--Santa Claus, Violent Night
Violent Night puts David Harbour in another action comedy with a horror bent not unlike his Hellboy, which was a much better film than its financial and critical reaction would have suggested. This Christmas action comedy comes from the director of Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters, and thankfully Violent Night is in every way a better movie. The comedy and tone are not unnatural or gratuitous this time, there is plenty of rather personal characterization for key cast members, and there is even a recurring focus on how Christmas has become so heavily associated with materialism (not the invalid metaphysical philosophy, but the irrationalistic, amoral emphasis on material possessions). This latter part is tackled in far more than occasional dialogue; it is a foundational aspect of the general film.
Production Values
Standing more on its core characters than on special effects, Violent Night still has its moments of great camera work or effects--of which blood is one of the most common. An early shot that continuously tracks character after character is at least more prolonged than usual, and the camera has some great angles to witness the carnage from as the brutality ramps up. The mixture of comedy, violence, and focus on selfishness is even better than even the bursts of great cinematography. David Harbour is excellent as a disgruntled, complicated Santa Claus deliberating on whether he will even perform his Christmas roles next year who reveals enough about his past to somewhat touch upon his own moral failings and relationship troubles. Novel additions to this version's backstory for Santa very much work on its favor. Leah Brady also contributes often as a young girl named Trudy who convinces Santa to help her family as they are being held at gunpoint and threatened with torture, eventually getting the chance to have Santa open up about himself. Her parents are played well by Alexis Louder and Alex Hassel though Leah is the more central character. Delivering the humor and torment of his character splendidly, John Leguizamo plays the leader of the villains and has one of the strongest presences after Harbour and Brady.
Story
Some spoilers are below.
On Christmas Eve, Santa Claus prepares to deliver gifts, but first he complains about increasingly rampant greed, selfishness, and ungratefulness of children around the world. The next day, the adult children of the wealthy Lightstone family gather for Christmas, but some of their hired helpers take the family hostage. Santa is in a vibrating chair upstairs when gunfire erupts, having sat down to enjoy cookies and alcohol. The leader of the robbers, it turns out, wants to rob the Lightstones of 300 million dollars given by the American government to distribute in the Middle East, which were secreted away in a personal vault. Santa ends up staying at the estate to fight off the attackers, but not without some reluctance.
Intellectual Content
Not everything is about money, contrary to what some characters seem to believe in Violent Night: money is only a social construct that is fixated on by many at the expense of reason, morality, and many other pivotal philosophical issues, but it does have both pragmatic usefulness and attention that is practically cultural worship. The nature of things like the laws of logic are of course not about money, and just because one person is driven by greed does not mean another is, something seen in Violent Night, as well as how someone can renounce their former glorification of greed. Yes, Santa Claus in this story was once a Viking warrior named Nikomund the Red who was obsessed with taking riches for himself to the point ot slaughtering people for them. Showing deep regret for his past, this Santa despises how petty living for money is even as he delivers gifts to a world he is troubled by. This greed is reflected in the villains who attack the very rich with the same avarice they seem to condemn in other contexts, as John Leguizamo's character complains about the Lightstone family leader not giving her employees livable compensation while trying to torture people in pursuit of money. To an extent one might not expect, Violent Night offers a fairly somber acknowledgement of how destructive greed is.
Conclusion
Violent Night is about as good as a movie of this very specific kind could be. It does not fail to thoroughly address the capacity for greed (which many, many characters deal with in different ways), it does not let comedy stomp out the more serious moments, and it is very well acted, particularly by David Harbour and Leah Brady. This film could have been far worse than it is, and given its themes and plot, there are not many areas it needed to improve. Should a sequel be released, the hints at a broader metaphysical lore for this rendition of Santa Claus and the complex approach to the character could be expanded upon enough to provide new elements to what is already a very clever story.
Content:
1. Violence: The more graphic images involve the likes of someone falling onto an ice decoration that protrudes out from their torso or a Christmas tree star getting inserted into someone's left eye. Other kinds of violent brawls or traps are shown, including traps imitating those in Home Alone.
2. Profanity: "Fuck," "shit," and "bitch" are used.
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