Horror is not something that is commonly associated with Christmas, and this juxtaposition has led to filmmakers using the holiday as a setting for their horror films for years. Several of these films I have already covered through these reviews, and there are definitely more to come. That includes today’s film, A Christmas Horror Story (2015). You are not going to get a title more on the nose than that one. The film is an anthology, following four separate scary stories taking place on Christmas eve in the fictional town of Bailey Downs. These stories consist of a group of students creating a documentary about two murders that took place the year before, a family whose son is replaced by a mysterious creature with a blood lust, another family who are hunted down by Krampus, and Santa fighting off a horde of undead elves.
I am going to use the second half of this review to comment on each of these individual stories separately, but for this first part I want to talk about the general structure of the film and why I find it interesting as well as slightly problematic for how the film feels. For regular readers of these blogs, you will know that I am not a huge fan of anthology films. Although there are some great ones, I often find that they are hamstrung by the differing quality of the stories they tell. This film does suffer from this as well, with some of the stories being more interesting and entertaining than others. But the threat of one of these stories dragging is mitigated by the fact that the stories overlap, both in the actual narrative and structural. Each story is linked slightly through relationships between the characters in each, which doesn’t do much for the grander storytelling, but does add an extra dimension to the world as you become aware that each of these stories is occurring at the same time. And the film tells them in an overlapping fashion. Unlike most anthologies which completely separate each story by telling them in full one by one, this film tells each story at the same time, cutting in between each story throughout the runtime. This means that none of the stories has the chance to become dull because we are hopping between four different stories. As interesting as this structure is, it also makes the film feel like a mess. The biggest issue with telling the film this way is that each story has a completely different tone, and so the film is constantly changing tones and you can never get a grip on any emotional arcs or real scares because we are shifting from the more serious to the ridiculous and back again in a ten-minute timeframe. It just makes the whole thing feel messy, even if I do find the idea an interesting one.
Now before I go into these stories, I want to say that none of them are great. That will save me saying this before each one, and will hopefully stop me from being mean because I really didn’t enjoy this film. I also want to mention that all the actors do a decent job. No one is bad in this film, and they all are giving it their all so I can’t complain. Even William Shatner, who was clearly brought in to do his scenes all in one day and was allowed to sit down for the whole time, puts in a fun performance. But this is about all the good I can say for the film. The first story is that of the students making the documentary. This is as basic a paranormal style, jump scare-fest film as you are going to get. There is very little to say about it really. From the direction, sound design, and story it is all just very bland. The second story is about the family whose soon is replaced by a mysterious creature, and this is the best one although it is not without its problems. It has the creepiest imagery of all of the stories and is genuinely quite intriguing as to what exactly is going on. Unfortunately, when it eventually reveals what is going on it loses a bit of its intrigue, and it doesn’t give a satisfying ending either which really drags it down. The third story is the one involving Krampus and is the one with the most potential. The Krampus design and make-up are pretty great (if a little silly) and if more focus was given to the characters in the film, it could have really worked. Instead, all we get for character development is one short scene where these people, who so far have just been a bit brattish, all reveal quite extreme secrets about themselves. This ranges from kleptomania to murder of the family pets. It comes out of nowhere and feels completely forced. The final story is that of Santa killing zombie elves. This section is really quite shit, but it was the most entertaining. It is one of the ugliest bits of film I have seen in a long time. Honestly, every frame is just vile to look at. The camerawork is ass, and the CGI in it is horrible. The practical effects are at least decent, and I would be lying if I said I didn’t find potty mouth, zombie elves having their heads cut off hilarious. And the story ends with Santa and Krampus having fisticuffs in a scene that almost made the whole film worthwhile. Almost.
This film is not the worst thing you are ever going to see, but it isn’t good either. The actors are all good and there is some creepy imagery, but it is all let down by mostly poorly executed narratives that are never given enough attention to really get through to you on any level. If the tone had stayed as ridiculous as in the Santa killing elves story, then it may have worked as a stupid horror-comedy style film. But the shift in tone really makes the film a complete mess. Not for me, and I am going to ay not for any of you either.
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