Christmas films

[will.15]

When will some enterptising producer make Night of the Living Christmas Carol where Scrooge is the sole survivor on Earth because everyone making merry was eaten up by zombies while he was safely in his vault counting his money?

[vincenzo]

It could be called Resident Ebenevil.

[Rowdon]

name='vincenzo']That's the one. Also known as Stranger In The House (which gives away some of the climactic impact).







Late Night Trains (aka Night Train Murders) also has a parents/girls/xmas/killers storyline too. Much nastier film than any of the above and genuinely unsettling even today, though the Demis Roussos theme song is equally terrifying.

Just watched the trailer in Youtube. looks like it crosses that line between "Horror Film" and "Film of Horrific Behaviour" - I like a monster, me.

[vincenzo]

It's very similar in vein to Last House On The Left, only much better. Originally banned for UK cinema and later listed as an official video nasty. Available uncut now.



Deathline and Horror Express are the best train monster films.

[Rowdon]

name='vincenzo']It's very similar in vein to Last House On The Left, only much better. Originally banned for UK cinema and later listed as an official video nasty. Available uncut now.



Deathline and Horror Express are the best train monster films.

While we're on this subject: I was just in my local dvd store (or, in Spanish "Store of DVD") and saw "A Christmas Tale" by Paco Plaza - part of the recently reactivated "Stories to keep you awake" for TV ... it's a slasher set in the 80s - you seen it?

[vincenzo]

Aka Cuento de Navidad. I've heard of this but never seen it.

[taffy1967]

name='vincenzo']Black Christmas is the king of the holiday horrors for me. Silent Night Deadly Night is more of a typical 80's slasher film with a better plotline than most. More graphic too.



Don't Open Till Christmas (the Alan Lake/Edmund Purdom mess-terpiece) is easily horror's Xmas turkey, but still an entertaining one.

Black Christmas (1974) is one of the best horror films ever made. But as usual the recent remake is utter rubbish.



In the 1974 original, all the cast (especially the female students) are very likeable and are great characters, without the need for a back story.



The 2006 remake cast aren't and the girls are nothing but unpleasant bitchy sluts. It's hard to tell one apart as none have any real personality. The only good thing about it is the house mother was one of the girls from the 1974 original.

[vincenzo]

name='taffy1967']Black Christmas (1974) is one of the best horror films ever made. But as usual the recent remake is utter rubbish.



In the 1974 original, all the cast (especially the female students) are very likeable and are great characters, without the need for a back story.

Agree 100% Taffy. The remake was dire, and also completely pointless.

[Gerald Lovell]

There is also a similarly-titled offering called Silent Night, Bloody Night (1972/74). As an illustration of its worth, even John Carradine has no lines in it.

[dremble wedge]

name='Gerald Lovell']There is also a similarly-titled offering called Silent Night, Bloody Night (1972/74). As an illustration of its worth, even John Carradine has no lines in it.

I quite like this (but I have a high tolerance of anything featuring John Carradine). It amuses me that a few of the Andy Warhol crew appear in small roles.

[PhilJones]

When I was a young man living in Canada many years ago (early 1970s) the Alastair Sim 'Scrooge' was presented on one of the 12 VHF channels on Christmas Eve - Hamilton, Ontario's CHCH TV station, I believe. I have seen it on all the Christmas Eves since (now more than forty!), sometimes more than once. One Christmas Eve in the early 1980s it was broadcast on either 9 or 10 of the 12 available TV channels in the Toronto area. I don't believe that those living in the U.K. understand what an icon the film was in North America. It's probably not as popular now as 20 years ago, when TV was restricted to the non-satellite channels, but is still very much the film to watch on Christmas Eve.



I have probably watched that film over 60 times, and never ever ever tire of it!!! Not just the superb acting by the very cream of the British actors of the 1950s, but the timeless lessons it contains. Young Scrooge walking away from the only thing that he later realized was everything in life -- the love of that gentle creature, Alice. The toy shop window, and how material desires are just fleeting. Cratchit's big day off every year. Old Joe's parlour -- with scenery probably close to that actually existing for that class of society in the early 1800s. The beggar on the steps, desperate to avoid the workhouse. A film made in only two weeks, and which Patrick McNee has recalled as a 'half day's work'. A true masterpiece!!!!!



The late Glyn Dearman (Tiny Tim) gave an interview with a Toronto newspaper in the 1980s, and it covered the whole front page of one of the sections of the Toronto Telegraph or Toronto Sun. I wish that I had saved a copy, since very little exists in print about the making of the film at Nettlefold Studios in Walton-on-Thames. I returned to the U.K. in 1999 after many years living in Canada, and have often thought that someone should write an article on the making of the film, maybe making it part of a larger article on Nettlefold Studios itself (now long gone, but at one time occupying the centre of Walton, and the locale also for the TV series Robin Hood with Richard Greene -- another favourite on Saturday mornings in 1950s' Canada). George Cole, Patrick McNee, Rona Anderson (Alice) and Carol Marsh (Fan) are still alive, and it would be wonderful if they could share their memories -- although I understand that George Cole wants to save things for his autobiography!



Would anyone on this website know of any articles that exist on the making of the film?? I have often wondered where the scene of Fan's carriage approaching the schoolhouse to bring home Ebenezer was shot. Also the outdoor scene where the carolers are shooed away by Scrooge and Cratchit is running to beat the chiming clock. And the final scene where Scrooge is tugged by Tiny Tim to follow him past the bollard and down a snow-covered street. Where was that filmed?



Some of you may have read Mark Simpson's new book out on Alastair Sim. Mr Sim was a very private person who talked little to the media. Mr Simpson devotes three pages to the making of the film, but the comments are mostly general ones on Mr Sim's personality. Mr Simpson told me in correspondence that the cinema magazines of the time all sent reporters to cover the making of the film, so possibly there is information available.



Does anyone know of any articles on the making of the film, including info on the outdoor locales that were used?



Thanks.



Phil Jones

London W11

[Timmy_Lea]

Christmas with the Kranks is possibly the worst