Natale di sangue

It isn't hard to see why this movie offended so many people. I mean, it's a slasher movie about CHRISTMAS, and it actually has SANTA as the killer. However, I feel the movie deals with an interesting question. What if you suffered some traumatic event right at Christmas, and the event was somehow bound up with one of the major icons of the holiday? This is what happens to 5-year-old William, who, on Christmas Eve, sees his mother raped and both parents murdered by a street thug dressed as Santa Claus -- right after his semi-senile grandfather tells him that Santa Clause punishes those who are naughty. I think the first part of this movie does an effective job of showing the preadolescent William's struggle to deal with this event as he is raised in a Catholic orphanage and brought face to face with Christmas every year.

I was particularly impressed with the portrayal of the Mother Superior. Although she was most definitely from the Old School of discipline, beating children, locking them in closets for extended periods, and such, I somehow was able to believe she was sincerely trying to do the right thing and cared about the children -- that she was not simply a sadistic hag. There was also an interesting conflict between her and a younger nun, who believed in gentler, more progressive methods.

Alas, the whole thing turns rather formulaic when William puts on the Santa suit and goes on his killing spree. So, as a serious exploration of the question we started with, it falls very short of what it could be. As a slasher movie, though, it's definitely above average.

Silent Night, Deadly Night tells the story of a boy whose parents were killed in front of him as a child, and it was by a man dressed as Santa Claus. Not only that, the man shot the kid's dad in the head and tried to rape his mother before slitting her throat while the boy watched. He hid so he escaped, but the memory remained, even throughout Catholic school where the Mother Superior was strict and violent, saying punishment is good and all naughty children should be punished. Naturally, this messed with the kid's head, so one day when he's finally all grown up, Christmas time comes along at his job and someone has to dress up as Santa Claus. Well, who better than the kid whose parents were killed by Santa to play dress up! He then embraces being Santa Claus, a judgmental fat man who kills naughty people, and that's when the bodies start piling up.

It's a truly dark story. The movie would have been much better had they focused more on the psychological aspect as opposed to it just boiling down to "Santa is a killer. Now I'm Santa. Now I must kill!" It felt like the whole setup was wasted for an anticlimactic, soulless killing spree. Sure, there are some good kills, and there are plenty of boobs in typical '80s B-horror affair, but it failed to make an impact on anything more than a surface level. It's an enjoyable movie, it's simply a matter of greater potential not being realized.

Now this is a horror movie, not an unintentional comedy like its infamous sequel, and it's admittedly effective as one. It's refreshing when a horror movie has an actual narrative you can follow. Worth a watch if you're a horror buff or just want to watch Santa kill topless women for an hour and a half.

Traumatised after witnessing a man in a Santa suit brutally murder his parents, a teenager goes on a killing spree after his employer forces him to dress as Santa in this controversial horror thriller. With a plot that mostly follows slasher clichés, 'Silent Night, Deadly Night' is easy to forget amid the surplus of 1980s horror flicks, but it is a highly competent production that stands up well to revision. The film actually does a better job than John Carpenter's far more iconic 'Halloween' in establishing the psychology and mindset of its serial killer protagonist. Eighteen minutes of exposition may sound like a lot, but it works magnificently for getting us to understand how the character ticks and actually pity him, heinous though his actions may be. The film takes a potent swipe at church-run orphanages too in which children have religion forced upon them with the protagonist a victim of this system in addition the aforementioned childhood trauma. The film does not do itself any favours by painting the nuns as stereotypes and lead actor Robert Brian Wilson is never really convincing, but everything else falls into place so well here that it is hard not to like it. The filmmakers approach the project with the perfect dose of dark humour too; "he sure knows how to handle kids!" comments one mother after Wilson quietly threatens a girl sitting on his Santa's lap! The Yuletide themed deaths also come with streak of black comedy and there is an awesome 'Battleship Potemkin' lions style sequence in which several toy soldiers appear to react to a toy store death.

I enjoyed this film alot. I'm a horror nut and I love 80's slasher movies..so no its not for everybody...but for those who do like 80's slashers you should really check this out. The story is good, it sounds cheesy with santa being a killer, but the back story is very well done, the character development is great, the music works, and it has one of the coolest death scenes in a movie ever....(antlers) Sure, here and there it can be cheesy-PUNISH!- but it still is very watchable and I recommend it to any horror fan around the holidays.

Watching SILENT NIGHT, DEADLY NIGHT today, it's difficult to believe that it was quite controversial when first released in theaters. In reality, it's just another slasher film with a holiday theme. The controversy arose from its depiction of a killer Claus, and its daring to use Christmas time as a backdrop.

Far from being blasphemous, it's purposefully absurd, and the not-so-merry madman (Charles Dierkop) is perfectly "suited" for the subject matter: revenge against those on his naughty list. The entire mood of SN, DN lets us know immediately that it's not to be taken seriously, at all. Linnea Quigley's "death-by-antlers" scene alone should be enough of a tip-off that the whole affair is tongue-in-rosy-cheek. Speaking of Ms. Quigley, she just can't seem to keep her clothes on. Not even in December! Brrr! Anyway, just settle in for a nice cozy evening of jingle kills...