Christmas Bloody Christmas review – Robo-Claus rampage in seasonal slasher

’Tis the play for genre film-makers and distributors to currency successful with horror-themed Christmas movies. So if existent deed Violent Night sounds a small excessively classy and mainstream, past present is this shoddily made but tinsel-bright acquisition for you, the cinematic equivalent of a inexpensive soap and assemblage lotion acceptable bought astatine the past minute. It’s serviceable, but not a batch of thought went into it.

Adding to the corpus of films astir Santas who are not conscionable atrocious but positively evil (see besides Krampus, Rare Exports et al), Christmas Bloody Christmas builds its crippled astir an animatronic toy-shop Santa Claus robot that abruptly develops a murderous instinct. Before the mayhem commences, however, the movie spends clip with record-store proprietor Tori (Riley Dandy) and her employee-friend Robbie (Sam Delich), 2 likable chill kids with opinions connected each sorts of bands, movies and leisure activities that they ceaselessly bicker over. In fact, their fluent, lively dialog and simmering flirtation feels amazingly spontaneous and authentic, to the constituent wherever 1 alternatively dreads that the mayhem volition soon commencement and each speech volition crook to assorted kinds of screaming. As Tori and Robbie sojourn immoderate friends successful a neighbouring store and past marque their mode to a dive bar, the Robo-Claus comes to beingness and starts sidesplitting each and sundry.

It’s ne'er intelligibly explained wherefore this physics Father Christmas is truthful intent connected sidesplitting Tori and Robbie erstwhile surely determination are plentifulness of different radical to attack, but you get the consciousness writer-director Joe Begos wasn’t truthful funny successful information and logic. Sadly, that makes the movie little engaging, but it indispensable beryllium acknowledged that Dandy is outstanding successful the relation of the lead/last girl, showing disconnected existent comic chops successful the aboriginal moving and past screaming with panic similar a champ successful the aboriginal stages. She mightiness spell acold if she tin interruption retired of doing Christmas movies. Also amusive is the lurid lighting design, which looks arsenic if the full acceptable was illuminated lone by assorted hues of fairy lights.