After dropping my review, I decided to use this as a more at-ease, all-over-the-place, caps-galore, no-restraint, just-let-it-go-wherever kind of post. I got the idea to do this while putting together the first review for Nightmare on Elm Street 4, as I have plans to go all out and drop a secondary attachment to that blog review.
This movie proved right away how warped it would be right out of the shoot with Grandpa (played by a VERY intense William Hare) warning his own grandson, Billy, impressionable and absent any evil, that he'd get it bad because Christmas Eve is Christmas Evil. I think this leaves its mark because Hare goes from catatonic to all-out batshit loony.
You wanna provoke an audience? You want to really cause a mother to fume? Wanna cause a scene right out of Fury (1936) with mothers standing in unison, outraged, fists towards the sky, faces twisted in a fit of rage? Put a mean, vile, sadistic scumbag in a Santa suit, have him just kill a happy married couple in pure, cold blood, a little infant baby bawling and squalling, a little boy running into the bushes afraid for his life. The actor who portrays this guy is really effective at snarling, and how he just goes about destroying lives, not a care in the world...how could such a scene not be built to really turn stomachs and cause an outcry against the entire film?
I wanted caps featuring places significant to the film itself. What Santa Sicko didn't already do to poor Billy, Saint Mary's Home for Orphaned Children's own Mother Superior sure does him no psychological favors.
Lilyan Chauvin has perhaps the most memorable role in the film because of how her character, Mother Superior, has a definite impact on Billy's life. She is supposed to be a positive influence on this boy, but she instead causes irreparable harm. He never recovers from the experience as a child because Mother Superior insists he face his demons, not over time, but all at once. Totally a hissable character.
With a film as repellent as Silent Night, Deadly Night is to the easily offended, it wouldn't be as notorious without a little sex and some soft strokes of naked flesh. Add Mother Superior rushing in as Billy is caught gazing at two teenagers getting it on, rushing the kids, wielding that leather belt, and another scene adding infamy to the film.
The fear of a child, afraid of a nun who just seems to add a weight of anvil to his tortured psyche, and this film conveys just why he is scared, certain again to get a rise out of particular people. The little boy actor who portrays Billy during the orphanage scenes really adds gravitas to how destructive it could be to sustain abuse from a figure of authority who just won't give him a break.
Linnea Quigley's death is mentioned in the conversation as one of the most imaginative slasher deaths of all time. After watching Silent Night, Deadly Night (1984) Sunday night, I think just as memorable as the actual way she dies is how Quigley struggles to get away from Billy, lifted off her feet, that little, hot bod kicking and fighting, to no avail. She almost looks like a child in Billy's arms (in the form of the baby-face, hunky Robert Brian Wilson), and he is able to keep her in his arms, carrying her across the room, hoisting her onto those deer antlers, leaving that smokin' bod hanging. What a waste of primo hotness. Okay this juvenile Scarecrow is moving on..
This movie is all about cashing in on the promise of the movie poster...getting Billy in the Santa uniform, having him go over the deep end, and getting that ax in his possession. All the other weapons are bloody icing on the bloody cake.
Movies like this always have snarky assholes who use foul language and bullying to cause mischief and aggravation. Both, of course, get their just desserts. I particularly enjoy the use of Christmas lights to literally lynch a victim in the stock room. If you've seen one beheading gag, you've pretty much seen them all.
Director Charles E Sellier, Jr. sets the stage for what's to come in the movie by having Billy tear through the staff at Ira's Toys. The stockroom manager, as foul as he is, is only the first to be executed.
Sellier, Jr. loves to compose establishing shots of Billy's crimes. Bodies laid to waste. In the Ira's Toys store, Sellier, Jr. enjoys shots of Santa toys and displays alongside Billy hunting and killing fellow employees.
What could a movie of this caliber be without a deaf priest playing Santa for the orphanage kids getting shot from behind by a policeman believing he was Psycho Santa Billy with blood from him spraying a line across a child's face?
I'm sure you have watched a movie and asked yourself, "What the hell was that about?!?!" When Santa Billy gives a girl, whose been really good during the year, a bloody box cutter he gutted a girl he was sexually attracted to, I'm sure I wasn't the only one who came away with a look of bewilderment.
Whether you're a victim tossed out a window, glass shards buried deep, or a cop taking it to the chest from the ole ax, there's not a death scene Sellier, Jr. and company doesn't like.
Naughty.
Happy Holidays from Scarecrow's Blog from the Darkside.
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