Customer Reviews

Black Christmas (Full Screen Edition)

5 star:		(20)
4 star:		(30)
3 star:		(20)
2 star:		(17)
1 star:		(35)

 

 

I agree with the sentiment of most reviewers on here. The plot to this movie was simply absurd and while the director did not set out to make a slasher movie, this is simply all he made. For one, you never really care about the sorority members and what happens to them in this movie. Rather than getting backstory on the sorority members to actually care about them, you have a lot of Billy backstory and simply a bunch of foulmouthed sorority sisters that you don't care about.

Further, the movie is filled with Billy backstory that simply takes away from what made the original so great. Who was Billy...why did he do what he did? But you can figure out what's going on here from early on, so there's really no great surprise. There are also a bunch of plot holes and killers doing things that are physically impossible. And how many times are two people both erroneously pronounced dead?

I don't usually waste my time reviewing bad movies, but I felt it was my duty to warn others about this turd. As the other review stated this is definitely the worst horror remake ever (and that's counting the horrendous Wicker Man rehash). The girls in this movie are absolutetly the most brainless bimbos in horrordom, even for sorority girls. For some lame reason, no one wants to leave the house where everone is being murdered because "oh no! it's snowing outside!" what? This basically drags the story out to over an hour where one dumb brunette after another gets killed, and the lighting is so dark in the film, you can't tell one from the other. My biggest gripe was killing Lacey Chabert off so quickly, as she was the hottest of the sorority sisters, and the only one I had seen before. The ending was completely pointless, like why would they cart two psychos off to the hospital without checking if they're dead first? duh... The four alternate endings were actually worse. This movie is horror kryptonite.

Surely no one sets out to make a bad movie. But in the case of the Black Christmas remake, it's hard to imagine writer/director Glen Morgan honestly thinking that this was the best he could do. The orginal Black Christmas is a classic, a forerunner to the modern slasher movie - stylish and eery and unsettling. But most importantly, simple and straight foward. A slasher and a murder mystery, deftly directed by Bob Clark. The remake (WHY!?) is, to be blunt, absolutely dreadful. From the first frame to the pitiful end, Black Christmas (2006) puts its viewer through the ringer, from the absurd and outlandish to the just plain dull and stupid. Giving the killer an elaborate (and ridiculous) backstory is beside the point, meaningless, mere filler. We get lame attempts at humor and gross out moments that are bad camp. The inclusion of Billy's sister, Agnes, is so out-of-left-field that it feels like Morgan was simply trying to throw in a few extra kills and pad out the movie's already spare running time. The movie isn't even 90 minutes, but you feel every second, particularly with the completely unnecessary hospital finale dragging things out to an asinine, but blessed close. Fans of the original Black Christmas should feel insulted. Horror fans should feel taken advantage of. The human race as a whole should shudder knowing this slag of trash came from one of its own. We can only hope this movie will end the careers of all involved.

The original Black Christmas is one of my all-time favorite movies. The boogieman in the attic remained a fear of mine throughout the 70's after watching this show way too young. Sadly, and perhaps predictably, the remake is just a bunch of overblown violence, really terrible acting, and gore that is just too dumb to be scary.

I wish movie makers would get back to psychological, suspenseful thrillers and move away from this trend of mindless blood and guts crap. Today's "scary" movies give too much away. It's not about continuous slashing and screaming, it's about the creepy music and shadows slithering up behind you.

Black Christmas 2006 is perfect for the lazy viewer who can't be bothered with a good storyline or edge-of-the-seat suspense. For that reason, I'm rating it two stars. If you're more mature than that, however, stick with the original. You'll probably hate this remake.

Long a devotee of giallo, horror, hell ALL genres of movies, I looked forward to Morgan and Wong's latest. They did some nifty things with the X-Files and Millennium and other things. However....this has NOTHING to offer. No characterization, no colorful set-pieces. Nothing. A waste of time, by and large. It stinks on ice as Mel Brooks once said.

I would have given this movie zero stars but you have to rate it. This remake is an absolute insult to a classic horror film. Come to think of it, it's and insult to horror movies. Where to start....I wont. I wont waste your time like this movie wasted mine.

To sum it up, I'd rather sit through a 24 hour marathon of Richard Gere romance movies than spend 30 seconds watching any of this junk.

NOTE: THE FOLLOWING REVIEW CONTAINS THINGS THAT ARE NORMALLY CALLED "SPOILERS." HOWEVER, THE WORD "SPOILERS" INSINUATES THAT SOMETHING IS FRESH OR NEW TO BEGIN WITH. SINCE THIS MOVIE IS NEITHER OF THOSE THINGS, LET'S JUST SAY THAT THE FOLLOWING REVIEW CONTAINS "RE-SPOILERS."

If there's one thing wrong with "Black Christmas" (and, trust me, there's a lot more than one), it's that it hardly feels like a movie at all. The movie is as hollow as a shiny, Christmas tree ball, all shiny gleaming glass with absolutely nothing underneath.

We have the requisites for some mindless horror here: a sorority house full of girls, a road-blocking blizzard, and an escaped mental patient, but, amazingly, this trite little flick fails to do anything even remotely interesting, creative, or suspenseful with these paint-by-numbers elements. Instead, what we are given is a rushed, uninspired mess, something that plays out like the bare outline of a horror movie script. I felt like I was watching a treatment of a film idea, and not the actual movie itself.

For instance, character development is virtually nonexistent (according to this movie, not only are sorority girls indistinguishable from each other, but they are also all very crabby and self-centered). This makes it much harder (much, much, so much harder) to care when they are hastily and unceremoniously dispatched by the Killer On The Loose. The murders themselves never come as a surprise; the movie takes great pains to let you know what's coming. It's okay for a horror film to be mindless (by all means), but not if it is also lazy and predictable.

This movie is both. It is barely seventy minutes long, but each second scrapes by, relying on token effects (eerie Santa decorations, blood red Christmas lights, lethal Christmas presents) to convey a mood and urgency that the script itself can't be bothered to provide. Likewise, the heavy lifting of the plot (near misses, motives, and twists) is handled laughably with an improbable story and the eye-rolling inconsistencies.

For example, a normally easy fear-builder -- the Call From Inside The House -- is so overdone with vocal effects that you'll be wondering less about the fate of the characters and more about how the killer manages to make himself sound like five different people ... at the same time ... while adding in spooky static hisses and screams ... without alerting anyone to his presence inside the house. Perhaps he is a demon, calling from another dimension? No, I'm sorry, he is not. That would've been too interesting. Another question: what kind of EMT bags a person who is not dead? You'll find out! Are icicles heavy enough to fall straight through a person's skull from a ten foot drop? Sure! Some of them!

So, what is this movie then? It's quite simple. It's an excuse to watch the dull and dumb deaths of roughly a dozen people, most of them young, trash-talking bimbos. If you want suspense, atmosphere, uncertainty or even just creative gore, you are looking in the wrong place. If you want goofy exposition, fifth grade dialogue, and an ending that will make you scream, "Finish already!" and "What? That's it?" at almost the exact same time, then this movie is your cup of eggnog.

I have treated this movie as one of my Christmas horror favorites. Just recently watched the original, and it was......ok......but after seeing this one, I just liked this one better. If people thought this one was slow, then DO NOT watch the original, I thought it was slow. Not really sure how people thought this movie was slow.

All the characters are somewhat likable, no one really gives a "bad" performance with the main cast. All of them, eyerolling, wisecracking, screaming, it was great to watch it all unfold. It was like watching "Sorority Row" at Xmas. Plenty of boo scares in rapid succession. And definitely a great ending. I love those endings where you truly think its over, and poof, you have 15 more good minutes of the movie.

I won't sway you either way on this but definitely do yourself a favor and give this one a watch sometime. I have seen many many more remakes that totally sucked worse than this one.

Horror purists weren't too happy about a remake to Bob Clark's 1974 cult classic Black Christmas, but don't go into the remake expecting anything like the original about the only thing this version has in common with the original, is the name and setting. We don't learn much about whom Billy or Agnes is. But in the remake that is all explained.

Outside of the opening murder scene, Black Christmas 06 is a totally different movie. If anything this is more of a remake to your run of the mill 80s slasher movie. The original Black Christmas is one of the all time greats and I would recommend any aspiring horror filmmaker to watch it so they can learn how to craft a story, suspense and effective scares. The sense of dread and looming danger never lets up from the opening scene, even in the slower scenes that sense of dread remains. The same cannot be said about the remake; there really was very little suspense or tension. All that is replaced with a high body count and a lot of gore; at least there is some action something this movie needed. Violence and gore doesn't make a movie good, but at least something is happening and again this movie very much needed all of that.

The script by Glen Morgan is rather weak; the characters are your standard slasher movie characters with very little depth. But one thing I did like is Kate Cassidy, Michelle Trachtenberg or Mary Elizabeth Winstead could have easily been the final girl. I won't spoil, which one of them is, but either one could have been. Glen Morgan was one of the writers of the first Final Destination, which I thought was excellent and he also did a good job with Willard, but here it's like a whole different filmmaker.

As director Glen Morgan doesn't fair much better; his scenes lack any suspense or tension, but he does make a movie that is absolutely hysterical even if it wasn't the intentions of Glen Morgan. The flashback scenes are so silly and over the top one can't help, but be amused. The last flashback with Billy had me cracking up. Maybe that was the intention?

The final act is so over the top I refuse to believe that Glen Morgan was making a serious movie. I think some of the problems were after Willard flopped Glen Morgan had trouble getting another job. On the DVD he clearly shows no passion for the project and says this isn't the type of movie he wanted to make. He's doing what the audience wants. Big mistake, as a filmmaker you have to do what you think is best. Of course you keep the audience in mind, but at the end of the day you have to make the movie you want. If you give in and make a movie you have no passion for it very much shows. I'm sure the Weinstein's played a part as well so I won't put all the blame on Glen Morgan. The Weinstein's are known for interfering with the movies they are involved in and I'm sure they played a part in the outcome.

The kills scenes are pretty much the same, when someone is stabbed it's done with such rage, but instead of being scary or disturbing it's rather funny. When Billy stabs someone he does it so fast that odds are you'll be laughing rather than be freaked out. And when did Billy become a cannibal? I wasn't grossed out nor was I disturbed at that. I found it so silly that I couldn't help, but laugh.

The cast is your typical cast you'll find in a lot of the more mainstream movies these days. With that said though the cast does do a good job and even though I prefer unknowns or cult actors in horror movies I was pleased with the cast. The one thing Black Christmas has going for it over other horror movies is the women are beautiful. Easily this is one the best looking casts I have ever seen in a horror flick.

Just take the movie for what it is. What I found was a decent 80s style slasher movie that has the so bad its good quality. By no means is Black Christmas a good movie; several times I rolled my eyes, but I have to admit I was very entertained. As a remake this movie is no doubt a travesty of a remake, but as it's own film, while still bad, but works on the so bad its good level. I'll be the first to admit I had fun watching this and really enjoyed it.

The original is by far the better movie and I highly recommend it, but again the remake is a fun film in how bad it is. Just try and put the original out of your head and take this for what it is; a silly slasher flick.

this movie was funny not scary it was like jack frost but with no killer snow man. this was a great movie.