Silent Night

Check your "holiday spirit" at the door and be ready for a full on pitchblack snark fest instead of the usual holiday hokiness.

I had forgotten the premise after skimming some previews a few weeks back online, so almost felt like a blind watch, until the very dark paradigm switch happens with the story arch.

I just so happen to appreciate the well acted and directed film and its daring and unique take, but clearly wont be for everyone.

Mix it up this year, but also might want to leave the kids out of this one. Its only depressing if you can't find the humor and there is plenty of that.

The last twenty minutes and the end are excellent but sadly to get to that point you have to endure pretty much endless boredom. The acting is ok but the characters are so unlikeable you barely care what happens to them by the time you get to the good bit. The kids are all awful people and the constant swearing is quite repulsive - it may have been a plot point but if it was it was far too heavy handed. It would have worked as a twenty minute episode of an anthology tv show but did not have enough substance to carry it for ninety minutes and the padding that was the building of the characters and their back stories just made it tiresome to watch. It's a shame - handled differently it could have been quite good.

I really enjoyed this movie, but it's NOT a comedy (though had many dark comedic moments), NOT a horror film, and NOT a Christmas movie. It's also not some clever COVID-19/anti-vax film as it was filmed in early 2020 and probably written in 2019. Also - and this is not a spoiler - if you're easily offended by children swearing as so many folks who rated it seem to be, this is not the right movie for you. There's plenty of profanity to go around, so if you're sensitive to that go ahead and pass. But there's plenty to laugh about, think about, and enjoy in this one if you ignore how it's marketed and just go with it.

I'm not really sure this film knows what it wants to be. If you want to watch a good film about adults and children facing the end check out 'These Final Hours'. If you want to watch a black comedy about the end of the world try Dr Strangelove. There is a lot of talent on screen but much of the script is nonsense and the characters are both sympathetic and unlikeable - but not in a good way. Roman Griffin Davis was pretty good, but the script was obviously distorted to feature everything he says and does. Nothing felt natural and most of the character's motivations remain a mystery. By the end you don't care how it ends.

Wow, that was not at all what I was expecting. It's not comedy, it's not horror, it is the very darkest of British black comedy, which means not much comedy at all. However, go into it without those previous preconceptions, and you've got to say, it's a pretty good film.

Don't rely on it for Christmas cheer, but for enthralling watching, good acting and a mostly unexpected layout, you'll get more than you bargained for.

Happy Christmas everyone, well perhaps not everyone.......