Macabre…ish Horror Review: Silent Night
Silent Night, 2012/ 1 hr 34 min.
A mysterious man shaves and dresses as santa while a woman is tied up nearby and in the basement, a man sits tied to a chair in his underwear and wrapped in christmas lights. He sputters and assumes he’s being punished for an indiscretion, the man dressed as Santa flips a switch and electrocutes the man. Santa never says a word.
The next day, Christmas Eve, it’s all hands on deck for the sheriff’s department, including for Aubrey Bradimore (Jaime King). Before work she stops at church but unfortunately a perverted creep of a priest (Curtis Moore) is there to disrupt her prayer.
And at the same time, Santa (Rick Skene) knocks on the door of a very spoiled child (Laura Cartlidge) who’s terrible to her mother, she opens the door Santa delivers a ton of volts of electricity to that girl’s chest.
Aubrey hits the parade route and one of her stops is to a cynical, wise ass of a Santa (Donal Logue). This santa sucks, not even the kids like him but he has a permit. While there Ofc. Bradimore gets a report of a bad smell coming from an abandoned house. When she arrives, she’s hit by the smell as soon as she gets out of the car.
And inside the house she finds the decaying remains of her colleague Deputy Jordan (Brendan Fehr). She searches the house for Alana Roach (Ali Tatarin), who he was last known to be with. Alana’s remains are upstairs, and she’s been dismembered. Her remains are scattered around the room. The phone, still in her hand, which is currently in a drawer, is ringing.
The Sheriff (Malcolm McDowell) arrives and tells Ofc. Bradimore that she’s not equipped for this case and he’s pissed that a murder has happened in his town.
At a nearby motel, Santa arrives at an adult photo shoot and he swings a scythe at everyone in the room. The photographer, Frank (Aaron Hughes) gets a shot off after being impaled through his crotch. The model takes the opportunity to leap out of the bathroom window. She ends up in a Christmas tree stand and unfortunately for her there is a wood chipper there and Santa feeds her through it after hacking off one of her legs.
Back at the Sheriff’s department, the phone is ringing off the hook, residents are calling in about a lot of blood and bodies are stacking up.
Among the evidence found at the hotel is a camera that was still recording. It didn’t record the murders but it definitely got the terrifying Santa. The same santa that just walked into the evening sermon espousing the evil of Christmas, the creepy reverend gets his weird sermon cut short when Santa cuts off his fingers and brutally stabs him to death. The one parishioner (Doreen Brownstone) promises not to say anything and Santa hands her money and leaves.
Ofc. Bradimore questions a potential suspect, another Santa that lives in the motel and is also a drug dealer named Karsson (Mike O’Brien) who’s known as Mr. Snow. He’s not the one she’s looking for be he’s another bad guy and proves it by running away, attacking and slashing her in the alley. She’s saved by the Sheriff.
There’s something up with this place, it is chockfull of degenerates and otherwise bad people. This town is already said to be dying, these murders are the death knell to the place, if they don’t catch this guy.
While the Sheriff is talking to the Mayor (Tom Anniko), Santa strangles him and the call ends, the sheriff blames the signal. He doesn’t just get the Mayor thought but his daughter who is a porn actor and her boyfriend. It would seem, Santa is trying to clean up the town. The night is still pretty young and Santa manages to kill 10 people, and get away, in no time. But he doesn’t kill everyone and some people he treats.
The quirky Sheriff is sure this serial killer will be at the Christmas parade, he nabs a Santa and is certain he has the right one. It’s just the disgruntled Santa from earlier in the day who Ofc. Bradimore checked for a permit. But Aubrey goes back to check on the Santa/drug dealer who lives in the motel. He pulls a gun on her and all but dares her to shoot and she does. But she notices something, a gift on his counter, looks just like the one her dad got this morning and like another at a victim’s house. Ofc. Bradimore, rushes home.
Oh and the Sheriff also received one of those boxes, he opens it and finds coal inside. The power goes out, he looks up and sees Scary Santa staring at him with a flame thrower. And back at Ofc. Bradimore’s house, she finds her dad, also dressed as Santa, he’s been disemboweled and her mother’s in the closet.
Disgruntled Santa is still in a cell when the sprinkler goes off and when scary Santa lets him out, he picks a fight with him. Scary Santa stops playing nice and pulls out his axe but decides a pair of brass knuckles will be better.
Scary Santa is still there when Aubrey Bradimore arrives. After being tosses around, they end up in an axe fight and then she gets her hands on the flame thrower and lights Scary Santa up. Before the building burns down she rescues Brenda (Ellen Wong) and they get out of there. Not just them though…
There’s a story about a man who went on a rampage at a party that his wife and her boyfriend was at, dressed as Santa, with a homemade flamethrower. It happened a long time ago and his name was Ronald and he was taken down by a male cop by the name of Bradimore. In Ronald’s truck sat Ronald Jr. watching the entire thing unfold.
The story goes that he’s still at it, traveling around the country and every Christmas, he ‘cleans up’ the town. It is said to just be urban legend but it’s not much of a legend if it’s happening.
This was directed by Steven C. Miller who also directed Werewolves (2024). This is graphic and gory plus it feels like an old fashioned slasher and the scary Santa looks like a character out of an old horror movie. Very well done!