Christmas Bloody Christmas

Christmas Bloody Christmas (2022) is a movie that I recently watched on Shudder. The storyline follows a department store robotic Santa Clause that gets recalled shortly after they arrive in stores. One store decides to keep theirs through the holiday and quickly discover why they were recalled...

This movie is written and directed by Joe Begos (Bliss) and stars Riley Dandy (That's Amore), Sam Delich (Spiderhead), Jonah Ray (Victor Crowley), Jeff Daniel Phillips (3 from Hell) and Dora Madison (Bliss).

This reminded me of a cross between Silent Night Deadly Night and The Terminator. The ax scenes and kills in this are absolutely tremendous. There's some great gore, blood splatter and special effects throughout the movie. The soundtrack is also excellent. The acting and dialogue is solid, even if there are some forehand slapping opinions. The cinematography and use of lighting and colors is also very good. I did feel like they dragged out the ending a bit.

Overall, this is a unique addition to the holiday horror genre that's an absolute must see. I would score this a 6.5-7/10 and recommend seeing it once.

I watched a couple of absolutely horrible horror movies back to back to back and finally got something good from this one.

Cinematography - Had no idea Joe Begos was the director, from the director of Bliss and VFW comes another visually stunning flick. If I was rating this purely based on the visuals it would've easily been a 9.5/10. Very beautiful aesthetics, angles, colors, nailed it once again. I recognized a familiar pattern while watching the movie.

Plot - It's pretty straightforward, the only complaint I have is about cutting one character short too early in the movie(in my opinion). I'm keeping it spoiler free but that's about it. Easy to digest and without major holes.

Acting - Riley Dandy killed it. No clue who she is, just checked her IMDb page but she was superb here. Very convincing and carried the entire movie by herself.

I'm going to go with 6/10 simply because it dragged a little towards the end and was a pretty simple film. Intense but not in a way VFW or Bliss were. Enjoyable simple film nonetheless for the horror lovers <3.

I didn't really know what to expect when I sat down to watch the 2022 horror movie "Christmas Bloody Christmas", but I must admit that I was somewhat intrigued by the movie's cover/poster. And there is just something oddly enjoyable about Christmas-based horror movies, isn't there.

So writer and director Joe Begos had every available chance to bedazzle and entertain me with this 2022 horror movie. And while the movie definitely was watchable, the movie was just somewhat lacking in the script department. It wasn't the most elaborate of storytelling that was going on here. Sure, it made for an okay enough viewing experience, but you're not in for a grand cinematic experience.

The acting performances in "Christmas Bloody Christmas" were fair enough. But again, it was pretty straight forward stuff going on, as the script didn't really call for the most elaborate and intricate of performances here really. I wasn't familiar with the cast ensemble in the movie, which is something I enjoy when watching movies.

Visually then "Christmas Bloody Christmas" was actually quite good. There was enough mayhem and mutilations in the movie to keep a veteran gorehound such as myself adequately entertained, and it almost made up for the lack of profound writing.

This is the type of horror movie that you watch once and most likely never will return to watch a second time. "Christmas Bloody Christmas" is definitely not going to be a reoccurring movie that I will be watching during the Christmas holidays. The one time I sat through the 81 minutes was sufficient.

My rating of "Christmas Bloody Christmas" lands on a five out of ten stars.

In "Christmas Bloody Christmas," the military-industrial complex has created a killer robot Santa. The movie begins with a series of fake TV ads for Christmas-themed promotions and events, and it's clear that something is going to go wrong with the RoboSanta+. The story follows disenchanted record store owner Tori Tooms as she fights against the evil robot Santa.

Unfortunately, the movie fails to improve once the deadly elf shows up. The action and kill scenes are muddy-looking and the 16mm cameras used for most of the filming are not effective. The best parts of the movie are the early scenes between Tori and her employee, Robbie, where they have a believable and tedious edge to their conversations.

Overall, the movie struggles to make the characters' seasonal disenchantment seem more real than the high-concept circumstances. The swear words, pop references, and counter-cultural poses that define Tori and Robbie's relationship are perfunctory and do not add to the story. While the writer and director clearly has affection for the characters, it is not enough to save the movie.

What a deeply unpleasant bunch of people inhabit this town. Pretty much every single character can't complete a single sentence without punctuating it with the f-bomb several times a syllable. Their interaction with each of their companions gives the word 'shallow' new depths of meaning. And when the Robot Santa begins his reign of axe-fuelled mayhem, you find yourself hoping that every one of the cast are gathered in one room so the slaughter will be quick and thorough, and we can present Robot Santa with a well-earned cup of tea and a medal for rescuing us from such a vacuous bunch of idiots.