1984
Director- Charles Sellier
Cast- Robert Brian Wilson, Lilyan Chauvin, Gilmer
McCormick, Toni Nero, Britt Leach, Linnea Quigley
This
movie begins with little Billy being taken by the old folks home to visit
grandpa on Christmas Eve. Everyone believes that grandpa is catatonic but when the
adults step out of the room, leaving Billy alone with gramps, the old geezer
comes to life and warns Billy that Santa is a vengeful force that punishes all
of the naughty kids.
On the
way home, Billy’s family picks up what appears to be a stranded motorist in a
Santa suit. Unbeknownst to them he has just robbed a convenience store and
murdered the clerk! This evil old elf
pulls a gun on the family, shoots dad and sexually assaults mom before cutting
her throat, all in plain view of little Billy.
Orphaned and traumatized,
Billy is raised in a Catholic orphanage. He, predictably, has a rather morbid
view of Christmas. The Mother Superior (Lilyan Chauvin) is determined to make
him into a normal child, even if it means punishing him until he learns to suppress
his feelings. Billy’s childhood is filled with the inevitable mixed messages of
a hyper religious upbringing. He witnesses two people having sex (which
triggers the memory of seeing his mother’s assault). He is caught by Mother
Superior, and to drive the point home that sex is “naughty” the Mother beats
Billy for witnessing the act. He is haunted by nightmares, seen as an outcast
by the other kids and as his trauma becomes more pronounced, the Mother
Superior’s discipline becomes more extreme.
Fast forward a few years and
Billy has grown into a strong young man. He gets a job stocking in a toy store.
The closer it gets to Christmas the more tense he gets. He meets a nice girl
but can’t even enjoy a sexual fantasy; memories of his trauma intrude even into
his dreams. Billy, meanwhile, is preoccupied with trying to be good and not “naughty”.
The department store loses its mall Santa and the boss sticks Billy in the
Santa suit. His warped morality becomes
evident when he tells a little girl that is squirming in his lap that if she
doesn’t sit still he’ll have to punish her severely for being naughty.
But, against all odds, he
makes it to Christmas Eve without snapping. At the office Christmas party the
booze starts flowing and the girl that Billy had the hots for pairs off with a
jerk co-worker who had been giving Billy a hard time. Things get out of control and the co-worker
tries to rape the girl. This is the final straw needed to break Billy. He charges in, strangling the would be rapist
with Christmas lights with a yell of “Naughty!” He then kills the girl too,
telling her that “punishment is necessary”. And why not? His whole life, sex has
been associated with violence.
Billy is now past the point
of no return and sets out on a string of mass murder, working his way through
the rest of his coworkers and then various members of the town. The most
standout scene in the movie is when he kills a very topless Linnea Quigley by
impaling her on deer antlers while he declares “Punish! Punish!”. He then gives
her little sister a box cutter as a present before leaving the home!
The movie is obviously at
its heart a slasher, and I wouldn’t say this was a deep examination of psychopathology
like Manhunter or Henry, Portrait of a Serial Killer. Having said that, the
makers of this film either had some education about trauma or an intuitive understanding
of it. The depiction of the effect of childhood trauma is pretty accurate, if
exaggerated; stress, nightmares, isolation, the inability to connect
intimately, the intrusion of the troubled psyche into the sex life, rigidly separating
people into good and bad, and the continuation of the trauma cycle when the
victim becomes the perpetrator.
The movie, at first glance,
appears to be gruesome satire paring morbid subject matter with festive holiday
imagery. But this is a serious and very grim movie. It starts very dark and
never lightens up. If you are wanting something fun to watch for Christmas,
stick with Gremlins or Die Hard. Save Silent Night Deadly Night for when you
want to be disturbed.
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