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| Silent Night, Deadly Night (1984) |
Something never quite crossed my mind and into when I write
about Silent Night, Deadly Night, until I was responding to a thread comparing
it to Christmas Evil, in regards to why the former seemed so much more popular
and discussed than the latter. This thought had nothing to do with the films in
the same discussion but about the end results of SNDN; of the muscled killer
after his murderous rampage led to the orphanage where he was tormented by
Mother Superior who failed to understand how damaged he was, he never achieved
success, really. Mother Superior thought she knew what was best for the child.
He needed sympathy and a paternal figure that could give him care and proper
treatment. But she, in her infinite wisdom, thought hard, tough confrontation
of the very thing that damaged him—Santa Claus (well, the dirtbag rapist/psycho
who murdered his father/mother dressed as Santa)—was the right thing to do.
Ill-advised and wrongheaded (she thought her way was the only way, despite
objections from her “inferior”, a sister with affection for him) as Mother
Superior was, the one punished was Billy. The thought was that, despite all the
killing, Billy never truly exorcised his demon: Mother Superior. Sure, the
genesis of the trauma—the human beast in Santa costume—was ultimately
responsible for that horror that coursed through the veins of Billy’s tortured
psyche, but Mother Superior encouraged the beast to reach from the depths and raise
havoc. She had become condemned to a wheelchair, no longer even able to really
use the blunt force of her personality and brute force of her Mother-knows-best
attitude about raising children in her church’s orphanage, but as Billy, ax in
hand, made his way towards her, he would not be allowed to avenge himself. Cut
down before that ax could carve into her face, Billy laid at the foot of a
wheelchair, Mother Superior able to hold onto her superiority and thumb her
nose at this good-for-nothing kid she was ashamed of.
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