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Hey All!
Christmas has passed but we're still in the spirit here at CBC and excited to get this review of Violent Night out there to the world. It's never too late for a good old fashion Santa on a Rampage Christmas Movie and this week we're all sitting around in our PJs eating leftovers until the New Years, so while we lounge and relax might as well throw on some last minute Holidays flicks before the season is completely behind us. You can find Violent Night for rent on Amazon now!
But before you dive in let's check out what our intrepid movie reviewer Frankin thought of it!
In the spirit of Christmas, I bring to you Violent Night. Directed by Tommy Wirkola, Violent Night is an action comedy movie about the family members of a powerful billionaire, Gertrude Lightstone (Beverly D'Angelo), facing a long night, courtesy of a bad guy Scrooge (John Leguizamo), who hates Christmas. The Family's only hope for survival was in someone who wasn't invited, Santa Claus (David Harbour from Stranger Things). If you have seen John McClane's famous "Die Hard," you should have an understanding of how Violent Night plays, with Santa playing the role of Bruce Willis, who destroys the bad guys' perfect plan of stealing a fortune and going away with it. However, there is a little twist, with Santa getting help from a 7-year-old and her Home Alone tricks.
In the opening scene, we see Santa (suffering from the burnout from centuries-long delivery) in a pub, getting a drink and having a little chat (more like a rant) with another Santa about how highly disappointed he is with modern kids (He could be seen expressing despair over how materialistic contemporary children has become). He, therefore, declares this holiday to be his final run as Santa Claus. He then swoops across a city skyline with his reindeer before a glowing full moon and then vomits onto a woman from the pub below as he continues his journey of delivering gifts to other kids.
As the movie continues, we see the excellently rich, powerful, and flawed Lightstone family gathered at the big mansion belonging to Gertrude (Beverly D'Angelo) to celebrate the Christmas holidays. The Family consists of Gertrude's hateful daughter Alva (Edi Patterson), her equally odious son Bertrude (Alexander Elliot), and her foolish actor boyfriend (Cam Gigandet). Also, Gertrude's favorite child, her son Jason (Alex Hassell) and his estranged wife Linda (Alexis Louder), who were trying to work through their issues, and their sweet little daughter Trudy (Leah Brady), who seems to be the only one willing to embrace the holiday spirit.
Some minutes into the family get-together is replaced by gunfire when a group of violently armed thieves led by a guy with the nickname Scrooge (John Leguizamo) arrives to steal $300 million, which supposedly arrived the day before that. With intel from inside and constant planning for months, Scrooge and his guys believed they had the perfect plan to get the money without getting caught.
While all this is happening, Santa happens to be in the house to deliver presents. On noticing the mayhem, he then tries to escape but winds up getting trapped inside when his reindeer take off during the initial chaos.
After finding his way out by defeating one of the thieves, his first instinct is to flee before he realizes that Trudy Lightstone is one of the stars of his nice list (keeps room clean, kind to animals, listens to parents, invited weird kid to party, sweet to everyone). Santa Claus decides to bring himself together and rescue her and her Family by utilizing the skills for dispensing gruesome violence that he cultivated before he became Santa (which was really brutal), leading to several scenes in which he terribly kills the various bad guys using everything in his possession from a sledgehammer (just like Skullcrusher which was similar to the one he used for war before he became Santa Claus) to a sharp stick to a snow blower and many more.
As Santa was wrestling with the bad guys, he was in constant communication with Trudy (via walkie-talkies) as she escaped the room where her family was being held hostage. Trudy graduates to a more active role when she displays tricks she learned from the movie Home Alone (We all remember Kevin and how he outsmarted the bad guys).
The film Violent Night surprisingly has a ton of heart that's guaranteed to refuel your spirit for Christmas this year. The nonstop action and gruesome kills make Violent Night's thrilling direction, and the well-written script never forget what makes a Christmas movie a classic tradition for the holiday. This movie has an emotionally sweet message passed by memorable characters. Another fantastic thing is that the film brings about sentiment towards the end by making us care about the fates of the most hateful and annoying family members. Family is very important, no matter how wayward some can be. Christmas is for families to be together, put aside their differences and celebrate the holidays. Violent Night gives that and more under its fun blood-red Christmas tree.
About the author: My name is Franklin Ifeanyi. I am someone who likes to help people; I hope to do that with writing.
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