James Proclaims!

The original incarnation of Black Christmas may not have fully stood the test of time but when you consider that it was made in 1974, it does seem considerably ahead of its time.

I’m not generally a fan of the ‘slasher’ movie but they do always tend to do quite well at the box office, so clearly I don’t represent the masses on this point. From what I have sampled of the genre, Black Christmas seems to be a pretty good example of it.

I certainly found it quite disturbing and fairly stressful to watch, which probably means it was doing its job well. The cast are all pretty decent, particularly Margot Kidder, who steals every scene she is in.

Score for Christmasishness

It is called ‘Black Christmas’ so you’d imagine it should be getting top marks. And it does score highly, there are plenty of nods to the time of year, with Christmas trees, carols singers and a fairly unenthusiastic Santa Claus. But the film is set in the build-up to Christmas rather than on the big day itself, and in spite of the title of the movie, the Christmasishness is incidental rather than essential to the plot. I didn’t exactly feel full of good cheer at the end of this, and frankly I’d have been just as happy (or in my case unhappy) watching this at any time of year. So I’m controversially not awarding full marks in spite of the title.