A Christmas Horror Story

Plot synopsis:
Dangerous Dan (William Shatner) is a radio DJ stuck pulling a long shift at the Bailey Downs radio station during Christmas. During his broadcast, a series of four stories are witnessed:
=== First story ===
Dylan (Shannon Kook), Ben (Alex Ozerov), and Molly Simon (Zoé De Grand Maison) have decided to break into their school, which used to be a convent, in order to investigate two murders that occurred in the school's basement the year prior. Their friend Caprice (Amy Forsyth) was supposed to go, but she has to go with her parents out of town. The three of them end up getting locked in the basement. Molly becomes possessed after witnessing a bloody ghost and tries to seduce the others. When Dylan refuses her, Molly kills him. Ben agrees to have sex and after the act is finished, the ghost leaves Molly's body. Upon waking Molly reveals that the ghost is actually a pregnant teenager who died back when the school was a convent after the convent's nuns gave her a gruesome surgery to remove the baby. The ghost is only interested in having someone give birth to her child and if someone refuses, they're murdered – explaining last year's deaths. Despite impregnating Molly, the ghost still kills Ben before she unlocks the door and allows Molly to leave.
=== Second story ===
Scott (Adrian Holmes) is a police officer, but this doesn't stop him from going into woods owned by "Big Earl" (Alan C. Peterson) with his family to illegally chop down a Christmas tree for his family. During the trek, Scott's son Will (Orion John) wanders off and is lost. He and his wife Kim (Olunike Adeliyi) manage to find Will inside of a tree and are overjoyed to find him. This joy is short lived after Will begins to act strangely, culminating in Big Earl contacting the family to warn them that Will is actually a changeling. After the changeling kills Scott, Kim brings the changeling to Big Earl, who states that he's unable to help her find her son because it is up to the changelings. This ultimately ends with Kim shooting Big Earl, who was actually the changeling's abusive master. Finally free, the changeling returns to his home and frees Will.
=== Third story ===
Caprice and Duncan (Percy Hynes White) are traveling with their parents in order to visit their elderly Aunt Etta (Corrine Conley). During their visit, Etta tells them about the mythological creature Krampus (Rob Archer), which frightens Caprice – especially after Duncan purposely misbehaves in an attempt to irritate Etta's caretaker Gerhardt (Julian Richings). Their parents decide to take the children home at Etta's insistence but on the way the family ends up getting into a car accident, making it necessary for them to walk. Aware that they were being hunted by Krampus because they acted badly, the family members take refuge in a church where they confessed their sins in belief that Krampus will leave them if they do so. However, they are picked off one by one until only Caprice remains. Caprice manages to flee to Great Aunt Etta's house. She is successful in killing Krampus who transforms into Gerhardt. It's revealed that he transformed into Krampus due to his anger over the family's actions and that Etta was fully aware that this would happen. Furious, Caprice's anger causes her to transform into Krampus and she attacks Etta.
=== Fourth story ===
While preparing for a busy Christmas, Santa Claus (George Buza) discovers that all of his elves and his wife have turned into zombies after one of the infected elves dies following a fit of rage. He manages to kill them all, but is then forced to fight against Krampus. However, during the battle, it's revealed that "Santa" is actually a Mall Santa named Norman (who was an earlier guest on Dangerous Dan's radio show) that had a psychotic break while working overtime that caused him to see regular mall goers as zombies during the Christmas Food Drive. The police arrive and manage to gun him down just as he's about to kill "Krampus", revealed to be the mall's manager Mr. Taylor. This is the disturbance at the mall that Dangerous Dan has been mentioning through his broadcast.

Tags: violence, murder

Review:
The trailer and the current reviews made it out like this was going to be a blast to watch, and some parts of it were, but for the most part I felt pretty let down.So this is an anthology film, but instead of running each story back to back the film instead runs them simultaneously throughout.
The pacing was a big problem too, nothing at all really happens until about an hour in, once things do get rolling it is decent but not enough to make up for the first dull hour.I do have some good things to say, the Santa and Krampus scenes were absolutely awesome, it mostly made me wish that I was watching a movie that was strictly about them.
I feel like this could have been so much better because the parts that worked did work really well, but the stories just didn't blend well together and since you have to watch them all at once that really effected the entertainment of the overall film.
I was expecting this film was going to rate 5 or 6 but because it exceeded my expectations so much I am giving it a hefty 9.It's better shot, acted and written than the average shocker.The film nicely interweaves 4 stories and a semi-story of William Shatner as a DJ.
I can't say any more as I think this film is best watched without expectations and definitely without spoilers.A nice Christmas treat!.
Soon all the elves become zombies and violently attack Santa who will have to take them out one by one.All these stories are framed by a radio host who is in the Christmas spirit.
The story of the kids playing investigators in a locked school during Christmas Eve no less is very annoying at first until things change.
To die.Directors Grant Harvey, Steve Hoban and Brett Sullivan all lend their talents in an attempt to turn the happiest day of the year into a horrifying movie experience in A Christmas Horror Story.Best described as an anthology, A Christmas story interweaves multiple stories with Christmas being the anchor theme.
And a family is terrorized by Krampus, the anti-Santa Claus.William Shatner plays a radio DJ host that helps intertwine the stories and provides some spots of levity along the snowy roads to where the film journeys.
I could not say that about Tales of Halloween and that makes A Christmas Horror Story more in line with say Trick 'R Treat than Creepshow.Yes, Yes, Yes, we still had our favorite.
Each provide a fun sleigh ride of horror and all three could have been their own movie if the stories were expanded.A Christmas Horror Story played at the Toronto After Dark Film Festival on Saturday night and the audience clearly got in on the fun laughing at the right moments and offering applause for some of the more gruesome scenes.There are not a plethora of good Christmas horror films out there.
But A Christmas Horror Story brings enough presents in its Santa sack to make this a rather fun film that might just become a 'go-to' film for many horror fans every December..
Cool stories, couple of cool twists here and there and pretty sweet FX makes this movie a fun watch.
Finally, we come back around to a festering nod to modern zombies, as Santa Claus must ward off his elves that only want to devour flesh.While certainly not being a new concept in the world of horror cinema, with George Romero's Creepshow having carved a place over 30 years ago, anthologies have since become more mainstream with Michael Dougherty's 2007 woven horror treat, Trick R' Treat.
With our stories loosely being introduced by disc jockey Dangerous Dan (William Shatner), A Christmas Horror Story jumps back and forth between each tale, often placing too much on our plate.
There's a superficiality to our horror inspired Christmas treats, resembling a well put together fruit cake that in the end winds up being, well, still a fruit cake.Directors Grant Harvey, Steven Hoburn and Brett Sullivan certainly deserve praise and applause however, as they manage to blend enough sub-genre's into one film that doesn't pander too much to its fans.
A Christmas Horror Story is a forgettable yet fun little holiday horror anthology that winds up feeling too adventitious for its own good..
Perhaps this one is a BIT more serious...Probably, what will determine if you like this movie will be whether you enjoy more Fantasy based Horror films or not.
But, some of my favourites are chilling ones like the Classic 'LEGEND OF HELL HOUSE', the deeply Psychological 'SESSION 9', or the recent extremely well done 'BANSHEE CHAPTER' (dude, I seriously had to change my PANTS after that one!)As I have mentioned in many other reviews before, I personally lean much more so towards the Fantasy based Horror films.
Del Toro, where many people did not.Anyway, sorry to digress there a bit, but when it comes to Horror movies, people can REALLY be different in what they like, so if I am going to recommend a Horror film, I want to make SURE that I am clear about the kind that I like so that you can hopefully determine whether YOU would like it.I think what I personally really liked about this movie was that I appreciated the quality performances which the director was able to draw out of his cast, some of them quite young.
I really thought it was a very fun, scary, well put together Fantasy based Horror film; especially one about the Christmas holidays, of which there haven't really been THAT many good ones lately....
While not the best horror anthology, just the fact that Shatner is a radio host who's telling jokes (you know he's a funny Dude) and is always there after a shock to make you feel good.Having said that, the casting overall is good, as are the stories all not really in the original sense of the Christmas spirit.
Radio DJ Dangerous Dan (William Shatner) is hosting his annual Christmas Eve show while slowly getting sloshed; meanwhile, Santa is fighting off zombie elves, a group of teens are investigating a haunted murder site, a married couple's son is replaced by a 'changeling', and a greedy family have an encounter with Krampus, the anti-Santa.It took quite a while for me to realise that A Christmas Horror Story was an anthology (the title is a tad misleading, suggesting just one story), and when I did, I was more than a little disappointed: I had been looking forward to seeing how they were cleverly going to connect all of the different plot threads.As an anthology, the film is sorely lacking.
Furthermore, none of the episodes have particularly effective endings, whilst the 'wraparound' scenes of DJ Dangerous Dan are fairly pointless and exist simply to add some star power in the form of the ageing Shatner.On the plus side, the 'Santa vs the elves' story delivers some fun gore, the jolly old fellow slicing up several of the toothy little monsters with his staff, and the tale about the teens in trouble offers some eye-candy for the fellas in the form of pretty redhead Zoé De Grand Maison, who has a steamy sex scene, albeit one without any nudity.My rating: 5/10.
While I'd still rather watch this sort of thing over saccharine seasonal pap like Miracle on 34th Street or It's a Wonderful Life, there are many much better Christmas themed horror films to be had..
The only reason that i tried it was because of BILL SHATNER GLEN GASTON THE CREEPY GUY .I would recommend for some kids that want to watch a wacky movie and make fun of it .this rest of this review .
The movie adds some form of relief with its tactic of forming each of the anthology stories together, of which, at the end of the film leads to a twist that was slightly mediocre.
The official synopsis is interwoven stories that take place on Christmas Eve, as told by one festive radio host: a family brings home more than a Christmas tree, a student documentary becomes a living nightmare, a Christmas spirit terrorizes and Santa slays evil.As the synopsis alludes to, this is an anthology horror film.
The Santa one was a bit cheesy, but the ending of that one was good to tie it back.An issue I had with the film overall was how it was edited.
I definitely liked that aspect for sure.Now with that said, this film does do some good things with the story.
I like anthology horror movies, and there was definitely a market for a Christmas one and I think they done a pretty good job.
So this was never going to be great movie literature.The stories are fairly trite and not particularly terrifying or surprising but I found them interesting enough to keep me occupied.What this film does have going for it though is great actors, splendid production and a considerable and well managed budget.The film looks slick and the camera work is pretty good.The actors do a good job and are well cast, even William Shatter slots in to the stories comfortably.For a niche, Christmas, horror anthology, TV movie this gives a good turn out and I personally can't think of a similar film that is better..
When I found "A Christmas Horror Story", I needed little convincing to make me sit down and watch this movie after I saw the movie's cover.
No, it does not make any sense..." as Santa himself said it was essentially all that was needed to summarize this movie.For a collaboration of multiple writers and directors, then I must say that "A Christmas Horror Story" actually turned out to be quite nice.
And the three individual directors Grant Harvey, Steven Hoban and Brett Sullivan did great jobs in directing each their own story and managing to tie the three tales nicely together.They had managed to get together a good ensemble of acting talents for this movie, although I can't claim to be familiar with the vast majority of them.
But it should be said that the entire cast were performing quite well with their given roles and characters in all of the three different stories.The effects in the movie were quite good and they definitely served their purpose quite well.
And the scenes with Santa were just amazing.And the showdown between Santa Clause and Krampus was well worth the wait and definitely worth the watch, and it alone made it worthwhile to watch "A Christmas Horror Story".The twist to the storyline that was revealed towards the end was just a stroke of genius.
This means that, during the stories that you like, you're just happily getting into when suddenly you're wrenched back to one of the lesser interesting ones.I would say that the highlight of the film (or rather story which appealed to me the most) involves the elves in Father Christmas' North Pole toy factory developing a plague which turns them into flesh-eating zombie elves.
The final story deals with Santa (Buza), taking on zombie elves; at the North Pole.The movie is funny, gruesome, and somewhat in the Christmas Spirit (oddly) as well.
I had fun with A Christmas Horror Story!
Had a lot more action, and it had a far better ending than expected so I will gladly recommend it.A Christmas Horror Story wins by a mile against let's say Tales of Halloween.Cheers!.
I am at a loss as to how one reviewer can claim that there are better Christmas horror films out there...
You have to know what your getting yourself into watching a movie like this, it's Santa battling zombie elves, a Krampus demon dishing out some serious discipline to the naughty, trolls and changlings while getting a christmas tree and it wouldn't be horror without some ghosts and dumb teenagers plus you have William Shatner as the perfect drunken radio host.
So if you like horror movies that don't take themselves to seriously and can enjoy it for what it is, fun, funny, dark, horror Christmas stories you'll like it too..
Although this was presented in a series of four short stories I felt that each segment was long enough to develop, build and complete each one, where as films of late seem to rehash the same thing and are quite drawn out affairs to the point where you just want it to end.
If you can manage to stay focused and patient, there is some great entertainment here.'A Christmas Horror Story' has everything you'd want in a festive horror movie.
From zombie elves attempting to murder Santa to a possessed child, this is sure to satisfy those who like their horrors more on the 'quirky' side.It entertained me for an hour and a half, but I certainly won't be revisiting this bizarre Christmas film any time soon..
I thought a Christmas horror story would be a fun idea.
it almost feels like this was made for a different story but ended up being too short so they tacked it onto this and had the characters say "oh by the way it's Christmas!" a few times during their scenes.
Santa, Ghosts, Demons, Krampus and Zombie Elves Celebrate a Very Scary Christmas!!!.
Instead this Canadian anthology film is muddled and unfocused, going for gore and action over really effective storytelling.William Shatner plays a DJ in the linking scenes and is a delight; certainly the best thing about the otherwise lousy production.
'A Christmas Horror Story' is a solid, fun little film, with surprisingly entertaining stories.
A group of teenagers break into their school to investigate a murder that happened there a year ago.....A couple discover that their son might have something trapped within him....A greedy family finds that their attempts to re-invite themselves to a wealthy family member has brought about the wrath of Krampus, the anti-Santa, and a zombie outbreak at Santa's workshop concludes the anthology.......Christmas is a time for giving, and it's also a time for telling each other spooky stories under the Christmas tree, and film makers have started to realise this with the slew of Xmas based horror movies that are now coming our way.
It's starts solidly, but falters much lay toward the end.The third gets better, an off duty cop breaks into a Christmas tree farm, his son goes missing for a while, and when found, begins to act differently at home, until the owner of the farm calls the mother asking if the son is okay, a solid chiller.But the best story, which would have made a wonderful standalone film involves Santa at the North-pole, finding that his Elves have been infected, and have become flesh hungry beasts.
This is great - Krampus; The Changeling; Superhero Santa; Night of the Living Dead Elves; Horror; Terror; Gore; and, it's creepy!It's also a sort of guide for parents not to spoil their children into becoming little sh*ts who believe they can do whatever, whenever, wherever they want and expect everyone else to tolerate that bad behavior...Go Krampus!Krampus is the German/Austrian predecessor to the modern-day "Boogie Man." Parents telling children, "Misbehave, and, the Boogie Man will get you!"There are also a lot of twists and turns to this story that you won't see coming, and, you'll never come to realize until the moment they're exposed.Very close to the original stories and fairy tales, except -Krampus comes on December 5th, not Christmas Eve. He also returns the bad children to their homes after a serious attitude adjustment.
Santa's 'naughty' list is handed over to Krampus on December 5th so that the bad children will be 'born-again-good-kids" by Christmas Eve."The Changeling" from The Brothers Grimm Fairy Tales (they didn't mention cooking the 'eggshell' meal and how this makes the elves come to take the changeling away and return the mother's real child).The writers changed the details a bit, but...Who cares!This is a great movie filled with creative ideas built upon legendary myths and stories from Germany, Austria, and, other European nations.If you have an interest in old European folklore and stories with a moral for bad people and sh*thead kids; or, if you just enjoy satirical horror with the AWESOME William Shatner...this movie is for you..
Unfortunately they weren't put together is an interesting or logical way so for most part of the film I spent explaining to my mum what was going on as one story jumped into another and then back again.I think this could have been soo much better if it had been arranged differently - but, based on the reviews, it worked for other viewers so maybe it's just my family that had trouble with it.
An anthology horror of 4 stories happening simultaneously in a small town featuring vengeful ghosts, zombies elves, the Krampus, and a tough as nails Santa..
There are some really tense moments, and the story of the lost child and Santa's fight against Krampus are the best parts of the movie.
The story about the family meeting the Krampus has a great conclusion, but the final twist at the end of the movie is great.
Although the movie features Krampus vs Santa Claus, the stories do not revolve around that event.
After watching the other Krampus movie we were hoping to find a fun kind of thrilling Christmas film, but this was just another horror film using Christmas as the backdrop-getting a good deal of the folklore wrong on top of that AND not really tying everything together!
Krampus has become the latest rage in Christmas horror films, and in that regard, this one is the best.
HIGHLY recommend this to all horror anthology buffs like myself, especially those who love the twisted Christmas legends.***Final thoughts: Already loved this movie, almost from frame one, but it helped I fell for one of the actors.
They all take place on Christmas Eve in the fictional town of Bailey Downs, and you see little ways in which the characters are more personally connected as the movie plays on.
For most of the story, you have a straight forward story about Santa killing zombie elves, ending with a showdown with Krampus.