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Olivia's (Nicole Kawalez) Christmas party seems to be doomed from the
start: She wants to introduce her friends to her new boyfriend Ramsey
(Tony Nashed) - who's their history professor at college, which already is
a little odd. Then her best friend Nicole (Annette Wozniak) picks exactly
this occasion to confess to her boyfriend Bryan (Brent Baird) that she's
secretly a webcam girl and really gets off masturbating in front of
strangers. Another of Olivia's guests is Carissa (Keegan Chambers), the
chronically drunk party girl who had an affair with Bryan and hasn't come
over it - so much so that she fetches druggie Dwayne (Geoff Almond) for a
bit of sex to make Bryan jealous, but to her despair he can't get it up in
time. Plus, Olivia insisted on playing Secret Santa, but somehow
the presents all come out dead wrong, and people get stuff like chainsaws
and used meat cleavers and that sort of stuff. Being the hopeless optimist
that she is, Olivia tries her best to iron everything out, no matter how
hopeless the situation ... but there's a masked killer in the house, who
has of course repackaged the "Secret Santa"-gifts him or herself
- and now he kills the attendants of the party with their respective
"gifts" one after the other ... Sure, upon objective
appraisal Secret Santa is a slasher movie - it just doesn't feel
like one, and that's meant as a compliment: Basically the movie is really
funny, but not in the genre-conscious way Scream was funny, but
genuinely funny, putting likeable and quirky characters into hilarious
situations that invariably help plot or character development, but without
being genre clichés or the like. And add to that a light footed
directorial approach, and also plenty of suspense and gruesome killings
... and you've got a movie you'll probably really enjoy no matter if
you're at all into slashers or not! Screener courtesy of the Blood
in the Snow Canadian Film Festival, November 27th - 29th 2015, Carlton
Cinemas, Toronto, ON - http://www.bloodinthesnow.ca/
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