Billy Chapman (Rohan Campbell), haunted by a Santa-suited vigilante killer, is compelled every year to slaughter an evildoer for each window on an Advent calendar. Taking a seasonal job in a Christmas novelty store, he thinks of settling down… but the ghost points out evils requiring punishment with an axe.
The 1984 Silent Night, Deadly Night — once banned in the UK — is a middling slasher, falling several red noses short of the classic holiday-horror status of Black Christmas, Christmas Evil or the episode of Tales From The Crypt where a psycho Father Christmas strangles Joan Collins. Nevertheless, Silent Night, Deadly Night became a franchise — four sequels, a 2012 semi-remake (Silent Night) and a stockingful of imitations.
A fresh take on the very basic SNDN set-up.
A rule of thumb in grindhouse horror is that you’re on firmer ground remaking iffy originals than butchering classics. Writer-director Mike P. Nelson, who’s already been down this route with a Wrong Turn requel, manages an impressive party piece in a fresh take on the very basic SNDN set-up. As in the old film, protagonist Billy is unhinged as a kid when maniac Santa kills his parents. Grown-up Billy (Rohan Campbell) is compelled to don the red suit, white beard, hat and boots of Good Old Saint Nick to slay (or sleigh) victims in Christmas-related ways. The bit everyone remembers from the first film involves antlers — this gets a new spin here.
Campbell is affecting as the haunted murderer, oddly earnest and agonised as he goes through his Yule ritual of brutally killing someone then pressing a bloody fingerprint into his Advent calendar. Romance emerges when Billy connects with Pamela (Ruby Modine), a Christmas-store manager with rage issues, and Modine does wonders as a non-stereotype horror heroine. It develops via tipped-in ideas from Unbreakable and Dexter that semi-possessed Billy could really be doing Santa’s work. Some people on the naughty list deserve what’s coming down the chimney, and Nelson’s direction ramps up as Billy crashes a white power Christmas party and the message “Kill Nazis” flashes on the screen. A sub-plot about this small town’s other bogeyman (‘the Snatcher’) leads to a satisfying, possibly franchise-founding finale.
Just the right recipe for a seasonal horror cocktail — gruesome kills, proper suspense, sly wit, likeable leads and a dose of just deserts for very, very bad boys and girls.