To All A Goodnight

IMDb
A group of teenagers at a party find themselves being stalked by a maniacal killer in a Santa Claus costume.



OHTheHorror

“Lock your door, too. I want you to be safe, Nancy. There’s evil here, I can feel it. The devil’s here.”

For horror filmmakers, the challenge of making a movie set around Christmas is often “how can we make the holiday scary?” The answer is often to corrupt Christmas and have the film go against everything Christmas stands for. A meaningful, peaceful holiday like Christmas is then filled with images of bloodshed and carnage. The easiest and most common target in Christmas horror… the killer Santa Claus. First seen in a segment of 1972’s Tales from the Crypt, the “killer Santa” gimmick would actually not be used again until 1980, when Last House on the Left actor David Hess made a little yuletide slasher film called To All a Good Night his directorial debut.

It’s Christmas break at the Calvin Finishing School for Girls and the girls who share this particular house have only one thing on their minds: Sex. They drug their housemother and invite a group of boys over, to fulfill their needs. Of course, at this particular house, Christmas has always been a bit of a controversy. It was on Christmas break years earlier that a girl was accidentally killed in an initiation gone wrong. And now, with images of studs dancing in their beds fresh on their minds, someone has shown up dressed as ol’ Saint Nick to exact a bloody revenge upon the house. One by one, the girls and their gentleman callers are subjected to a series of grisly, vengeance-fueled murders. Will someone save them or will the girls experience a silent night…forever?

So a killer Santa Claus might not be the most original Christmas horror movie idea ever, but here, it was only employed for the second time. It would be used in Christmas Eviland then again in Silent Night, Deadly Night. Both of those films are much better known to the horror film world than To All a Good Night, although I do think the killer Santa in this one is much scarier than in both of those. For one thing, like all the best slasher killers, it uses an actual mask… a very creepy, rosy cheeked, friendly faced mask of Santa. Most other killer Santas merely slap on a fake beard and hat, using their own face to scare victims. The Santa mask here, though, is quite effective in the few scenes that you can actually see it (more on this later). The problem is, the rest of the movie isn’t quite as effective. In fact, all around, it just feels a bit generic. I’m all for style over substance if the style is good enough, but here, it’s just kind of plain and with a threadbare script, there really isn’t much to cling to.

For the most part, the kills are good and mean. We get a decapitation, throat slashings, an arrow through the back of the head and out an open mouth, and what might be the signature death scene of the movie… death by airplane propeller. The nudity present in the film isn’t something to write home about. There are a few beauties in this film, but the only ones that appear nude are the ones I would hope to never see nude again. The killer, as I’ve said, is pretty effective in the scenes where you do see the mask. The problem is that, it is gravely underused. Of course, this could’ve been due to the dark transfer of the Media VHS that I watched the film on. It’s hard to say, but I do think in any case, Hess could’ve gotten much more mileage out of the mask had he shown it a bit more (and a bit earlier). I didn’t even know the killer Santa was wearing a mask until nearly halfway through the film.

As I said, though, the script is completely weak. It delivers the same kind of slasher shenanigans that other films do. While that’s sometimes not a bad thing, here, there is nothing at all to liven things up. Want a “Crazy Ralph” type character to warn the kids of something bad going on… you get that here in a crazy, mentally challenged gardener. The opening of the film was very reminiscent of the opening in Prom Night. The little girl’s death in that film is the exact same as the death of the girl during her initiation in this one. We have the usual red herrings set up as to who the killer might be, then one by one they are dispatched of. We also get the kind of over-the-top cheesy romance lines that prevailed in not just 80s horror, but comedy as well. For instance, one girl says to a potential beau… “Time for your advanced course in… relativity.” You just never hear stuff like that anymore. It’s probably no shock as to why, of course. It doesn't help lines like these that the actors and actresses delivering them are strictly amateurs when it comes to talent.

The Christmas mood of the film is minimal, but we do see lights occasionally. The music of the film is the standard 80s synth job. While it has a few nice touches here and there, I was mostly bored with it. Still, it’s a moderately interesting composition for 80s synth buffs. To me, the biggest surprise of the film is that actor David Hess didn’t make an appearance at all. With such a recognizable face on the US and International horror scenes, you’d think he’d wanna be able to slap his pic on posters even if all he did was make a cameo. I guess this time out, he simply wanted to conduct duties behind the camera as opposed to in front of it. While that is commendable, I guarantee that had he appeared in the film somewhere, it would've seen a DVD release by now. Hess' direction isn’t bad. In fact, it’s quite competent. It’s just not particularly memorable or flashy. Take his name off the film, and you could’ve substituted it with any other director of slasher movie ripoffs of the time and no one would be any the wiser.

To All A Good Night has yet to see a DVD release, and the last news I heard was that somehow MGM owned it in their vast library now. It’s a shame, as the film could definitely use a modern restoration. Released by Media Home Entertainment, the film suffered on VHS from what many other horror films released by Media suffered from…horribly dark transfers. A Nightmare on Elm Street, Terror on Tour, Fatal Games, and other releases by Media have some scenes so dark that it’s nearly impossible to tell what is going on in them. To All A Good Night is no different. Many scenes look like the viewer is simply staring at black carpet, while a horror sound FX CD is playing in the background. The darkness does provide a good contrast for the Christmas lights and holiday mood, though. All this said, I do moderately recommend the film for slasher fans. It’s not the best or most original, but I think fans will enjoy the cookie-cutter nature of the formula going full speed ahead, the mean, inventive kills, and the creepy Santa killer. Not the best by a long shot, but certainly worth seeing once. At the very least, it's passable holiday horror fare, but only if you’ve already seen essential flicks like Silent Night, Deadly Night and Black Christmas.Rent it!


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How The Grinch Stole Christmas!

IMDb
A grumpy hermit hatches a plan to steal Christmas from the Whos of Whoville.



Rotten Tomatoes
Chuck Jones' animated version of the classic Dr. Seuss book How the Grinch Stole Christmas originally aired on television in 1966 and has since become a holiday family favorite. Voiced by Boris Karloff (who also narrates), the Grinch lives on top of a hill overlooking Whoville with his dog, Max. Each year at Christmas time, the Grinch's hatred grows stronger toward those insufferably cheerful Whos down in Whoville. Content to exchange presents, eat large banquets, and sing songs in the town square, the Whos live in a blissful ignorance of the Grinch's contempt. One year, he gets the idea to stop Christmas from coming by dressing up as Santa Claus. He cobbles together an outfit and makes his dog drag him around on a sleigh while sneaking into the Whos' homes and stealing their presents, food, and decorations. After he has stolen every last thing, the Whos wake up on Christmas morning to sing in the town square, causing the Grinch to question the basis of his nefarious plan. Thurl Ravenscroft (the voice of kid cereal mascot Tony the Tiger) provides the vocals for the song "You're a Mean One, Mr. Grinch." This story was remade into a live-action movie in 2000 by director Ron Howard starring Jim Carrey as the Grinch. ~ Andrea LeVasseur, Rovi


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A very Murray Christmas

IGN

BY MATT FOWLER Droves of determined "Bill Murray is God" fans who claim to be willing to watch the star of Ghostbusters and Groundhog Day in anything are in for a bit of a cheeky challenge with Netflix's A Very Murray Christmas - a walking-dream style homage to "good hang" holiday variety specials of yesteryear, premiering Friday, December 4th. Stepping in as host/nucleus - like crooners Dean Martin and Perry Como (and many more) have done over a good chunk of the previous century - Murray smartly evokes the "man of the people" pop-in vibe that he's cultivated over the past few years.

Reuniting with Lost in Translation director Sofia Coppola, A Very Murray Christmas occasionally gives off a similar aura. Trapped in a hotel during a blizzard (NYC's Carlyle, specifically), Murray starts off despondent over the fact that he's contractually obligated to play ringleader for a live holiday special in which no stars have arrived. Guests (the first of many) Amy Poehler and Julie White busy around him as frantic producers while Murray prepares to commit TV suicide. And it's during these first 10-to-15 minutes that the special drags. No coincidence too perhaps, these are the moments that contain the show's meager attempts at comedy.

Once you get past this hurdle though, the special relaxes into itself and becomes a big booze-soaked musical pal-around. With guests like Jason Schwartzman, Rashida Jones, Maya Rudolph, Rilo Kiley's Jenny Lewis, and the band Phoenix. I'd say the middle part of this soirée is the best. Just a Christmas Eve laze in the hotel bar with the "work staff" - doing shots of vodka and/or tequila while singing songs such as "Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)" and "Baby, It's Cold Outside."

Rounding things out here is a dream sequence featuring a more elaborate and "traditionally festive" series of numbers with Miley Cyrus and George Clooney (Yes, he sings - a bit. It's actually quite funny) that stands as the special's final hurrah. Odd though as it is to have a dream element within a show that already feels like one, but it still works.

As Murray himself slowly warms to the idea of spending the holidays stuck inside a hotel, so will you to the idea behind this special. Especially if you're not familiar with the sort of soused songfest programming it's attempting to pay respect to. As mentioned, it doesn't start off that promising. Essentially, the premise's "set up" is the weakest part, but once the star himself begins to enjoy himself, so will you.

The Alantic

A Very Murray ChristmasCaptures the True Spirit of the Season

Confusion. And commercialism. And goodwill to all mankind, via celebrity cameos and classic songs

What is Christmas? A religious holiday? A commercial ritual? A time of warmth, and togetherness, and generosity, and love? A time of sadness, and loneliness, and regret? Is it magic? Is it mythic? Is it madness?

It is, at this point, all of those things. As a culture, here in the U.S., we tend to be extremely confused about what, precisely, is being celebrated on December 25 (and, at this point, the entire month that precedes it). The Starbucks cup controversy. The fact that you can buy an advent calendar from Dior. The notion that there is, apparently, a war being currently waged in the name of the most wonderful time of the year.

RE

 Tradition

Nowhere is all this yuletide perplexity made more clear than in A Very Murray Christmas, the Netflix special directed by Sofia Coppola that takes the traditional cliches of the Celebrity-Driven Christmas Extravaganza—complete with musical acts and dance numbers and cameos from fellow celebrities—and makes Murray of it. The premise: Bill Murray, playing himself or a proximate version, has signed on to do one of those extravaganzas, this particular one set at the Carlyle Hotel in New York, on Christmas Eve. He does not want to do the show. This is mostly because he thinks the show is silly, but also because, apparently, he is beset with holiday ennui. (We are meant to understand this because A Very Murray Christmas’s opening musical number features Murray, bedecked in a tux and an antler headband, crooning “Christmas Blues” as Paul Shaffer accompanies him on the piano. And because Murray announces to his producers that “I feel so alone” and also that “God hates me.”)

Murray is forced to do the special, though, because—as his producers (Amy Poehler and Julie White) repeatedly remind him—he is under contract. And because, Poehler also reminds him, with an indeterminate amount of irony, “Everything that’s fun is always hard.”

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1970's Scrooge

Everyone well my friend loves the I Hate People Song


RogerEbert
The notion of Albert Finney playing Ebenezer Scrooge is admittedly mind-boggling, and so is the idea of A Christmas Carol being turned into a musical. But "Scrooge" works very nicely on its intended level and the kids sitting near me seemed to be having a good time.

Bricusse's songs fall so far below the level of good musical comedy that you wish Albert Finney would stop singing them, until you realize he isn't really singing. He's just noodling along, helped by lush orchestration. To get the lead in a big-studio musical during the long dying days of the genre, you apparently had to be unable to sing or dance. How else to account for Lee Marvin and Clint Eastwood in "Paint Your Wagon"? Or Finney in this one? Finney adopts Marvin's singing style, which is a sort of low-register growl. Meanwhile, countless dancers and a children's choir keep up the pretense that music is happening.

So if all of these things are wrong, why does "Scrooge" work? Because it's a universal story, I guess, and we like to see it told again. Ronald Neame's direction tells it well this time, and the film has lots of special effects that were lacking in the 1935 and 1951 versions. I was less than convinced by Scrooge's visit to a papier-mâché hell, but the appearance of Christmas Present (Kenneth More) surmounting a mountain of cakes and candies was appropriately marvelous.

The whole problem of the Ghosts of Christmas have been handled well, in fact. Reviewing the 1951 British version of "A Christmas Carol" for The Chicago Sun-Times, Eleanor Keen noted appropriately that the three ghosts are "a trio that resembles fugitives from an eighth-grade play in costumes whipped up by loving hands at home." My memory of that version is that she was right and the ghosts looked ridiculous.

In this version, the ghosts are handled more believably (if that's possible). The Ghost of Christmas Past is a particularly good inspiration: They've made the role female and given it to Dame Edith Evans. She plays it regally and sympathetically by turns, and seems genuinely sorry that Scrooge's childhood was so unhappy. Christmas Present, played by More, is a Falstaffian sort of guy with a big belly and a hearty laugh, who doesn't look like a ghost at all. And Christmas Future is simply a dark, faceless shroud, not unlike Lorado Taft's figure of Time in his Fountain of Life sculpture on the Midway at the University of Chicago. All three figures are miles better than conventional eighth-grade ghosts.

Alec Guinness contributes a Marley wrapped in chains; the Christmas turkey weighs at least 40 pounds; Tiny Tim is appropriately tiny, and Scrooge reforms himself with style. What more could you want? No songs, I'd say.

IMDb

A musical retelling of Charles Dickens' classic novel about an old bitter miser taken on a journey of self-redemption, courtesy of several mysterious Christmas apparitions.

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