of the school. Black capital letters on a white background: “SANTA CLAUS DOES NOT EXIST”. 

Eoin’s stunt makes him public enemy number one. The whole city is out to get him. He makes headlines, TV news, Liveline – the works. 

To the courts

When the advertising company, themselves disgusted by the message, takes down the billboard, Eoin objects to it in court. An amused but ultimately disgruntled judge, played again by Connors, finds Eoin in contempt of court. When he refuses to apologise, prison looms. 

Murphy is alone against the odds, a self-sabotaging truth teller in a world that won’t listen. These scenes play like an anti-Miracle on 34th Street.  

He does have an ally in Claire (Tania Notaro), a barrister who takes up his case.  Clare has a way of highlighting the absurdity of the situation. She is amused but also intrigued by Eoin, sensing the hurt that he carries along with all his bluster and grandstanding. 

Other figures who appear to be allies are shown to be bad actors. Outside the courthouse a friendly voice and smiling face asks Eoin to appear on a popular crime podcast to get his side of the story out there. 

The show is a trap.  The host is of those 30-second ragebait types and ambushes Eoin with aggressive questioning and irate audience phone-ins.  Eoin sees himself out of the studio deflated. Destined by chopped up into YouTube shorts and reaction GIFs. 

From comedy to tragedy

Alex Fegan’s film is handsomely bleak in black and silver. There may be a nod to Christmas classics of old in the nitrate sheen. But there’s also a sense that like so much in Eoin’s life, stubbornness and circumstances have sucked the colour from the world itself.

Murphy Vs Christmas is meditative in its pacing. Drawing from his documentary work, Fegan presents most of the action in a realist style. There are few cuts, the action is presented mainly in medium to long shots and always grounded by the black and white. 

Occasional stylistic flourishes stand out. Blurring time and reality, ripples of the past encroach on the present day with Eoin seeing spectres and doppelgangers of his father in every obstacle he faces. 

The way Fegan and Elliott’s script swings from comedy to tragedy in such an effortless and seamless manner is commendable. Although the comedic elements do get overwhelmed by the particulars of Eoin’s backstory in the film’s later stages. 

His battle against Christmas, seemingly rooted in a commitment to the truth at all costs, is shown to be rooted in deeper, darker places.

There is, however, just enough bonafide Christmas sentimentality to pull the film together, even if the messaging and emotions get muddled along the way.