6.6 | / 10 |
Users | 4.0 | |
Reviewer | 4.0 | |
Overall | 4.0 |
Interwoven stories occur on Christmas Eve, as a festive radio host attempts to spread cheer. A family brings home more than a Christmas tree; a student documentary becomes a living nightmare; a family's Christmas outing to a wealthy relative awakens a vicious spirit; and Santa fights evil.
Starring: William Shatner, George Buza, Rob Archer, Zoé De Grand Maison, Alex OzerovHorror | 100% |
Supernatural | 15% |
Holiday | 5% |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.85:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 (48kHz, 24-bit)
English SDH
25GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Slipcover in original pressing
Region A (locked)
Movie | 4.0 | |
Video | 4.5 | |
Audio | 4.5 | |
Extras | 1.5 | |
Overall | 4.0 |
Who remembers The Night the Reindeer Died? It was a fictitious Christmas special promoted by
Bill Murray's cynical network executive in Scrooged,
where Santa and his elves were trapped in
an action movie spoof that got progressively more ridiculous, capped by the arrival of Six Million
Dollar Man star Lee Majors. That story was positively tame compared to what happens at the
North Pole in A Christmas Horror Story, the ingenious new anthology film from Canada's
Copperheart Entertainment, creators of Ginger Snaps
and its sequels.
Although it was inspired by Creepshow, A
Christmas Horror Story (or "ACHS") isn't an
"anthology" in the strict sense. With the exception of the North Pole entry, all of the stories are
set in the same town, and they intersect and overlap. The town is Bailey Downs, which is not a
coincidence. It's the same town where the Ginger Snaps series is set, and it's also the town where
one of the clones resides in the BBC series Orphan
Black, on which ACHS co-directors Grant
Harvey and Brett Sullivan both regularly work in various capacities. And, of course, the name
"Bailey" immediately suggests a famous fictional family from Bedford Falls whose trials and
tribulations are the subject of one of the most beloved Christmas films of all time. But Bailey
Downs is nothing like Bedford Falls, and no one with even a faint resemblance to Clarence the
Angel (2nd Class) will be making an appearance this Christmas Eve.
After premiering at the Fantasia International Film Festival in July 2015, ACHS received a
limited theatrical release the following October and was also released via video-on-demand.
Image Entertainment is now issuing it on Blu-ray just in time for the holidays. It's the perfect
stocking stuffer for anyone who loves horror comedies.
Although A Christmas Horror Story had three directors, a single cinematographer shot the entire
film, Gavin Smith (Ginger Snaps 2: Unleashed). The film
was shot digitally with post-production completed on a digital intermediate, from which Image Entertainment's 1080p, AVC-encoded Blu-ray was
presumably sourced by a direct digital path. The Blu-ray image is clean,
sharp and detailed, with solid blacks that work effectively for the many dark scenes in basements,
nighttime forests and other places where danger lurks. Except for the North Pole, which has an
otherworldly quality to its light and palette, ACHS begins with bright and normal colors, but each
segment quickly descends into something dim and unsettling. The exception is Dangerous Dan's
studio, where the brightly festive holiday decorations seem to be struggling harder each time the
film cuts back to them from the increasingly dark proceedings in the other stories.
Image has mastered ACHS with an average bitrate of 20.99, which seems to have been adequate
given the digital origination and a large number of "calm before the storm" scenes, of which the
compression appears to have taken full advantage.
ACHS's 5.1 soundtrack, encoded in lossless DTS-HD MA, uses deep (deep) bass extension to create unease and convey the power of the supernatural forces attacking various characters. To be more specific would be a crime, as would describing the many detailed sound effects that come at the viewer from various directions during the course of several tales, just as they come at the unsuspecting characters on screen. Suffice it to say that the mix can be lively and involving, when the need arises. It can also be still and suspenseful at the right moments. The segments involving DJ Dangerous Dan are probably the least showy in terms of sound editing, but who needs effects when you have the great William Shatner giving one of his over-the-top performances? His dialogue is clear, and so is everyone else's, except for that spoken by creatures who aren't trying to be understood. The energetic horror score is by Alex Khaskin (The ABCs of Death 2).
The upcoming Krampus from Universal Pictures may turn out to be a
holiday horror classic, but
it already has serious competition. ACHS is cleverly written and skillfully made by people who
know their genre conventions and understand how to use audience expectations creatively,
especially when intertwining horror elements with Christmas imagery. The film provides laughs,
jump-scares, a plethora of deaths, plenty of gore and even a sex scene. It's everything a horror
fan could wish for, in a quality Blu-ray presentation. Highly recommended.
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