Silent Night Deadly Night revamps a 1980s horror franchise where, after an encounter on the way home from seeing his Grandad in the nursing home as Christmas is coming up, at the age of 8, Billy Chapman witnesses his parents being brutally murdered by a man dressed as Father Christmas, on his way home.
But then, as this is an American film, the tagline reads: “Santa’s gonna slay”, because American slang.
Some years later, as an adult – played by Rohan Campbell (The Monkey) -, he’s drifting from place to place like David Banner, but for reasons you’ll discover, something’s turned him to that dark side, killing other people violently, each December, and taking blood samples as trophies – Dexter-like, albeit to complete his novel form of advent calendar.
He bumps someone off by deciding on whether someone’s “Naughty or Nice“, and kills them if they’re the former. It did feel a bit random at first, but somehow… he knows.
This Christmas – yes, not “holidays” – Billy’s arrived in Hackett, taking a job at Ida’s Trinket Tree, where owner Mr Sims has a good feeling about him, while Billy gets plenty of feelings about his daughter, Pamela (Ruby Modine – Satanic Panic)… However, it’s an odd store that doesn’t seem to start setting up all their Christmas stuff until Decmber 20th, when in 2025, all stores are fully stocked as soon as Halloween is over!
However, given that he’s a psycho, but she’s also capable of snapping at irritating customers, perhaps this is a coupling made in heaven?
But back to his deserved victims, and one of them turns out to be running a club full of Nazis, who are “Dreaming Of A White Power Christmas”. But… if you’re going to kill off a ton of Nazis, that’s a great start, but too many of the kills in this scene are way too quick or even just offscreen. Did they have to tone it down a bit for the MPAA in the US, to get an R-rating?
Oh, and for reasons you’ll discover, Billy has to be dressed as Santa, given his parents’ murderer’s attire.
Overall, Silent Night Deadly Night is silly but quite fun, it doesn’t outstay its welcome at 96 minutes in length, and has a decent ending that will spawn a sequel as long as this film takes enough dosh. AND, quite importantly, in 2025, it’s a very rare horror movie that actually has an 18-certificate! That’s always something that will pique my interest!
The original 1984 movie spawned FOUR sequels! How have I not heard of these until now??
Silent Night Deadly Night is in cinemas now, and is available to pre-order on Blu-ray and DVD.
NOTE: There’s no mid- nor post-credits scenes.
Detailed specs:
Cert: 
Running time: 96 minutes
Release date: December 12th 2025
Studio: New Dimension Pictures
Aspect Ratio: 2.39:1 (Redcode RAW)
Cinema: Odeon Trafford Centre
Rating: 6/10
Director: Mike P Nelson
Producers: Erik Bernard, Tanya Brunel, Scott Schneid, Jamie R Thompson, Jeremy Torrie, Dennis Whitehead
Screenplay: Mike P Nelson
Original movie writer: Michael Hickey
Music: Blitz//Berlin
Cast:
Billy Chapman: Rohan Campbell
Pamela Sims: Ruby Modine
Charlie (Shotgun Santa): Mark Acheson
Dean Sims: David Lawrence Brown
Max Benedict: David Tomlinson
Young Billy: Logan Sawyer
Geoffrey Chapman: Erik Athavale
Elroy (The Snatcher): Rick Skene
Harold: James Durham
Delphine Anderson: Sharon Bajer
George Vilmo: Tom Young
Tara Chapman: Krystle Snow
Grandpa: Darren Felbel
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.