Saturday, December 16, 2023

Silent Night, Deadly Night Part 2 (1987)

 In this first sequel to the 1984 original, Ricky takes over his dead brother Billy's calling to punish the "naughty". Movie makes extensive use of footage from the first film, retelling the story of the original movie in flashback for about the first 40 minutes! This greatly pads the pictures 88 minute run time. 

The movie proper has young Ricky being adopted by a nice Jewish couple, the better to avoid further Christmas related trauma. Things go well for years, but eventually an 18 year old Billy stumbles upon an attempted rape, which is when his killing spree starts

Even sillier then its predecessor, lead Eric Freeman is a real ham, and he's not the only one. The "garbage day scene" is internet famous, but there are wilder deaths on display here. The film gets rather meta when Ricky goes and sees a movie about a guy in a Santa suit killing people and they use clips from the first movie in that as well.

Mother superior finally gets her comeuppance,  that and the overall weirdness of the film make it watchable despite the repetitive first half. *1/2

No comments: