Silent Night, Deadly Night 2025 Movie Review
“Silent Night, Deadly Night” follows Billy Chapman, a drifting serial killer who commits murders every December after a traumatic childhood event he experienced on Christmas. Landing in a small town days before the holiday, he begins dispatching wrongdoers left and right.
This reimagining of the 1984 cult classic tries to do too many things, unfortunately to its own detriment. There are nods and easter eggs galore to the source material as well as other Christmas-themed slashers, but the juggling act attempted here never quite gels. After its initial prologue, the film essentially begins in medias res and the first half-hour is somewhat compelling; the general skeleton of the original film is used to decent effect here with a number of modern flourishes. However, once Billy’s naughty list progresses, the sleigh ride really derails.
The film’s tongue-in-cheek “kill list”-style titles are amusing, but the murder sequences themselves become increasingly outlandish, with a skinhead/Nazi holiday gathering serving as an outrageous centerpiece and a marker of the story’s rambling descent into tedium. A romantic subplot between Billy and Pamela, the soon-to-be-heiress of her family’s antiques store where Billy has taken a job, is revisited throughout. There are overwrought implications that Pam has her own issues with mental instability, but this never truly amounts to anything compelling. Her abusive cop ex-boyfriend occasionally appears, primed as an antagonist, but the character has so little substance (he hardly speaks in his few scenes) that it’s impossible to care.
What’s perhaps the most tedious element of the film, however, is Billy’s inner dialogue (suggesting some sort of split-personality) through voiceover which telegraphs the action to come, and, thereby, acts as a vacuum for what little suspense is built into the story. Rohan Campbell does what he can here and occasionally evokes some mystery, but the screenplay continually undermines his performance. The same is true of Ruby Modine. It’s not that either are bad actors, but rather that the material robs them. As the film clambers toward its predictable and messily-staged climax, I found myself increasingly caring less and less–which is not a good feeling, even among the most cheapjack slashers.
It is important to acknowledge that none of the films in the “Silent Night, Deadly Night” series are high art; they are and always have been B-movies. While this contemporary reimagining occasionally captures that spirit, any attempts at reworking or honoring the source material come across as narratively anemic. The outcome here manages to be both all-over-the-map and remarkably flat. Unfortunately, this one gets one big lump of coal from me.
