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"...it steps away from cliché immediately in the first scene and continues to deliver tightly-scripted surprises..."
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Hey, how about a real scary Christmas flick this holiday season? One with a few splashes of gore here and there, a truly creepy plot, starring the always reliable John Carradine, the unexpected Patrick O'Neal, and the lovely Mary Woronov as both eye candy and would- be heroine? Sound frightfully festive? You bet! Just sit back and relax while we tell you of a Yuletide horror film that promises...
By DAVE DUGGINS Hello again, guys n’ ghouls, and a howling happy holiday to all! Tis the season to be jelly, as Richard Matheson says …or, as the Brits say, tis the season to be spooky! Sure, they knew what was going on, as do we here at Horror-Wood. The silly season is the perfect time to indulge in a creepy flick or two. If you watch two creepy films this holiday season, one of them should be Silent Night, Bloody Night (the other should be Ghost Story, the 1981 adaptation of Peter Straub’s excellent novel of the same name--but that’s just my opinion). If you’ve confused this with Silent Night, Deadly Night, which I’ve already written about-- albeit briefly--in these pages, then un-confuzzle yourself, my friend.
If you only know the film from the lurid, cheesy DVD cover art staring out at you from the bargain rack at Sam Goody, you may be surprised to discover that it really isn’t a bad movie. In fact, in many respects it’s an excellent movie, done on a really low budget. So it’s sort of like a good movie in bad movie clothing. The first "good-movie" thing I noticed about the film is in the writing – the characterization and dialogue, particularly. Even incidental characters are fully realized, illuminated in conversation. They are all delightfully small-town eccentric … or so you think at first. The truth – finally seen in a lengthy flashback in the film’s final act – is far more sinister.
The film stars Patrick O’Neal, Mary Woronov, and John Carradine. In 1973 O’Neal was a well-established B-list guy who might have been recognized by moviegoers familiar with The Stepford Wives or The Way We Were. He’s got a great face, dark and brooding, with just the right amount of projected menace to keep you edgy when he’s on screen. You spend a lot of time sitting around wondering whether or not he’s the bad guy (no spoilers, folks, I want you to see it for yourselves), and he’s perfect for that. Mary Woronov was and is a genre vet, with over 75 horror and exploitation film credits, including the excellent and frequently overlooked Nomads, starring Pierce Brosnan and featuring action-ace John McTiernan’s directorial debut, and one of my genre favorites, Warlock, with Julian Sands. She’s wonderful in her role as Diane Adams, a dark, brooding woman with a past far more haunted than even she imagines. At the beginning of the film, she already knows some of her ghosts. She becomes acquainted with the rest later, under very unpleasant circumstances.
As for John Carradine…what do I really need to say about him? The one disappointment about his appearance in the film is that his character is mute, responding to queries and demonstrating displeasure by ringing a bell. I miss that deep, gravelly voice (and just writing this is making me want to watch that wonderful Carradine Twilight Zone episode, "The Howling Man"), but the bell-ringing thing is just the right touch of craziness for a Carradine character. A plot summary is likely to turn you away from the film rather than engender much interest, but let’s face it – horror films are not about plot. They’re about mood, atmosphere. Here’s a story: a man, suspecting that his wife is cheating on him, has her murdered, only to discover later that he was wrong. Sounds like a soap opera, doesn’t it? Or one of the lesser Night Gallery episodes. It’s probably at home in both of those places, but it is also what happens in Shakespeare’s Othello.
Sometimes the real genius of plot--particularly in horror--is using and reusing those old clichés and trappings in a way that’s fresh and appealing. Horror has no choice but to cannibalize; a gruesomely appropriate fate, don’t you think? In Silent Night, Bloody Night, the cliché is an insane asylum and its inmates, a genre staple if ever there was one. You can find loony bins and crazy patients in films from The Cabinet Of Doctor Caligari (1924) to Disturbing Behavior (1998). Silent Night, in fact, goes one better, capitalizing on the story’s timeline to create two archetypal locations in one: The Insane Asylum in the past and the Creepy Old House in the present.
Horror films are often an exploration of past sins visited on present life, and this one follows that pattern. But it steps away from cliché immediately in the first scene and continues to deliver tightly-scripted surprises that mean you’ll probably have to watch the film again to be sure you’re catching everything. Jeffrey Konvitz (writer and director of The Sentinel, also starring John Carradine) and director Theodore Gershuny share screenwriting credit. Their story, too, is a looming gothic-standard house filled with trapdoors, blank walls, corridors that lead nowhere. This is a good thing. Just when you feel you’ve got a handle on the kind of story you’re watching, they change gears on us--something for which Hitchcock was both revered and vilified.
In fact, the first act features a very Hitchcockian sleight-of-hand with a couple of characters whose fate is not what you’d expect. Like Psycho, the film confounds your expectations, displaces you, and leaves you unsettled. All stuff us horror guys just love. Somebody out there who has already seen the film is surely groaning, "He’s not really comparing this low-budget trash to Psycho, is he?" At the risk of permanently damaging my credibility I offer this: a good script costs nothing. Good storytelling is cheap compared to even a day-player’s salary. Good writing costs only effort, mastery of craft, and time. It’s really a shame there wasn’t more money to throw at production, but look past the grainy print and cheap location shooting and find a story with depth, interesting characters and disturbing themes that linger long after you’re done.
There are great things happening visually, too, believe it or not. Good direction and knowing how to handle a camera are apparently not dependent on budget either. While many reviewers have complained about the darkness of the print, I did not find it distracting; in many instances, it added atmosphere. The flashback I mentioned earlier is particularly dreamlike and beautiful, shot in sepia tone, with a strange black haloing effect around each character’s head. I don’t know whether the halo thing is intentional or a by-product of film stock or lighting, but it works. Hey, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. I could say more about story, and I’d really love to, because it’s a juicy, multi-layered comment on deviance, insanity and the effects over time of homing with a deviant and insane family. But there isn’t much I could tell you without spoiling things, and as I said … I really want you to see it.
You’re required to take a leap of faith and abandon your usual attitude about cheesy cheapies to take this one in, but it’s worth the effort. It operates on several levels, giving you more than just junk-food entertainment. Of course it also offers a lot of the standard horror-film fare, but it does so with intelligence, taste and a certain brave style that belies its shoestring budget. So there you have it. Every once in awhile, Renfield actually sends me a good movie! Perhaps it’s just pity, having plied me with all those demonized tree stumps, college-student-propelled carpet monsters and turkey-headed blood-drinkers. Silent Night, Bloody Night handily avoids all of the above. Let me leave you with a line of dialogue I found particularly haunting, delivered sotto voce into a telephone receiver:
"You know me, Tess. It’s Marianne. Tell the mayor, tell them all … I’m waiting in my father’s house. It’s so lonesome here. Don’t be long." Merry Christmas to all, and to all … a good, spooky, sleepless night! Thanks, Dave! Silent Night, Bloody Night is truly one of those oughta-be-a-cult-film items that has managed to slip under the critical radar of film pundits and fright fans alike. You'd think any horror flick with John Carradine, the sexy cult siren Mary Woronov, and Patrick ("the poor man's Peter Lawford") O'Neal would be a fave for that alone, yet this one is still unknown to most fans. So here's a holiday treat for many of our readers...maybe, if you're really, really "ghoul," you'll find it under your tree this Yuletide. Article copyright © Dave Duggins |
