Santa Rooney!

One of the truest tragedies of the ‘90s had to be the sudden death of the Silent Night, Deadly Night franchise. Few other horror series managed such an odd mix of seasonal sleaziness and utter awfulness to the point of comedy gold. The first two films will remain classics of a different era, one where a great movie could be made pieced entirely from scenes of its predecessor, mixed gloriously with some of the worst acting (though to be fair, best by eyebrows) in cinema history. Part 3 was something of a bore, while Brian Yuzna’s followup offered something new, if imperfect. 

So with the hot chocolate cooling, I finally sat down to rewatch, after a decade and a half, Silent Night Deadly Night 5: The Toymaker.

Quick Plot: Like so many Christmas themed horror movies, a young boy briefly watches his parents get it on. That’s just foreplay for a mysterious Christmas gift from a stranger, one that shirtless dad has the unluck of opening, being facehugged by, and strategically eye-impaled on a firepoker. 

No wonder why some people hate the holidays.

Little Derek (the toy soldier from Demonic Toys, boo yah!) catches the kid from Scrooged’s disease wherein such a traumatic event has left him mute. Newly single mom Sarah does what she can to cheer up her kid, even going so far as to take him to the local toy shop run by Joe Petto (get it? really, do you?) and his awkward teenage son.

Oh, and Joe is played by The Manipulator himself, Mickey Rooney.

Meanwhile, a self-inflicted mysterious man named Noah enters the picture, buying Petto’s toys and conducting Jack Skellington-like experiments to trace their evil. Sure, he also causes the death of his landlord and terrifies Derek with an awful mall Santa gig, but since he’s the best looking male onscreen, we can at least count on his wavy brown locks to see us and our women and children through to the end.

There are, of course, a few California Christmas-related side notes. Neith Hunter, who savvy viewers may remember as the bewitched lead in SIlent Night Deadly Night 4, pops in as Sarah’s neighbor, occasionally offering knowing remarks with hints to how “You would not believe the things I’ve been through.” This comes right before her bratty baggy pants wearing teen son nearly explodes from some mischievous roller blades, which is slightly fabulous. Even Clint Howard stops by in an all-too brief cameo. Also of note is a horny couple that proves why parents should simply never hire teenage babysitters and why horny babysitters should never expect to survive an evening of consummated affection.

High Points

For a movie that was clearly heading straight to video, you reallly have to admire the playful score, which subtly calls up fitting musical themes for its death scenes, including an Egyptian-style toot for a snake kill and an almost Psycho-esque staccato for a water pistol shooting

The full reveal of the main villain is nicely bizarre and rather icky

Low Points

Perhaps it was some budgetary restraints, but there's something about this film that feels so ...small. Aside from a handful of main characters, we never see the killer toys cause any real mayhem on strangers. Even the fact that Noah has a connection to Sarah and Derek, and yet also *happens* to be investigating Joe Petto is in itself a seemingly easy way to keep costs low by confining all conflict to our leads.

Lessons Learned

It's perfectly normal for a child to never speak again after witnessing the horrific and bizarre death of his father

Not all kids are asking for Larry the Larvae crawling toys, especially when they're known to cause fatal car accidents

In the 1990s, California shopping malls employed one dozen workers at a time to man the Santa/Elf station

Rent/Bury/Buy

It’s a shame Silent Night, Deadly Night 5 doesn’t have any special features, as it’s a surprisingly interesting little Christmas movie and easily one of the best of its series. Sure, that’s not saying a whole lot when your biggest competition is Garbage Day!, but The Toymaker is a strange watch, filled with passable performances and some groovy kills. 

Horrible Non-Horror! Left Behind: The Movie

There are some types of people I find endlessly frustrating and equally amusing. We’ll call them psycho doomsday religious folk.

Sometimes they stand next to me on the subway, ranting and raving about how children are turning to iPods and homosexuality because they’ve forgotten the word of Jesus. Shame on all of us for not remembering how that nice young crucified man so detested iPods and homosexuals.

I have no problem with faith. We’re all entitled to believe or not believe whatever we wish, however silly it may seem to others (like me). But there are some aspects of religious zealots (namely the mass unwarranted judgment imposed on others) that truly irks me, including the concept of today’s gloriously awful feature, Left Behind: The Movie.

To begin, you have to adore any film that adds “The Movie” after its title. Because it’s already assuming a certain level of stupidity from its audience. Honestly, I find it adorable.

Quick Plot: Our story opens at 6PM in Jersalame. Then the credits roll and the new time card reads ‘6:03PM.’ 

Am I crazy, or is that hilarious?

Anyway, Kirk Cameron plays Buck Williams, a reporter, despite all associations with his name reminding us of cowboys or porn stars. On his returning flight, something wacky--or Langolier-ish--occurs when a bunch of passengers simply vanish, leaving their clothing and relatives behind. This appears to be a global phenomenon, one so dramatic that martial law is immediately declared.

So who disappeared, and who...dramatic piano tones...was LEFT BEHIND (the movie)? Hint hint: all empty clothing may have included a crucifix.

See, the Christians were rescued before the upcoming (7 years, according to some characters) rapture, leaving their loved ones alone and doomed. Unless they start reading the Bible, like goofily named pilot Rayford Steele. Meanwhile, a slick Russian politician slithers his way into world power minutes after Kirk Cameron has a religious epiphany in the UN bathrooms. 

Oh, and a bunch of stuff explodes along the way.

Here’s the thing about Left Behind: The Movie: the extras are way more entertaining than the film itself. Take, for example, a featurette wherein actress Janaya Stephens enthusiastically  announces how this is “the biggest and most ambitious Christian movie ever made.” Then just imagine her sadness at the $200 million plus gross of The Passion of the Christ (a real horror movie if there ever was one).

We also get to hear red carpet interviews with a few Hollywood stars (including the guy from The Michael Landon Story!) which is mostly useful for learning what actors are also scary and religious (Lacey Chabert, Hunter Tylo, Demonic Toys’ Tracy Scoggins). By far my favorite part though is Stephens' stiff reading of “The producers knew they would have to go big.”

Cut to a bunch of things blowing up.

Yes, dear Hollywood, that is how you reel in the rowdy teens and convert them via Kirk Cameron. Poor Kirk. I’ve never seen an actor in more pain than watching the former Mike Seaver pretend (I won’t call it acting) to be a non-believer. It's a relief when his character (Buck Williams, say it without laughing please) finds God because finally, Kirk can at least play his type and draw out some form of believability.

Lessons Learned

The UN’s no picnic

When you meet Kirk Cameron, the best thing to always say is ‘Nice hair!’

Beta fish will be left behind

One sign of showing your Christian solidarity is to remove your scandalous nose ring. Jesus hates those

The best place to have a religious conversation is a very clean public restroom

Rent/Bury/Buy

My biggest beef with Left Behind (it’s a movie) is its painstaking dullness (despite “big” explosions). The antichrist gets nothing special other than awkward slo-motion (but not really slo-motion, it’s fast slo-motion which somehow seems sacriligious). The rapture is saved, presumably for parts 2 and 3. The fact that they’re streaming on Instant Watch is even more frustrating. Now I HAVE to watch them, and not in order to save my soul.

So do I, from a bad film perspective, recommend Left Behind: The Movie? If you’re the type of person who finds yourself chuckling at Sunday mass, then perhaps. More importantly, I can’t urge you enough to watch the featurettes on the “Special Edition” DVD. Hey, they even toss in a scene from a Gary Busey Christploitation! That alone might make you a believer.

Have Yourself a Deadly Little Christmas

Having now sat through three film equivalents of reindeer poop, i think I’ve figured something out:

Christmas horror is the new zombie movie.

Somehow both subgenres seem to attract the least talent when it comes to cinema. Flip through Instant Watch for dozens of examples of Romero ripoffs or, with a little more work, compare the ratio of of good to atrocious yuletide horror. For every Christmas Evil, there are three times as many titles like Feeders 2: Slay Bells, Santa Claws, and today’s ever so painful (yet not without its charms) Deadly Little Christmas.

Quick Plot: 15 years ago-

Yes, you read that right. The movie technically starts in the past, rather than beginning, then flashies forward 15 years later. I’m already confused.

Anyway, a dark-haired family is enjoying Christmas morning as the three rugrats wrestle in wrapping paper, mom Felicia Rose (Sleepaway Camp) snaps photos, and dad (as Santa Claus) sneaks off to the bedroom to get naked with the housekeeper, quickly being stabbed to death in a scene my DVD decided to skip. Thankfully, the film later gives us a 5 minute flashback of the very first five minutes, which is quite thoughtful.

In a scene that offends John Carpenter’s Halloween far more painfully than anything Rob Zombie ever did, middle child (whose name I can't remember, so eh) slowly walks outside, a bloodied knife in his little hands. Fifteen years go by with Middle Child Whose Name I Can't Remember living in a mental asylum, escaping on a fateful Christmas night as his now-grown sisters Taylor and Noelle are rehearsing a community theater production.

Stop everything for this plotline, please. Sure, there’s a masked madman on the loose, but really, we need to talk about this play, especially since every character onscreen says the word ‘play’ or ‘director’ at least three times in every scene. Taylor is directing a PLAY, a PLAY about Easter being performed on Christmas Eve, being DIRECTED by her this PLAY is. 

How does a young woman DIRECT a PLAY, you might ask yourself. Taylor’s method is quite Scorcessian. It involves advising her cast to run lines and do their best, sometimes to do their best and then run their lines. For the PLAY. 

The PLAY she DIRECTED.

Before we get to the actual performance of The PLAY Taylor DIRECTED and many actors RAN LINES for, we need to meet a few more characters. Two actors who smoke weed (or really, in their words, weeeeeeeeeeed cough cough cough) are murdered by that pesky madman (who would dare to be in conflict with Taylor’s PLAY). That doesn’t seem to have any effect on the PLAY though, which goes about as planned despite missing two of its actors. Taylor is that good of a DIRECTOR.

Also, there’s the greatest police detective in cinema history, a man who can barely look another person in the eye or complete a full sentence. Instead of a business card, he writes his number on looseleaf. Instead of solving crimes, he lets emotional mothers search for escaped homicidal mental patients on their own so that he can watch Taylor’s PLAY. Which is actually quite nice of him since he’s one of eight people in the audience. Also, he dresses like a waiter, which I imagine might be the actor’s night job which he was headed to after filming his two scenes.

Despite a missing mother and brother, Taylor and Noelle put on a PLAY about the Last Supper, which, did you know, involved folding chairs? And graduation robes. And three people.

 After the PLAY, other stuff happens but were we supposed to care? There’s a twist that my cats saw coming and a hilarious showdown with one of the easiest to defeat villains of all time.

I just realized that I’ve been writing for a few pages now. What am I doing? In all that time, I never once RAN MY LINES. Reindeer poop for me.

High Points

Well...with their dark hair, at least the female actresses in the film look like they could potentially be related

Low Points

Clearly the whole movie, but to not be petty, here’s an example of why this movie is awful (yet still not Santa Claws awful): when the two ill-fated actors smoke their pot, they make incredibly crass comments about how they’d like to have sex with Taylor. While I don’t disbelieve that a pair of 18 year olds would talk the way they do, their conversation is just ugly. Not funny, not sexy, not with any point whatsoever. 

Lessons Learned

Family is supposed to protect family

The main rights of passage in turning into an adult include having sex, doing drugs, and directing a play

After killing a villain that has destroyed your family, take comfort in knowing there will be no more bloodshed (also, run your lines)

Rent/Bury/Buy

Deadly Little Christmas is a deadly little awful movie, but as you might guess, I had some fun watching it. The set design gets as advanced as a lamp on a snack table (I have the same one in my apartment, so hollah that) and the performances seemed to have been given without the actors ever once RUNNING LINES with each other beforehand. Sadly there’s not nearly a strong enough xmas element to make this any kind of seasonal tradition, but hey...there is community theater. You can’t find that in any town!

Oh wait. You can. But Taylor didn’t DIRECT it.

Yup, I guess I sort of loved this movie.

Santa Roll Call

As some of you know and others don't care about, I spent the last year or so contributing to Pop Syndicate, a recently renovated website that lost all its past content (and writers). The following article appeared in 2009 and since you can't find it anywhere else in InterWorld, I'm rerunning it here, with a few edits. Apologies for the deja vu.

As I sprinkle my sugar cookies in anticipation of a certain cheerful home invader’s arrival, it seems fitting to consider, judge, and rank some of cinema’s Santariffic incarnations. Naturally, we’re not talking about Tim Allen (although that’s a horror in itself) 

7. Wayne, Santa Claws

Unless you really dig C-movie actresses rubbing teddy bears over their artificial bodies to one electronically synched beat playing on loop OR have a serious fear of garden weasels, there’s not much to love in this John A. Russo directed “horror” from 1996. Yes, that’s the same man whose name graces the screenwriting credit of Night of the Living Dead, but he’s seriously etched his name onto the naughty list with this soft(er than a fleece blanket)-core porn/autistic community theater production of a slasher film about a lonely man harnessing a fatal crush on Debbie Rochon. His way into her heart? Donning aforementioned garden weasel, dressing as Santa, spray painting his costume black, drugging her children with sedative-laced hot cocoa, and strangling a few of her competitors for the Scream Queen Christmas Calendar. It’s far worse than it sounds.

6. Bill Goldberg in Santa’s Slay

Little known fact: Santa is a gambling man, child hater, and crappy curling player. 1000 years ago, he lost a somewhat cheated bet with a claymation angel an as punishment, was forced to bring presents to all the well-behaved Christian kids of the world. A millennium’s worth of ho-ing breeds an awful lot of resentment in a man, so it’s not overly surprising to watch him slaughter his way through Rob Zombie-esque strippers and grumpy old ladies the second his spell wears off. Former WWE champ Bill Goldberg has a sort of Bill Mosely on steroids feel that works for the ridiculous character, but this Santa loses a point for a) not being a well-written film and b) stabbing the kindly Jewish butcher, who by any logic, should be one of the only characters a disgruntled Santa tired of giving gifts would spare. 

5. Mike McGavin, Elves

I’ve probably discussed this 1989 bottom feeding flick with far more energy than the one time I watched it fifteen or so years ago, but one can’t draw up a Ho Ho Horror list without citing Grizzly Adams himself donning the hopefully dry cleaned mall Santa suit and battling (sadly sans costume) a genetically engineered homicidal Nazi elf. How can you not root for a guy with naturally pruned facial hair that puts all polyester beard to shame?

4. Rebecca, Cuento de Navidad

Roseanne Barr shocked the television waves with the in-your-face realism of her small screen family, but we also can’t forget her glass ceiling shattering insistence on donning the big man’s suit for some extra December cash at the Lanford Mall. Paco Plaza’s The Christmas Tale features a similar twist: a mysterious dark-haired woman clad as Santa Claus has stolen $2 million and now finds herself trapped in a deep and lonely forest ditch, where her only salvation is a group of ‘80s infused children with mixed morality. I’d hate to spoil this excellent little offbeat thriller (found on the Spanish series Six Films to Keep You Awake), so just know that Rebecca does get to prowl the lonely woods with a sharpened axe and serious lack of Christmas spirit.

3. The Chapman Bros.Silent Night, Deadly Night 1-3

Gifted with one of the easiest psychologically explained motives in slasher history (crazy grandpa’s insistence that Santa’s purpose is to discipline sinners; parents’ subsequent murder after cursing; an abusive nun wielding a switch at the sight of premarital sex) and one of the best one word mottos ever (PUNISH!), Silent Night, Deadly Night helped to set the popularize and polarize Christmas massacres for all time. Billy himself is something of a drip, but he does earn points for innovative slayings (including one involving a slay) and honoring the honor system by trusting “nice kids” and improvising presents. Yes, the knife you just used to kill a little girl’s older sister’s boyfriend may be a slightly inappropriate stocking stuffer, but it’s the thought that counts. Little brother Rickey is a little less effective as Old St. Nick (although his eyebrows alone could possibly steer eight reindeer solo). We’ll give him a pass for being an infant at the initial Chapman family tragedy, especially since he still managed to remember and recount that and the entire rest of Silent Night, Deadly Night to take up 60% of the running time of his first sequel.

2. Jack Skellington/Santy Claws, The Nightmare Before Christmas

When we really consider Jack’s Kringle skills in this stop motion animated masterpiece, we can’t be kinder than A for Effort, D for Execution (especially since all the kids seemed to survive--I mean...carry on). Mr. Claws, on the other hand, is kind of a pompous jerk with a sense of self-importance as big as his bloated waistline. Still, the little booted big man should be commended for cleaning up Jack’s mess with such speed and efficiency, not to mention introducing the concept of snowballs to Halloweentown. 

1. Harry Stadling, Christmas Evil 

He makes high quality presents. He’s a smooth dancer and thorough spy, but it’s Harry’s innocent yearlong yuletide spirit that really earns him the top spot. Sure, his standards for the Nice List are a little controversial (bad breath could be genetic and being “just darling” seems a little surface), but of all the cinematic characters to ever don a homemade wool jumpsuit, it’s Brandon Maggart’s Travis Bickle after too many candy canes from this 1980 low budget classic that makes the holiday. Although the stress of non-believers does eventually drive him to multiple homicide, Harry follows his own dream and is never happier than when donating a van full of handcrafted toys to a needy children’s hospital. He’s a taker of unworthy lives, but a giver of true joy. 

The Island of Misfit (& Demonic) Toys

Ah, the early ‘90s, a time when baggy clothes were hip, 90210 was the most famous number on the playground, and my weekends were filled with free video rentals through a store credit system. More often than not, what came home in my pudgy little hands was whatever new Full Moon release had been prominently displayed.

Demonic Toys is a film I find myself thinking of quite often, yet in truth, I’ve only watched it once. Until now.

Quick Plot: A pair of inept police officers are attempting to arrest some arms dealers, but through a series of bad copping, one gets shot, a thug escapes into a toy warehouse, and the other crawls inside to drip his blood over the seal of Satanically animated dolls. The surviving cop, played by a buff and one-note Tracy Scoggins, is pregnant and pissed. The surviving thug is smarmy and mean. The Satanically animated dolls are simply incredible.

Also on call are a chubby night watchman, his nightly fried chicken delivery boy, and a teen runaway with terrible hair. None of the ragtag group is quite equipped to battle the horde of titular tot-sized evil, headed by the snarling Baby Oopsie Daisy.

As a child, I seriously feared this thing. As an adult, I semi-seriously fear this thing.

Dare I forget the whole reason for their homicide? See, 66 years ago, some demon thing tried to be reborn. Didn’t work. His horned devil corpse was carelessly tossed aside by some hungry trick-or-treaters, left to fester for decades until the blood of Thug 1 reawakened his power. His method of return is to ‘do the nasty’ with an already pregnant woman, possessing the soul of her fetus in the process.

I’ll say what you’re already thinking: the movie is amazing. And way better than A Nightmare On Elm Street V.

Generally, I’m a pretty loyal fan of Full Moon Entertainment. Witness my collection of Puppet Master action figures or my willingness to sit through the atrocity that was Netherworld. Demonic Toys is Full Moon at its finest, with some genuinely unique villains and a script that seems to care.

Sure, we get the cheese factor of a happy couple rejoicing in their pregnancy, only for the lovable lug of a soon-to-be-daddy to get gunned down less than two minutes later.  There’s gratuitous nudity involving silicone. Terrible one-liners from an evil baby doll. Two little boys (one dressed like a toy soldier) engaged in a wrestling match to determine the rebirth of Satan. One ten-year-old lip-synching as a deep Devil voice talks about ‘doing the nasty’ with his mother. A giant bear.

In other words, a whole lot to love.

High Points

A slow motion scene of the heroes shooting the heads off of rather harmless looking toys is kind of the greatest thing ever put on screen

Was that a cameo from an extra in Dolls???

Lessons Learned

It takes a whole lot to be fired from a fried chicken joint. Insulting your boss, smoking in the kitchen, and being surly to the point of insane jerk levels will not do the trick

Cinematic air conditioning vents are, on average, 18.7x more spacious than any NYC apartment

The war for domination of a woman’s womb is best played by the card game War

Rent/Bury/Buy

I was surprised by how ‘well’ Demonic Toys held up. Okay, it’s a terrible ‘90s direct-to-VHS horror movie made as much to create a franchise than scares, but hey, it’s still a find. The monsters are genuinely interesting, whether they be carnivorous jack-in-the-boxes or tricycle riding blond girls in gas masks. The movie is readily available on Instant Watch or just about any Full Moon multi-film pack. So why are you still here?