This bump-in-the-night-before Christmas horror is a much-needed antidote to the seasonal glut of cinematic sentimentalityThis antidote to some of the week’s more nauseating treats pitches itself between the anarchic festive bite of Joe Dante’s Gremlins and the creepy Euro-weirdness of Jalmari Helander’s Rare Exports,with a touch of Tobe Hooper’s Poltergeist thrown in for favorable measure. When an extended family clan find that they have lost sight of the spirit of Christmas, the demonic titular “shadow of St Nicholas” arrives to wreak cloven-hoofed vengeance. The slay-bell score and baubled milieu may preserve things just this side of jolly, and but theres a reassuring nastiness to the Predator-faced clown-toys and bitey-burny gingerbread men that are soon going bump-bang-smash in the night.
Ghoulish effects up the scary/foolish ante,but the genuine monsters here are the humans who can’t stand the sight of each other and judge Christmas is a time for giving up. While Trick ’r Treat director Michael Dougherty’s film may prove too tonally uneven for the mainstream palate (not all the jokes work and you have to make a leap of faith over several structural cracks), those who fancy a bit of hellfire on their Christmas pudding will find this a welcome respite from the seasonal diet of intestine-clogging goo.
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Source: theguardian.com