Horror Comes Home for the Holidays

On the fourth day of Creepmas, The Krampus gave to me...one short family movie.

2013 | Color | 30 Min | 1.69 | R | Stereo | Family | Fighting Owl Films

Director: Thomas Smith

Writer: Thomas Smith

Stars:

Khristian Fulmer

Erin Lilley

Soren Odom 

According to legend, on Christmas Eve Santa Claus travels with a creature known as Krampus. While Santa rewards the good children, Krampus punishes the naughty. But that's just a myth. ...Or is it? When the naughty kids of a suburb begin to vanish in the weeks leading to Christmas, all evidence points to the creature's existence. In this follow-up to "The Night Shift", it's up to supernatural investigators Rue Morgan, Claire Rennfield, and skeletal sidekick Herbie West to solve the mystery, save the children, and face-off against the deadly Krampus.

Director and writer Thomas Smith bring's his reoccurring charters back for this short film wrapped around the Krampus. The main character Rue Morgan started his journey in the full-length feature The Night Shift from 2011 along with his sidekick Herb a talking skeleton. But never fear Claire comes along in Night of the Krampus to lightly fill you in on why they are bound to a cemetery.

Krampus is written to be a light-hearted comedy that can be watched by the whole family. You will not find any really bad jump scares and there is no blood to be found! But do not let that fool you, they cram in a ton of fun in 30 short minutes. At times, they can get a little deep to set up the plot with old mythical folklore that may be hard for a younger audience to handle. But with a fresh flow of comedy to help make up for it.

The Krampus himself is just the right mix of creepy without going over the top. Some of the special effects even impressed me. Not bad for a movie with a $3,000 budget that they used in all the right places. The effects of him coming down the chimney work perfect giving you the chill that you need. The locations are ok, they used what they had well.

The characters that drive the movie work very well together doing their best to give you that X-Files vibe. And for me the bad guy came off well giving you that super creepy yes I hate children feel. The kids are good in the movie as well and the main two kids hit their lines  just right. In fact, the little girl is so cute and does a great job telling her side of the story. It pays to be on the nice list.

As for the music score, you do get a few fun twisted versions of Christmas classics in the back round but nothing over the top. The sound effect's were again nothing crazy cool but nothing that takes you out of the movie as well. All the elements of this movie work well to tie it up in a nice little box with a bow on top. But...

the one thing that drives me crazy is the use of the color blue. I feel like it's a new trend with movies to not set the white balance. I'm not sure if they were going for a cold feeling or just a blue look. I just don't like that at all and this is not the only movie that has done this lately. So is the 2013 Rondo Award nominated film Night of the Krampus worth your time, I say yes give this one a shot. Krampus is all the rage right now and this was from 2013 so they were ahead of the curve!

You can watch this now for free on YouTube just click here and let me know how you felt. For me, I give this one...

3 Samurai Santa's

My only regret is that I did not get to this sooner!