Krampus Review

I have been excited for Krampus for a number of months now and it finally came out, right in the Christmas season. I was straight to the cinema for some festive frights, I expected some fun, some spirit and some creepy ass puppets and I'm happy to say Krampus has all of those and more but that's not to say I don't have any issues with the film, let's look a little deeper.

The base story of Krampus starts like your usual Christmas story but twists into something a lot more interesting, a family who only ever really sees each other around Christmas time is brought together in the home of the kid Max, he's a nice kid who just wants the best for everyone and when some of his young relatives embarrass Max by reading his heart warming letter to Santa out loud during dinner and belittling him for still believing in Santa, he freaks out and takes back his Christmas wishes and tears up his list and throws it out the window. All this manages to accomplish is attracting the hellish tricks of Krampus and his fiendish helpers. The family gets caught up in a massive snowstorm and are trapped inside the house while toys, creatures and evil animated Christmas cookies pick off family members and ruin the Christmas holidays for everyone! The thing I love about the story is that the movie isn't trying to be a horror movie that happens to be set around Christmas, it really is a Christmas spirited movie with really scary puppets, messed up deaths but family morals.

When I think of the characters, the mother Sarah (Played by Toni Colette) comes straight to mind, I was already a fan of her from other movies, she's very good at showing emotions facially and she does that pretty great again here, the rest of the characters are good but not great. There is something generally likable about Adam Scott and Krista Stadler is likable too despite just being there to be that cryptic character that horror movies seem to need sometimes. I will also add that I actually liked Max in his movie, that's important to me because it's hard for me not to dislike a kid in a movie, I'm evil, I know.

I would like a moment to talk about monsters because they are the best thing about this movie, to me anyway, I love creature shit. See in most movies that have a bunch of creatures or a host of monsters, you normally have a favorite and it's not hard to choose one or one would really stand out or cause more of a reaction. In Pan's Labyrinths it's the Pale Man, in Jurassic Park it's the T-Rex, in Jurassic World it's probably Blue. In Krampus it's really hard to choose, every monster is pretty fucking scary and the only one that isn't is still great because it's adorable and fun. Every new reveal of another Krampus helper is just as eye opening as the next, the practical effects involved are awesome and are really the main reason I wanted to see this movie. I'm a fan of the Krampus look itself, it's very dark and does a great job of showing a physical idea of 'Santa's Shadow' The creatures are a BIG highlight of the movie.

I just mentioned that the practical effects were awesome and they really are, the designs are terror inducing and creative enough but I'm probably biased because I have a serious hard-on for practical effects. Props to the CGI as well, I expected it to be worse than it was for some reason, it's not flawless but it really does it's job well and awh man, those gingerbread men are great. I also want to add that there is a gorgeous animated flashback scean in this film, it's really lovely and really effective.

I'd normally mention the soundtrack here but there's not too much to say, it certainly does it job and is enjoyable enough so I have no issues with it.

My main issue is that I can't decide if they had a good idea of what they wanted the end to be or if they had no damn idea what way they wanted it to end, I won't ruin it but it is a little contradicting. I think I like the ending, it just took me back a little, Certainly not a prefect movie but hell if I wasn't entertained, I enjoyed it as much as I though I would, it's funny, crazy and it does justice to Christmas horror films, you might enjoy The Nightmare Before Christmas because it's nice twist on typical happy Christmas movies but even that ends with the same feeling as the other Xmas movies, Grimmer than Gremlins and a lot more entertaining than a lot of recent horror movies, Krampus is great, dark family mayhem, if you're a slightly odd family anyway.

Pros -It's festive -It's really creepy -It has Toni Colette -Great effects -It has heart -It's Twisted