Horror Movie A Day: December 2018

DECEMBER 24, 2018

GENRE: HOLIDAY, SLASHER
SOURCE: DVD (OWN COLLECTION)

Back when I ran HMAD proper, I tried to make sure I saw at least one new Christmas-themed film every year around this time, because there are so many I haven't seen and don't usually find myself in the mood for such fare in say, April. It's a tradition I meant to keep after "retiring", but like most of my optimistic plans for the site's future, it hasn't exactly panned out; even when I manage to see one, like last year's Better Watch Out, I usually lack the time to write them up (for the record, that one is pretty good but the twist is far too easy to spot ahead of time, and the film takes a bit of time to get back on track after trying so hard to misdirect us). So after last month's Mrs. Claus I'm happy to be sitting here again with a review of Christmas Blood (Norwegian: Juleblod), making up for last year's absence.

Alas, while it's certainly better than Mrs. Claus, it's not exactly a new classic that will join the likes of Black Christmas or even Black Xmas. I'll give it this much: they score lots of points by going big with the concept. Our killer is another axe-wielding Santa Claus setting his sights on a house full of lovely people, but they're just a few of the many, MANY targets he has. As we learn in an opening crawl (after a pretty good prologue where he takes out a guy and his present-snooping daughter), Santa has compiled a "naughty list" of admitted criminals from all over Norway, and every Christmas he whittles that list down from his initial 300+ (!!!). After being taken down and institutionalized in the opening sequence, we cut ahead seven years where he has escaped and picks up where he left off. You gotta love such a widespread scenario that - if all goes well - makes sequelizing easy, as they don't need a continuing victim hero like Sidney Prescott or even much of a new story. "It's Christmas again and now he's after these people on his list" is all they really need.

And we get a cop on his tail, which fills in some of the questions one might have about this particular MO since it's known (basically, the departments work together to check in on all of the people on his list) and breaks up the house-slasher stuff. But here's the weird thing: rather than take advantage of this scenario by having Santa hit up a few victims in one area (dealing with the lone patrol checks as necessary) he sets his sights on one group, so the filmmakers never really embrace the freedom of their own concept. If you think about the biggest hurdles for a slasher, finding a reason for everyone to stay in one spot (and not notice when people go missing) is one of the harder to overcome, and they had this easy way around it but opted not to take it. And they really should have, because (like Mrs. Claus, oddly) the house isn't exactly perfect for this kind of thing - it's kind of cramped and not even isolated, forcing the action outside often enough to make you think "Isn't it supposed to be super cold, and also where are the neighbors?"

Weirder still, the person on his list is already dead, so he's not even sticking to his "thing". The person on his list is a woman who drunk drove and ran over a kid, but the grief about this led her to a recent suicide. Lucky for Santa (and non-discriminating slasher fans), she has a daughter, and that daughter has several friends to comfort her, and those girlfriends have love interests to pad things out. So even though they set up a slasher where the victims kind of deserve it for once, it ends up being another thing where he's going after people who never did anything wrong, which is fine when we know that's the score (see: Friday the 13th) but when they establish "criminals get their due" and don't deliver, it feels like more of a bummer than it should. I'd rather it was just crass from start to finish.

(Santa also goes out of his way to murder two of the people at the house who are made to leave, rendering the backstory even less relevant.)

Another problem is that it takes too long to get to the kills, in a movie that's too long overall (an hour and forty five minutes) to boot. It's just before the hour mark when Santa starts offing the people in the house, by which point some folks might have already checked out (I myself might have, but I had to wait for laundry so it was either this or find something else). That first sequence is a pretty good one, to be fair, with Santa toying with the two victims and giving a good chase before taking them out, but after that all the kills lack the same panache. Most of them don't even have much of a buildup: Santa just shows up and chops them with his axe (or smashes their head with the blunt side of it), and then we cut to the others or to the cops that are trying to pin down where he might be tonight. He occasionally seems to teleport as well, which wasn't even that acceptable when Jason did it in Manhattan - at least build up your goodwill before cheating the audience, brah.

Finally, the end isn't worth the wait; if it was great some of the other flaws could have been forgiven, but alas. (SPOILERS!) In the prologue Santa is shot several times, including once in the head, but survives - and we kind of buy it, because we don't see where the bullets hit (and maybe the hat got the blunt of the round!), and also maybe there's a MBV-like twist where this Santa isn't the same one. But no, it is, and when he gets taken down by the same cop, you'd think this time he'd make sure the bastard was dead. Instead he inexplicably wanders away, so of course Santa disappears, and you have to wonder if he's actually a damn zombie already (along with the teleporting thing, maybe this IS Part 8 of their plan and the next bunch of films will be prequels?). It's also a downer; after Santa is dispatched, the Final Girl (whose mom is the one he was ostensibly after) rushes to a friend he attacked, a familiar beat that usually ends happily - but no, in this one the girl dies, adding to the bummer nature. Nothing in the film feels like a triumph, even momentarily.

On the plus side, the girls are mostly likable and normal, so the only reason you're wanting Santa to start killing them is because, well, it's a slasher and that's what we came for. And he does so with practical glee - there's more than one instance of spilling guts (if that's your bag) and one girl is killed because so much blood from the other victim poured on her that she doesn't seem to be able to see enough to get away. Also, they don't overuse their Santa, which is a blessing - he sticks to the shadows and stays quiet, so that when he does speak near the end it's kind of a creepy moment. I wouldn't have minded if they had personalized his look a bit - in wide shots he might as well just be Billy Chapman - but in this era of "THE NEW HORROR ICON!" it's nice to see one that keeps it simple and doesn't earn top billing. Last but not least, the score is Carpenter-ish but not punishingly so, and doesn't directly ape any of his themes in its attempt at homage (looking at you, Strangers 2), so it's not distracting - it's just a pretty good idea of what he might have done if he scored this movie with his new band.

Plus, you know, 'tis the season and all. My slasher itch has been well scratched lately thanks to Hell Fest and Halloween, but otherwise I might even be kinder to it, as it's not exactly BAD, just zigs where it should have zagged more than once, leaving it kind of in that neutral "Well, if it's on and you got nothing better to do, you can do far worse" kind of territory. I'll probably keep it but only because I collect slashers (and Christmas movies); the odds of me watching it again land somewhere between Jack Frost (Keaton) and "one of the lesser Silent Night Deadly Night movies", though those would have improved if it was twenty minutes shorter at least. I've included the Amazon link for my fellow collectors - everyone else that's still intrigued can do with a rental, as the disc has only one extra: the trailer that's right below this paragraph. So uh, happy holidays!

What say you?

PLEASE, GO ON...

DECEMBER 4, 2018

GENRE: WEREWOLF
SOURCE: BLU-RAY (OWN COLLECTION)

While people keep singing the praises of A24 and Neon, I'm gonna humbly request IFC Midnight get some more love for their steadily improving library of acquired indie/foreign gems. By partnering with Scream Factory, more eyeballs are getting on titles like A Dark Song and Autopsy of Jane Doe, and now we can add Wildling to that impressive (if still spotty - please steer clear of Desolation) roster. Like their earlier release The Cured, it's a dramatic and atmospheric (read: "slow" to those who demand a jump scare every three minutes to hold their attention) take on a classic movie monster, in this case the werewolf; checking the boxes that fans of such films expect while making sure the characters and story are always given priority.

And it hooks you in early, thanks to Brad Dourif in what seems like a rare good guy role. He is "Daddy" to a young girl who he seems determined to protect from "the wildlings" outside, telling her that she's the last child alive after they got all the others. During this opening montage sequence, it gradually becomes clear that he's trying to keep her in rather than them out - she is confined to a room with an electrified doorknob and isn't allowed to interact with anyone who happens to visit him, and when he starts giving her a mysterious drug any reasonably astute horror fan can probably figure out SHE's a wildling and he's trying to prevent her from turning into one.

This scenario might have been a perfectly good movie on its own, focused only on this man and the girl he sees as a daughter but also a monster, but after an incident I won't spoil she is taken in by the town's sheriff (Liv Tyler) and given the chance to live a normal life: she goes to school, makes a few friends, even learns about internet porn courtesy of Tyler's brother, who is at least twenty years younger i.e. closer to her age/a potential love interest. At first he's dismissive of her, but as they grow closer she also starts finding it harder to subdue her monstrous side - will she end up killing these folks? Will she be hunted down by the same folks who killed the rest of her kind?

I'm not here to answer those questions, but I can tell you that the film does a good job of balancing its sad nature with some violence, including a gnarly throat rip. Again, like The Cured (which kept coming to mind because, like it, Wildling is a movie that's just been sitting there on my floor hoping to get noticed for who knows how long) this isn't a movie that will satisfy those looking for the popcorn thrills generally promised by their sub-genre, but knowing that going in I was kind of surprised at the carnage it offered. A pair of clear villains are established, and you're expecting them to go out spectacularly, but a third act plot point introduces some random hunters that allows for bonus bloodshed, sort of like a reward for being patient with the slower-paced first hour.

That said, ironically the movie kind of races through one of the dramatic plot points, making me wish that earlier part had been stretched out some. As I mentioned, when Anna is first brought to Tyler's house her brother is kind of antagonistic toward her and sees her as a weirdo (for good reason), but they become quite close over what seems like an afternoon. I wouldn't have minded seeing their bond strengthen more organically, as opposed to a "Well you know they have to get past their opposition eventually so why not get on with it?" kind of approach. It's not a crippling flaw or anything, but it was a bit distracting, as if the editor chopped out a chunk somewhere to move things along. The disc has a few deleted scenes, but it's mostly more with the younger version of Anna and also when older Anna and Ray had already bonded.

Speaking of young Anna, they did a phenomenal job casting younger versions that actually look like they might grow into the lead actress, particularly the middle one. It's the holiday season, and thus naturally Silent Night Deadly Night is on my mind, which has what may be the least likely progression of actors showing the same character across three periods, so perhaps it's just making this one look all that much better? But seriously: it's one of the best matches I've seen - I figured they were actually sisters until the IMDb told me otherwise. Casting just did a fantastic job across the board, really - we're even treated to James Le Gros as a mountain man who aids Anna from time to time. Haven't seen him in a genre movie since Bitter Feast, always good to see that guy pop up (no Phantasm jokes! He was fine and it wasn't his fault!).

Ultimately what works best about the movie is kind of a spoiler, but I'll try to be vague and say that Anna isn't treated as the villain, or even a doomed hero - there's an optimistic slant to her predicament. Most movies of this type end in one of two ways, but this one opts for a third version I can't say I've seen too often. There are sad moments in the movie, for sure, but overall it's kind of an uplifting entry in the sub-genre, one that didn't bum me out as so many indie horror films tend to. So it's a good-natured movie where someone gets impaled! Definitely worth looking for, and I look forward to what writer/director Fritz Böhm does next - he has an extensive VFX background (which he puts to good use here, but thankfully for things like backgrounds, not just the creature stuff) and such folks don't have the best track record, but he clearly has more on his mind than, say, the Strause Brothers. Here's hoping he continues that approach for his future endeavors.

What say you?