Krampus may not be the scariest film this year, but it's certainly entertaining and you can tell the creators gave it their all. Even if not everything in the film ends up working.
The director is very talented at creating legitimate thrills and building up suspense. There are no false jump scares or lame fake-outs. When the film is building up to something, it builds and builds. Showing just the right amount at just the right time. That scene in the trailer where the girl is being chase under the car, is exactly how a chase should be done. It's tense, it's fast paced, and it's awesome.
This may be the first film in years that captures the feeling of being stuck at home in a snow storm, perfectly. I actually remember shivering at one point and wondering if the theatre had turned on the AC, but it was actually just that the film looked cold. The fireplace always looked cozy and warm and inviting, and the claustrophobia of staring outside and seeing a blank white page of environment really sits in. It feels exactly like you're there, stuck in that house.
There are so many moments, that are insanely creative. The opening credits sets the mood perfectly and there's a pretty cool animated stop-motion segment in the middle of the film that evokes those old Rankin/Bass holiday specials. These are great ways to bring a little more life to the film and shake things up a little.
There's a lot of creativity in the monsters. From demonic sharp toothed teddy-bears, a jack-in-the-box caterpillar monster, and maniacal laughing mischievous gingerbread men. Krampus looks great as well. He kinda looks like Santa Claus on Meth, which is a unique design. Although he does have one main flaw, his face is just so lifeless and cheap looking. The Krampus in the animated segment showed more personality in a matter of seconds, than the actual live action costume.
The actors for the most part are good. Conchata Ferrell gets all the best lines. But the other actors all do good work with what they're given. I thought I was going to hate these characters, but strangely enough the performances of the actors involved actually made me end up rooting for them to survive. They tried their hardest to work with the limited material, and it shows.
The ending was the worst part. It ends three times. The first I was perfectly fine with, and felt like a legitimate place to end the story. History repeats itself, lessons are learned. But then it just kept going, and the second ending was kinda lame but at least was serviceable. We got to see more of Krampus' crew which was kinda cool. The third ending was just flat out dumb. I get what the creators were trying to do. The old divine intervention ploy we've seen in The Christmas Carol and It's a Wonderful Life, but unlike those films it just felt like a cop-out and unearned.
It's not drop dead funny, it's not soil your pants scary. It's just kinda in the middle. There's some good stuff, there's some bad stuff. But in the end, I was entertained by the film. I wouldn't recommend going out of your way to see it on the big screen, but watching it at home by the fireplace with a cup of hot-chocolate, totally!
The director is very talented at creating legitimate thrills and building up suspense. There are no false jump scares or lame fake-outs. When the film is building up to something, it builds and builds. Showing just the right amount at just the right time. That scene in the trailer where the girl is being chase under the car, is exactly how a chase should be done. It's tense, it's fast paced, and it's awesome.
This may be the first film in years that captures the feeling of being stuck at home in a snow storm, perfectly. I actually remember shivering at one point and wondering if the theatre had turned on the AC, but it was actually just that the film looked cold. The fireplace always looked cozy and warm and inviting, and the claustrophobia of staring outside and seeing a blank white page of environment really sits in. It feels exactly like you're there, stuck in that house.
There are so many moments, that are insanely creative. The opening credits sets the mood perfectly and there's a pretty cool animated stop-motion segment in the middle of the film that evokes those old Rankin/Bass holiday specials. These are great ways to bring a little more life to the film and shake things up a little.
There's a lot of creativity in the monsters. From demonic sharp toothed teddy-bears, a jack-in-the-box caterpillar monster, and maniacal laughing mischievous gingerbread men. Krampus looks great as well. He kinda looks like Santa Claus on Meth, which is a unique design. Although he does have one main flaw, his face is just so lifeless and cheap looking. The Krampus in the animated segment showed more personality in a matter of seconds, than the actual live action costume.
The actors for the most part are good. Conchata Ferrell gets all the best lines. But the other actors all do good work with what they're given. I thought I was going to hate these characters, but strangely enough the performances of the actors involved actually made me end up rooting for them to survive. They tried their hardest to work with the limited material, and it shows.
The ending was the worst part. It ends three times. The first I was perfectly fine with, and felt like a legitimate place to end the story. History repeats itself, lessons are learned. But then it just kept going, and the second ending was kinda lame but at least was serviceable. We got to see more of Krampus' crew which was kinda cool. The third ending was just flat out dumb. I get what the creators were trying to do. The old divine intervention ploy we've seen in The Christmas Carol and It's a Wonderful Life, but unlike those films it just felt like a cop-out and unearned.
It's not drop dead funny, it's not soil your pants scary. It's just kinda in the middle. There's some good stuff, there's some bad stuff. But in the end, I was entertained by the film. I wouldn't recommend going out of your way to see it on the big screen, but watching it at home by the fireplace with a cup of hot-chocolate, totally!
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