Director: Robert Conway
Year: 2015
Country: USA
Alternate Titles: N/A
Genre: Creature Feature
Plot:
Tormented by a troubling home life, a lonely young girl with an unshaken belief in the Krampus figure protecting her causes a psychologist investigating a series of murders to tie the two together and soon sets out to stop the deadly creature from continuing his rampage.
Review:
This one wasn't as bad as it was expected to be. One of the better elements here is that the first half does a great job building up the girl and her loner tendencies to build her status for the rest of the film. Showing her locked in the room while the family members get attacked and her fascination with the figurine in her possession as well as the attitude she takes during the questioning, later on, makes for quite a decent build-up to the girls' condition. Once this one starts delving into the investigations both into the strange murders around town and the girls' mysterious past, tying it together with the girl's behavior makes for an engrossing time and starts the first half of this one off quite well.
Leading into the attacks throughout here, from the creatures' appearance taking out the foster parents in the beginning, the encounter with the nurse in his hotel room and the drunk in the car all come off rather nicely if all done too quickly. The dream sequence showing the creature targeting her is quite chilling and leads nicely into the aftermath revelations that take place inside the house where the creature goes after them and brings about a really nice twist-ending in the hospital where the trip through the two dimensions dealing with the great revelation that's pretty nicely handled here. Likewise, the fact that there's not a whole lot of action within this yet it still remains at a nice watchability factor is a solid point here by forging the engrossing mystery about her and the connection to the deaths so that even without a whole lot happening this one is still quite entertaining and somewhat enjoyable.
While these make this one better than it should be, there are still a few flaws here. One of the main flaws here is that this one's so low-budget that there's just not a whole lot of appealing work in its main worthwhile elements. The Krampus himself doesn't appear on-screen all that often, and it's such utterly cheap CGI that it's hard to really feel any kind of fear from the creature with there not being much to base his fear off of. The low budget extends to the rest of the film by containing barely any action at all except for the few brief, minor kills scattered throughout here since the majority of the film is dedicated to the investigation which ends up resulting in overly bland scenes that go on endlessly in these cramped, closed-in locations that really showcase how little actually happens within this one. As well, there's never any real link here between the girl and the creature which is never quite explained here, leading to a confusing reason why he's the one selected to go out killing the people as this never seems to offer a concrete explanation for this particular creature to be here and makes it quite weird why he's here at all. These here lower this one somewhat.
Overview: **.5/5
A decent if unspectacular entry that has some worthwhile elements despite plenty of flaws, this one is solid enough for what it is even though its flaws are quite damaging overall. Give it a shot if you're a fan of these indie creature features or really appreciate this holiday horror genre, while most others out there should heed caution.
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