Up until now, this year I've been reviewing Christmas horror and suspense movies I've never seen, but watching Good Tidings reminded me of an old British flick I've always loved that ranks amongst my all-time favorite Christmas-themed horror flicks: the wonderfully sleazy Don't Open Till Christmas. Seeing as how there was a newer, better-looking print out there on Blu-Ray that was supposedly uncut, I thought, what the hell? It's been a few years since I've seen it, so why not go for it?
Sure enough, the new print is worlds away from the crappy VHS and bootleg DVD (which turned out to be just a dub of the VHS) I'd been watching for years. For one thing, you can actually see a lot of what was once shadowy and hard to make sense of, and that's readily apparent from the very first scene.
And yes, all the muted gore from my version was present and accounted for, though I think my print might have actually been the uncut one, as I don't think there was much difference between this one and the one I grew up watching, save, like I said, being able to see things more clearly this time around. Still, I'll take it, as the "new" version is leaps and bounds ahead of my version.
For newbies, the film revolves around a serial killer that is going around stalking and killing anyone dressed as Santa Claus, for unknown reasons, and it's up to the detectives at Scotland Yard to stop him. As the tagline put it: "This time, Santa Claus is the victim"- an obvious nod to the controversial Silent Night, Deadly Night, released the same year.
As with that film in the States, DOTC was itself quite controversial in England, becoming a so-called "video nasty," and leading to it being heavily censored for its subsequent video release, which is over two minutes shorter, most of which is excised gore.
Somewhat ironically, a substantial portion of that was added after the fact, as the producers felt the film needed some more spectacular deaths- hence the "additional scenes shot by Al McGoohan" credit. (Actually Alan Birkinshaw, who would go on to do remakes of the Poe classics The House of Usher and The Masque of Red Death.)
Given that said producers were Dick Randall (seen above, enacting every stereotype about sleazy producers you ever heard) and Stephen Minasian, arguably best-known for the spectacularly trashy Pieces and the ridiculous-if-fun slasher flick Slaughter High (which also features Caroline Munro, playing a high school student, when she was just south of her forties IRL!), I suppose this is understandable.
The film stars Edmund Purdom, as the much-beleaguered Inspector Harris, himself a suspect in the murders. Purdom also played the Dean in Pieces, and only agreed to star in this film if he could also direct. The producers acquiesced, but they didn't ask permission for shooting the aforementioned additional footage, which Purdom was reportedly not happy about, as he wanted the film to be more of a straightforward murder mystery and wasn't a fan of extreme gore.
Nonetheless, Purdom is no stranger to exploitation film, having previously starred in the giallo classics The Fifth Cord and Absurd, as well as the likes of Ator, the Fighting Eagle, Amok and the Escape from New York rip-off, 2019: After the Fall of New York, all of which are pretty violent. The ostensible promotion here did him no favors, and ended up being his both his directorial debut and his final such credit.
Indeed, he didn't take to the job at all, and quit before it was finished. In addition, Derek Ford shot some footage- but was fired after only two days! Then Ray Selfe was hired for a spell, before Purdom was finally convinced to return to finish it off- sort of, as the aforementioned Birkinshaw handled the post-filming reshoots and additional gory footage, much to Purdom's chagrin. All in all, it took a good two years to complete filming.
Given the jigsaw way the film was put together and all the cooks in the kitchen, it's remarkable how well the movie holds together. It helps that, by having the hook of the killer simply taking out any given Santa he comes across and remaining unseen for most of the film, it was easy enough to insert the newer footage.
Indeed, some cuts of the film rearrange the murders, so if you have a copy that references a murder that hasn't happened yet, or in which the timeline seems off, that would be why. The new print I watched corrects that mistake, thankfully, in addition to the highly improved picture-quality.
The mystery element isn't that great, anyway, as the film tips its hand on that early on. In a way, though, the film seems to realize its own mistake, as it reveals the killer a good twenty minutes before the ending. To be fair, there are a good bit of red herrings to keep you on your toes, and you could be forgiven for thinking it might have been the other main suspect.
Be that as it may, there are some interesting twists along the way- the people who die aren't always the ones you might think, for instance, including a rare scene in which the killer encounters a scantily-clad Santa Ho and actually lets her go! He seems to be far more interested in killing the men, as he also holds a female eyewitness hostage later on, rather than killing her outright.
We do get a late-in-the-game flashback to the "why" of it all, which was standard operating procedure for a lot of slashers and giallo films of the time. (Spoiler alert for the rest of this paragraph, for those who haven't seen it.) It seems that the killer saw someone who wasn't mommy kissing Santa Claus, aka his dad, who had the nerve to do it while his wife and kids were in the house downstairs, in one of the kid's bedrooms- with the door open, no less! In the ensuing melee, his mother falls down the stairs and dies, thus setting off the son's crazy in earnest.
Of course, most slashers are only as good as their respective murders, and this one has some doozies. Santas are stabbed, shot, maimed with broken bottles, and even, in the film's most notorious scene, castrated! The often quick-cut editing ruins the suspense of a lot of the scenes, but there are two solid stalk-and-slash bits that are almost worth the price of admission.
Notably, there's the one involving the Santa on a bike, who is first accosted by some punks, then a dog, and finally ends up in the spectacular London Dungeon, a wax museum of horrors that is enough to give the one in Tourist Trap a run for its money. The killer does kill a woman in this scene, but it's mostly to cover his tracks- still, it's pretty extreme. The other is towards the end, involving what amounts to the film's "Final Girl."
However, fair warning to all you Caroline Munro fans- she's only in one scene, despite her top billing. But if you're a fan, you'll still want to see this, as she does an amusingly 80's piece of pop pap called "Warrior of Love" that is also worth the price of admission for fans, although you could just cut to the chase and watch it here, on YouTube. Those here for the babes will not be disappointed, though, as there's a fair bit of nudity, most of it of the gratuitous variety. Like I said, it's a trashy one all around. Not that I'm complaining.
Aside from Purdom, I'm not readily familiar with most of the cast, but Belinda Mayne, who plays Kate, was in no less than the semi-beloved cult fave Krull; Mark Jones, who plays Detective Powell, crops up in The Empire Strikes Back, albeit briefly; Kelly Baker, aka the Peep Show girl, was also in Slaughter High; and I'm going to go out on a limb and say that, if you were a Brit of a certain age and inclination, you were probably familiar with Pat Astley, who was in a small army of exploitation flicks, i.e. The Stud & The Playbirds, as well as some outright porn, which would later get her fired from a rare mainstream role in the long-running TV series Are You Being Served?
I'd have to say this is easily one of my all-time favorite slashers, Christmas-themed or otherwise. It's just a lot of fun, and the cast is pretty solid, although some of the dialogue is admittedly LOL bad. ("I think there may be a pattern here" says the Inspector, after a good three Santas are already dead. You think?) And some of the plotting is dubious as well, such as when the boyfriend tells his GF it's time to move on, to say nothing of pose nude- the day after her father was killed right in front of her!
Yes, the editing occasionally seems to have been done via chainsaw- or perhaps a straight razor- which robs the film of a lot of potential suspense, but overall, it's a pretty enjoyable slasher for non-discerning fans. In fact, as much as I love Silent Night, Deadly Night, this one is much more fun, and completely lacks the self-serious nature of that film. Though, to be fair, SNDN more than made up for it, with its LOL-inducing first sequel.
If you love slasher movies, it's easily among the best of the Christmas-themed ones, and the British element sets it apart from a lot of the pack. The Brits didn't do a lot of ribald slashers like this, and it's a shame, because I really dig this one. I wouldn't recommend watching it with the family, but then, you probably figured that out already. For the rest of us, though, it's primo Xmas time viewing.
By all means, check this one out! 🔪🎅😱
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