After the indulgence and insanity that is T&K's Advent Calendar, where I pretty much watched nothing but Hallmarkies, I decided to leave the non-Hallmarkies to a small handful of posts, post Advent Calendar. They are all Xmas related.
2022, Tommy Wirkola (Dead Snow) -- download
We begin in a bar in ... Scotland? Not sure, but American accented Santa (David Harbour, Hellboy) sits at the bar with another Claus in the background, the later assuming the former is just another disgruntled mall Santa fed up with the commercialism & greedy kids he encounters every year. But no, we know he is The Real Santa (TM) and as Xmas Spirit wanes each and every year (even though we have been pointing out that it's since the 60s) Santa loses more and more heart. The drunken lout then climbs into his sleigh, pukes up his indulgence and heads out to finish the night off.
Meanwhile we have our leading family, the ultra-wealthy Lightstones, are collecting on their grand estate in the countryside surrounded by fences and armed guards. The matron Gertrude (Beverly D'Angelo, National Lampoon's Vacation) is holding her family party catered by about a thousand staff, but only for her two children, their spouses and their each single grandchild. I think the movie starts with some other guests but by the time the havoc begins, it is just the family. Or the other guests die; I don't remember.
Yeah, havoc. Quite expectedly, the catering staff is mostly Bad Guys led by Scrooge (John Leguizamo, John Wick) who gleefully slaughter each and every staff member including the security and household staff. All that is left are Gertrude and family. Son Jason (Alex Hassell, Cowboy Bebop) and his estranged wife Linda (Alexis Louder, Copshop) are trying to put on a brave face for their daughter Trudy (Leah Brady, The Umbrella Academy), while daughter Alva (Edie Patterson, The Righteous Gemstones) and her new BF (Cam Gigandet, Twilight), and streamer kid Bertrude (Alexander Elliot, Locke & Key) are just there to suckup to gramma. The Bad Guys are there for the millions in a basement vault, millions that were supposed to be used as bribery, on behalf of the US Govt, by Gertrude's company and overseas contacts. She stole it. They want it.
Santa tries to hide it out, his nose-finger trick with chimneys not working due to his lack of of Xmas Spirit, but almost immediately he gets discovered by one of the Bad Guys. They let an automatic weapon loose, which scares off the reindeer, before Santa slays the BG by knocking him out the window onto a large spikey Xmas decoration. Soon after, the gig is up and the Bad Guys are hunting down Santa. Meawhile, Trudy has escaped, discovers The Real Santa and becomes his Home Alone collaborator in fending off the Bad Guys.
This movie was ... mostly fun? It is so very very by the books on how these comedy-murder-fests are supposed to go, but thankfully Harbour, despite being a rather icky Claus, really leans into the role as the Viking Who Somehow Became Santa. That it rips-off / draws-upon Home Alone is rather intentional but in an over the top, toss someone into a snow blower way, which must have killed it with the alt-film horror movie crowd who just lap this sort of stuff up. To be honest, I prefer my gore-fest, schlock movies less sincere and more tongue in cheek. This one almost wants to be taken sincerely. Almost.
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