MOTM December 2010: Santa's Slay (2005)

[GL]

When a 1,000 year-old bet finally runs it's course, Santa Claus is finally allowed to return to his true ways and begins a massive campaign of bloodshed across the country, forcing a descendant of the original powers who imprisoned him to again find a way of stopping the homicidal rampage.

What did everyone think of this?

[CT]

This one actually looks quite fun and I think it's hilarious that it stars bill goldberg. It actually has good ratings on amazon, I'll order it later this week. The cover is also awesome btw.

[Jen]

Ron loves this movie so we have to watch it every year anyway. It really is cheesy fun.

[HNT]

Didn't we already have a thread for this one? Anyway, its fun and silly

[GL]

Dec 12, 2010 15:21:02 GMT -5 HNT said:

Didn't we already have a thread for this one? Anyway, its fun and silly

1. We did on the first one, but not on this forum. Why I chose it.

2. It's the only Holiday-themed film I have access to I can watch. I have To All A Goodnight, Don't Open Til Christmas and Christmas Evil on VHS, but they're in such shoddy condition I'm not tempted to try them out on my VCR to see if they work, so I'm stuck with Santa's Slay as the only Christmas horror in my collection.

[HNT]

WEll, its a very goodchoice, IMHO. I kind of enjoy it, all in all. Not a masterpiece, but its camp and fun, and Goldberg manages not to be the worst actor in a role of this type. I give it a solid 3, maybe even 3.5.

[abraxas]

That looks horrible, watched Christmas evil, horrible also, but I am looking forward to that Finnish film.

[GL]

Dude, give it a shot. It's really good. Body count alone makes this one worthwhile. He knocks off about twenty people in this one, all pretty gruesomely and violently, and he's turned quite early on so it's pretty much just him killing people from the start.

[HNT]

It is definitely a decent holiday themed slasher. Especially when you consider some of the Christmas themed trash out there. This movie, along with Black Christmas are the best. Some of the Silent Night, Deadly Night sequels are clearly the worst. Indeed, the second might literally be the worst movie ever made.

[GL]

I've seen the first Silent Night, Deadly Night but don't officially own it, it wasn't that bad, but I haven't seen any of the sequels. Their reputations are enough to get me interested at the very least. I'm not a huge fan of the original Black Christmas, I think it's one of the most boring slashers ever made and highly overrated, the remake is far better and much more enjoyable even though that one does have a few areas I wasn't that keen on.

[HNT]

Yes, the Black Christmas remake was a quality job. I also like the original alot too, though. The first Silent Night, Deadly Night is cheesy as hell, but in a fun way. The rest are absolutely attrocious (like I said, especially the second).

Anyway, back to this film, I think it is pretty bad, but in a good way. It is an excellent example of a nice, entertaining, camp film. And, like CT pointed out, the Jewish wrestler playing Santa Claus just pushes it all over the top.

[GL]

To me, that little tidbit there is a shining example of "Who gives a shit?" It has no bearing on the movie at all, it adds nothing to the film itself and really only stands as trivial information at the very least, since not knowing it doesn't offer any hidden rewards within the film and knowing about it means only that, a little extra bit of knowledge to store in your memory bank to do with it what you will. I've never understood the fascination of using that in reviewing the film.

[HNT]

But, of course it does. Part of the joke in casting several jewish actors (Goldberg, Fran Drescher, Saul Rubinek, Chris Kattan, JAmes Caan, etc.) It is very clearly one of the very intentional (and funny) jokes in this film. That is why its completely worth mentioning. It is one of the few things that actually elevates this film above the sum of its parts and shows that it actually has some intelligence going on behind the scenes.

[The Walking Dude]

So HNT, are you saying that Santa's Slay is actually an anti Christmas movie with a Jewish agenda?


Anyhoo, when I first saw this one a few years back i got a kick out of it. Especially the opening dinner set piece and the Rankin Bass style exposition sequence.

Unfortunately, on revisiting the other day, I found it to be overly juvenile(unsurprising with a wrestler in the lead role) and riffing almost exactly on the Gremlins template.

I guess third times the charm,and this will be the perfect film to stack up to my three watches theory, which I will explain later.

and Robert Culp must have been pissed that he joined the Silent Night Deadly Night franchise after the Killer Santa story had played out,cause here he is again in a festive freakout.

[HNT]

Dec 22, 2010 8:24:29 GMT -5 The Walking Dude said:

So HNT, are you saying that Santa's Slay is actually an anti Christmas movie with a Jewish agenda?

Oh my, Mel Gibson. What do they put in the water down in Australia?
;D