MOVIE REVIEW: Violent Night

(The Green Nebula - EVE Online OST) 

There isn't really a well-documented recipe for producing a movie that's timeless. Admittedly, it's possible that such a recipe does exist and moviemakers simply choose to ignore it but I suspect that's probably not what's happening. 

Because truly timeless films are so rare, they tend to be a big deal when they come along. One such example is the 1988 action classic 'Die Hard'. (Here's some irony for you: While it's widely regarded as a Christmas movie -- because it is. -- it was actually released in July. Go figure!) 'Die Hard' was a perfect storm on a number of levels and it remains a Go To for many people even when it's not the holiday season. As a film, it's been dissected from end to end countless times, each scene poured over by experts and would-be film nerds alike. After all this time, you'd think that we'd have figured out why the film was so beloved, why it continues to work as well as it has. Examine it as we might, we just haven't managed it.

Perhaps we've been going about that pursuit the wrong way though. Perhaps the easiest way to figure out why 'Die Hard' is so good is to stand it up against a film with similar pretense and see where the other film is lacking. And what shall we use for this other film?

...Well, sitting here reading a 'Violent Night' review, so...

THE SHORT VERSION:

'Violent Night' was a movie with mountains of promise that delivered on absolutely none of it. It is TERRIBLE. It is not even a rental.

THE LONG VERSION:

I found my viewing experience of 'Violent Night' to be equal parts frustrating and illuminating. That thought experiment I was posing above about 'Die Hard' works perfectly when placed alongside another holiday movie with similar pretenses. What makes 'Die Hard' a success becomes immediately apparent. It's hard to celebrate that revelation though. I frequently found myself shouting at the television in raw dismay. 'Violent Night' had absolutely perfect ingredients at its disposal and elected to waste them utterly.

'Violent Night' tells the story of a terribly behaved rich family held hostage by bad men on Christmas Eve for their money. The real, honest-to-god Santa Clause shows up while this is going down and elects to do something about it. The story isn't a complex one but, as is so frequently the case, it all falls apart in the telling.

'Violent Night' was clearly an homage to other violent Christmas movies but it couldn't make its mind up about what it was. Is it a fun children's film like 'Home Alone', or is it a violent underdog tale like 'Die Hard'? It may shock you to learn that you cannot do both successfully in the same film. 'Violent Night' wants to be gritty and adult. There's brutal, abrupt, serious, GORY killing in it. There's huge volumes of (unnecessary) foul language. Santa himself has a very grown-up demeanor and backstory. There's...also a cute, adorable little girl who WEAWWY DOES BEWEAVE IN CHWISTMAS!...but she believes in 'Home Alone' more, and spends a great deal of the film shamelessly ripping it off in a manner completely apart from the rest of the movie's tone. Aaaand when the bad guys eventually DO come find her, they suddenly switch from hardened, efficient, well-trained killers to the dumb cousins of the Wet Bandits. This conflict in tone alone is enough to completely derail the movie.

Then there's the fact that most movies only have enough time to tell one story. 'Violent Night' is trying to tell two of them and it fails at both as a result. This is most readily on display when the film starts telling you a really, REALLY cool story about Santa before he was Santa. By the time this happens, you're already pretty depressed about how bad the film is but if they would have locked in on Santa's backstory and built more of the film around it -- Santa used to be a very, VERY naughty viking -- things might have been different for the film's final act. Unfortunately, they pretty much ignore his backstory in any meaningful way. The potency of the story itself is also completely swept away with how it was told, electing to soften the story through the lens of the 'Child' arc in the film rather than keeping it darker and more adult. The peak of 'What Could Have Been' is reached shortly before the third act of the film when the main villain -- a role absolutely phoned in by John Leguizamo -- asks Santa who he really is. For one really, REALLY brief moment, the movie sounds like it's about to head in the direction you think it should.

Then it doesn't.

It's at this point that the depression REALLY begins to set in because the reality of what makes 'Die Hard' so excellent finally begins to crystalize...and it's not that complicated a recipe. 'Violent Night' just chose to ignore it at virtually every single opportunity.

...Naturally, a sequel has already been green-lit. Ho, ho, ho.