Director: James Klass
Year: 2017
Country: United Kingdom
Alternate Titles: 12 Deaths of Christmas; The Curse of Frau Perchta
Genre: Supernatural Slasher
Plot:
Heading off to her father’s cabin, a woman and her daughter intending to get through the Christmas holiday together find themselves the subject of a town-wide curse as the spirit of a witch that was killed years earlier comes back for revenge, targeting the daughter and forcing them to try to stop it.
Review:
This one wasn’t nearly as bad as it could've been. A lot of the film’s positives center on the fear of children being targeted by the vicious creature. The real-life inspiration here for the figure coming back to haunt the citizens of the community based on the curse of the woman that the town burned alive has a great setup here with the witch coming back to target the kids. Based on the historical setup given through the church-meetings that go into the connections between everyone in the village to the hanging of the woman years ago, the overall setup from the film is quite enjoyable that turns over to the kids being the target of the creatures’ rampage as it centers on the parents forcing themselves into action to save them.
There’s also the really enjoyable work here with the witch’s confrontations and encounters with the kids. The opening abduction of the kid from the church is a chilling opening encounter, while the sightings of the witch lurking around the family tempting the daughter all come together to give this a creepy atmosphere. Other scenes, including the stalking of the babysitter and the young daughter in their darkened home or the witch’s ambush in the woods, get far more brutal than chilling and it makes for a nice setup leading into the finale where the creature attacks the house. The action here is rather fun and frantic, leading to several nice confrontations with the creatures’ powers providing some bloody scenes, giving this one a lot to really like.
There are some problems to be had with this one. One of the biggest issues is the film’s rather puzzling setup that includes some unnecessary elements here that drag the pacing out longer than it should be. The human-interest storyline involving everyone dealing with cheating spouses and long-buried secret identities doesn’t provide the film with much, carrying on merely in the interest of bringing the husband and his girlfriend into the picture for more bodies to carve up sine their inclusion isn’t warranted at all. These scenes are boring and not in the slightest interesting, much like the seemingly endless house ambush that goes on forever and seems to exist solely to show the witch engaging in brutal exaggerated torments on the group rather than going for its target that it could’ve easily done so at various chances throughout the sequence.
The other real issue with this one concerns the film’s cheap look and overall tone. The one-location setting and lack of any real grandiose sequences won’t be any real reason to knock this but they do help the film come off with no budget. As well, there’s the penchant for on-location lighting that renders a lot of the night scenes hard to make out due to the darkness present and relying on the localized candles and Christmas lights to constitute the only enhancements present in the scene. The witch make-up is simply atrocious, looking like running eyeliner after a heavy night of drinking that makes her look hung-over rather than a vengeful witch. These here are what hold this one down overall.
Overview: **.5/5
A far better entry than expected which does have some issues with an overlong running time and some budgetary restrictions, this one manages to be somewhat watchable overall in spite of those elements. Give it a chance if you’re a fan of cheesy low-budget efforts or intrigued by holiday-themed genre efforts, while those looking for something more than that should heed extreme caution with this one.
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