Black Christmas (AKA Silent Night, Evil Night, Stranger in the House 1974).
Dir: Bob Clark.
Cast: Olivia Hussey, Keir Dullea, Margot Kidder, John Saxon, Michael Rapport, Lynne Griffin, Marian Waldman and Andrea Martin.
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| If this movie doesn't make your skin crawl... It's On Too Tight! (is that even physically possible?) |
Tis the season to be jolly, there's snow on the ground, love in the air, the smell of chestnuts roasting and in a sorority house at the world famous Baldpate University of Clever Clogs, many of the female students - including badgirl Barb and the virginal Jess - (a pre-mentalism Kidder and the pony faced Hussey) have been receiving a series of obscene phone calls from a strange perv nicknamed The Moaner.
You'll probably remember that's why your dad got sacked from The Samaritans.
Being a horror movie tho' no one takes his calls seriously, with a few of the saucier students (hands up Barb - tho' not literally, a couple of fingers would suffice) - actually looking forward to his nightly messages, that is until the night when Jess hears the screams and gasps of a woman in the background.
Calling her friends to listen in it's not long before Barb is threatening The Moaner with a severe buggering only to have him reply that he's going to kill her to death and with that he hangs up and the girls go about their business.
Which in this case is packing for the Christmas holidays.
Which as slasher fans will know is as good a cue as any for the bad murders to start.
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| "Try and shite in mah mooth now you bastard!" |
And start they do when cutesy Co-ed Clare Harrison (Griffin from the brilliant Curtains which I'm sure I'd reviewed once but it seems to have been deleted which is a pity as I remember it being a lot better written than this) becomes moaners first victim, a plastic bag wrapped around her head as shes dragged to the attic and sat in a rocking chair.
Obviously the killer knows a cool poster image when he sees one.
The following morning, Clare's dad George arrives to pick up his daughter but she doesn't show up he quickly heads over to the sorority house to, if not find her then at least get a glimpse of Lois Lane's stocking tops.
Well it is Christmas.
Unfortunately the only thrill he gets is a peek at housekeeper Mrs. MacHenry's (world's shittest superhero Waldman) infeasibley large hat.
And that is worth the R rating alone if I'm honest.
Meanwhile Jess is meeting up with her neurotic musician boyfriend, Peter (2001's Dullea saddled with really crap hair) to tell him that she's pregnant and thinking about having an abortion.
Which is nice and festive.
Peter, being a 70s type of guy gets a wee bit angry and shouts at poor Jess before stomping off in a huff giving us an excuse to see what good old Mr. Harrison is up to in the search for his daughter.
Well him, Barb and Phyllis (Kim Possible voice-over actress Martin, who also appeared in the remake too don't you know) are busy at the police station try to get tough as nails cop Lieutenant Kenneth 'Horse Cock' Fuller (Saxon - nuff said) to form a search party and look for the missing girl.
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| John Saxon receives a call from his agent offering him the lead in Cannibal Apocalypse. |
Unfortunately he's a wee bit busy as another girl, Janis, has also vanished while walking home from school and seeing as she's much younger (and cuter) the police would rather look for her.
Which is fair enough I guess.
Barb, overly upset by her friends disappearance, gets drunk leaving Mr. Harrison, Jess,and Phyllis free to visit the local park where Janis was last seen.
Adding even more stress to the situation is the fact that Mrs. MacHenry can't seem to place her pussy and between that and packing to go to her sister's for Christmas is causing all manner of problems for the housemates.
It's great to get your priorities right isn't it?
Luckily after following a faint 'meowing' noise she finds her precious moggy in the attic, unfortunately she also finds the killer, who promptly wedges a hook in her face.
Which is nice.
Obviously on a gore-filled frenzy after seeing how great the face stabbing effect looked, it's only a matter of time before Janis' mutilated body is found, upsetting Jess to a point where she has to go home to bed.
Poor lamb.
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| "Hallo? French Polishers? you might just save my life!" |
As the others continue their search continues for Clare, Jess receives yet another obscene phone call and this time decides to report it to the police but as she does Peter turns up to beg her to marry him.
Jess refuses and Peter storms off in a huff just as Lieutenant Fuller arrives to bug the telephone.
As in put a recording device on it, not hassle it over unpaid bills etc.
With the movie rushing (albeit leisurely) toward its climax, Fuller pools all his resources in an attempt to stop the moaners reign of, er..moaning, unfortunately this appears to involve standing around in the street looking tough whilst holding a megaphone whilst eyeing up carol singers.
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| "Boiled onions!" |
But Fuller is hot on his trail and has managed to trace the moaners calls.
And they're coming from inside the house.
It seems that Fuller had totally forgotten that there was an extension built onto the sorority house and that the killer could happily hide there, listening to peoples conversations and phone calls.
It's like a nightmare version of Homes Under The Hammer.
Ringing the house Fuller warns Jessica to leave immediately and wait for him outside but, being a girl she gets lost on the way from the living room to the front door and heads upstairs (armed with a poker at least) instead where - surprise - she is jumped on by the killer.
Managing to escape she runs back downstairs completely missing the front door (again) and heads into the basement where she bumps into her grumpy boyfriend Peter, whom she is convinced is the killer for no other reason than he wants to marry her.
What a bastard.
And as he approaches her to talk Jessica bludgeons him to death with the poker.
Ouch.
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| The lights are on. |
The police arrive to find her hunched over Peters body and decide that the case is closed - It's possibly their Christmas night out so understandably they want to get everything down as soon as - so you can imagine the conversation between Fuller and his men; "Aye, that Peter was a wee bit angry with his girlfriend not wanting to marry him so he must be the killer and the fact that we've found his aforementioned estranged girlfriend leaning over him holding a bloody poker means it must have been him! Right! mines a Babycham!".
Sorted.
They pack up the bodies, clean up the blood and bid their farewells to Jess, leaving her alone (in a major crime scene) to sleep off the excitement of her friends being murdered and killing her boyfriend.
But as we cut to the attic one last time we discover that there are two dead bodies that have yet to be found and as a man's voice whispers out thru' the darkness the phone begins to ring.....
Possibly the first of the modern 'slasher' cycle made famous by Halloween and Friday The 13th, the late, great Bob Clark's genre defining Black Christmas is unfortunately overlooked by all but the most rabid horror fans and Clark himself is better known for his seminal holiday classic A Christmas Story and Porky's than for this and the fantastic Children Shouldn't Play With Dead Things.
Which is a shame as Black Christmas has much to offer, not just of historical interest but as a darn good frightener in its own right.
Featuring a decidedly eclectic cast—from Superman's Margot Kidder to cult stalwart John Saxon via the Star Child himself Keir Dullea as well as many shots and set ups that would become genre mainstays, Clark's movie deserves to be sought out by any self respecting film fan if only to see where the stalk and slash genre started.
As well as to have a bloody good laugh at the haircuts and trousers obviously.
It's not too late to rush out and buy it to watch on Christmas Eve, tho' make sure you don't pick up the shite 2006 remake by mistake.
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