While 1984 was the year we got the undisputed king of infamous Christmas slasher movies with Silent Night, Deadly Night, there was another film released the same year that strived to match it for Santa-themed sleaze. But while the misadventures of Billy Chapman gave us the quintessential killer-dressed-as-Santa movie, Don’t Open Till Christmas went down another route entirely. While one movie featured someone killing people dressed as Father Christmas, the other featured a someone killed people dressed as Father Christmas in quite possibly one of the only seasonal themed, British Giallo movie that I’ve ever come across.
The halls won’t be the only things getting decked as various loners, perverts and innocent bystanders get taken out by a mad-dog slasher who sees red whenever presented with a lookalike to St. Nick. Its easy, it’s queasy and by God is it sleazy – it’s Don’t Open Till Christmas and it’s a hell of a lot to unwrap…
There’s a masked killer stalking the festive streets of London and he’s targeting a very particular type of victim by singling out anyone he can wearing a Santa Claus suit and murdering them in the most violent way possible. Be it a hobo on the street, to a young lothario indulging in a Christmas quickie in the back seat of his car, if you’re dressed in a red costume and a big white beard, you’re fair game for this maniac. However, the police investigation into these slayings steps up a gear when a man is stabbed through the head during a crowed party with a spear. Taking in the man’s traumatised daughter, Kate Brioski, and her somewhat callous boyfriend, Cliff, in for questioning, Chief Inspector Ian Harris and Detective Sergeant Powell hope to whip up at least some clues to the identity of this madman, but as the days to Christmas count down steadily, the Santa clad bodies start to pile up fast. It seems no one is safe, from a store Santa taking a piss, to another, loney, impersonator spending time at the local brothel, the killer shows no signs of stopping.
It’s here that various people try to figure the mystery out themselves, with Kate trying to whittle down the facts to discover who shish kebabed her father’s skull and the boundaries lacking reporter Giles who keeps telling Powell that there might be something fishy about his superior. But even when the killer steps up to kidnapping in order to get a potential witness off the streets, he still shoes no signs of slowing as he uses gun, knife, razor and his own two hands to eradicate anyone that triggers his hate for Father Christmas.
What will it take to stop this lunatic? The way everyone is dropping the ball, probably New Years now I come to think about it…
On paper, Don’t Open Till Christmas seems to be a perfect merging of numerous different aspects to create something excitingly new. While Bob Clarke’s sublime Black Christmas certainly contains many aspects you’d expect to find with something as conceptually outrageous as a Christmas Giallo, this film hews far closer to the more obvious tropes of the genre. There’s a masked killer, leering through his facial disguise as the slightest hint of his trigger is due to set him off like a deranged party popper; there’s a string of incompetent coppers struggling to get their noggins around this seasonal thrill-killer; and, as standard, there’s a fair level of seedy grot as the movie can’t resist reveling in lurid setups involving nude models, strippers and hollow-eyed perverts who happen to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. There’s even a plethora of random-as-fuck kills which all fail to make a lick of sense and smartly refuses to meet a basic pattern. One minute the killer is shoving a gun in the unsuspecting gob of a rowdy drunk, the next he’s using a razor to relieve some poor sod of his John Thomas as he takes a leak in a public toilet.
However, as chaotic as this all seems on camera, behind the scenes on Don’t Open Till Christmas proved to be mire tumultuous still as constant issues with creative differences saw the production of the film drag out to two years.
In that time, director Edmund Purdom (who also stars as the impressively ineffectual Inspector Harris) left the project, only to be replaced by writer Derek Ford who himself only lasted for about two days. Next to leap into the directorial fray was editor Ray Selfe and in this time the script had to be thoroughly rewritten now that the star had quit and other cast members had to drop out due to the torturously long production. However, in a final, ironic twist, Perdom eventually returned to finish helming the production and continue playing his role and as a result, the final film is as visibly uneven as the result of a chimp trying to gift wrap a bicycle. Supposed main characters disappear off-screen for long periods of time only to show back up, claim they’ve cracked the case and then bite the bullet without a single warning; the score keeps switching from John Carpenter style synths to what sounds like a more traditional stock score and back again with reckless abandon; and seemingly minor background characters suddenly become vital to the threadbare plot and have entire scenes that seemingly have nothing to do with anything.
The result includes both pros and cons. For one thing, you could hardly accuse Don’t Open Till Christmas of being predictable, because I’m almost certain no one even knew what the fuck was going to happen next on set, let alone watching it around 40 years later. Another noticable win is that with its obsession with sex workers and dirty old men, the flick somehow manages to out-sleaze Silent Night, Deadly Night despite being as technically competent as its legendarily trashy sequel and it’s also unintentionally funny too. Why exactly shitheel boyfriend Cliff thinks it’s a good idea to bring his girlfriend to a glamour shoot in the hope of getting her to model topless mere days after her father was murdered, I have no idea, but it hits the exact messed-up funny bone that had me chuckling at a stripper describing her creepy, horny, soon-to-be-murdered punter as sweet old man.
However, for all of its perplexing, unsettling fun points and the neat twist in the premise, there’s no escaping that this film is an utter mess, which is understandable considering the circumstances. Yes, there’s an argument to be made that its erratic plotting makes it feel even more like a particularly deranged Giallo flick (coincidently, Purdom also showed up in the truly deranged Pieces), but it’s flailing plot and chaotic continuity scream more of production issues than an actual style.
It’s seedy as fuck and it moves as fast as Santa’s sleigh, but all that speed means nothing if the film hasn’t a single clue to where it’s actually going. Sleaze lovers and old-school trash enthusiasts will definitely be overjoyed to find it in their stocking and there is a certain lure to its murky, sordid charms. However, it’s tough to embrace this Santa slayer any more than just a seasonal curio simply because it’s plot plainly seems to be being made up on the fly. You won’t open until Christmas, but you’ll wrap it back up long before boxing day.
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