At the start of this year I reviewed Phil Herman's anthology film, Doomsday Stories, which as the theme might suggest, had the central theme of the post apocalypse. Now he is back with a new anthology film, I Slay on Christmas, which unsurprisingly uses the theme of Christmas to base its stories on. Much like the anthology I saw earlier this year, the budget here appears to be extremely low, but low budget thankfully doesn't equate with badness, at least for some of these short films included within the package. I had originally intended to review this last week, but being an idiot, I looked at the wrong week of my schedule when picking the films to watch!
Contained within the hour and twenty two minute film are four short films, as well as (bizarrely) two wraparound segments. The first layer is made up of 'Wraparounds' which is made up of a few disjointed segments. There is some effort to link this in with the ongoing zombie story that has been ongoing since 1992's Hell on Earth II: The Arena of Death, with the opening having a man watching a news report about a viral outbreak, as he himself slowly begins to transform into one of the undead himself. This zombie storyline comes back at the end of the film, but it doesn't seem related to anything else that happens here, so felt a bit out of place. Still, it had a good monologue sequence from Jaysen P. Buterin, appearing to be reprising his role from Doomsday Stories.
The actual proper wraparound segment was the titular I Slay on Christmas. This starred Herman as a man who finds himself wandering a snowy forest, with no real memory of how he got there. He encounters a spectral figure who gives him four pine cones, telling the man that each pine cone will reveal to him a nightmare from Christmases past. This worked fine as a uniting segment, and ends on a slightly clumsy, but functional ending.
The first short proper was 'All Chopped Up And Nowhere to Go'. This had a very mean man, Drudge (Joel D. Wynkoop - Doomsday Stories), someone who is physically and mentally abusive to his deaf son, and who hates Christmas so much that he flies into a rage even hearing the word said out loud. After his long suffering wife heads to her sisters with the child after one of his assaults, his wife's friend, Maddie (Vera Marlowe) visits looking for his wife. With the misogynistic brute looking for a good time, he tricks the woman into a dangerous situation, which results in Drudge's evil side completely coming to the forefront. The best part about this one was the title itself. While Wynkoop put in a spirited performance, the story didn't reach a satisfying conclusion, just seeming to end without the story being wrapped up neatly. This anthology has a lot of women hating characters in it, but they are always shown to be horrible people, and often, the female characters end up coming out on top, though not so much here. This first short, along with the second wraparound segment both featured nudity, something that doesn't appeal to me, but it was vaguely appropriate for the unpleasant story being told.
Next up was 'The Best Company', directed by Marcelo Fabani (Doomsday Stories) which started off as a news report about the victims of a disturbing serial killer, before we are introduced to the killer, Luis (Walter Alonso). When he invites his new girlfriend to his apartment, it looks like she is due to be his next victim, but things don't exactly go according to plan. Sure, the twist here was obvious, but it was also a fun one, and the first sign of women not being here purely for exploitative reasons.
The third film was 'Re Gifting', written by and starring Debbie D (Doomsday Stories). This had a woman, Suzette (Debbie D) meeting up with her new boyfriend, having brought him a gift for Christmas, but his restrained behaviour comes to a head when he decides to give in to his violent desires. This was another one that didn't seem to end very well, the plot felt like it ended before there had again been any kind of proper resolution. The acting in this one was also some of the worst to be found in the whole anthology.
Thankfully, the saving grace of this film was the wonderful Derek Braasch directed 'Christmas Revenge'. It is always good when a great film turns up in an otherwise unspectacular anthology, and this one was the golden part. Taking on a more fantastical feel, a violently angry man, Curtis (Justin Bower) has managed to kidnap the real Santa Claus (P.J Laird) He mistakenly believes that as a child he caught his mum kissing Santa, and that this was what resulted in his father leaving him and his mum. Rather than a case of mistaken identity, the man kidnapped is the real deal, and with his supernatural powers given him a photographic memory, he is able to tell the troubled man what he really saw as a child. There are scenes of torture here, with some of the more gruesome effects to be found, but thankfully Santa does have a contingency plan in place for situations such as this. What I loved about this, outside of the fun flashback sequences that show events from an unreliable perspective, was the curveball of an ending, something that was so unexpected that it put a smile on my face when I saw it play out.
As a Christmas themed horror, there wasn't too much Christmas stuff going on. This is explained away from a news report at the start saying about a unseasonably warm winter, though I suspect it was actually down to the film not being filmed in the colder seasons. I think it was 'Re Gifting' that featured a classic Christmas tune made to sound more sinister, if it was, that was something that segment did do well. The quality throughout is low, and the acting sometimes not the best, but it was enjoyable, especially with the wonderful 'Christmas Revenge'. The final ten minutes did feel like they dragged a bit, with the actual film done with, but the zombie storyline from previous films tacked on. Overall though, this very low budget anthology was worth sitting through, with neat ideas dotted throughout. I Slay on Christmas was released on November 10th.
SCORE:
No comments:
Post a Comment