Review by Ken King
THANK YOU TIP JAR SINT - 2010 USA Release: Dec. 20, 2011 Tom de Mol Productions, Parachute Pictures, IFC Films Rating: USA: R

"Saint Nicholas Eve is nice. You always get a lot of junk you don't need."

A lot of the wonderful fairytales we learn as kids, always have dark beginnings. From Cinderella, to Snow White, to nursery rhymes like "Ring-Around-The Roses" to "Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary." So, taking all this into consideration, why should Santa Claus be left out of the equation? He's not, if you watch this movie directed and written by Dick Maas (THE LIFT, AMSTERDAMNED, DO NOT DISTURB, THE SHAFT, PREY).

In 1492, Saint Nicholas was a total douchebag accompanied by his gang of villains called "Black Pete's." St. Nick (Huub Stapel: ) was a bishop who went around to small villages to exhort many goods such as food, gold, wine, other various possessions and virgins. One night, when the hooligans come around to collect their ill-gotten gains (The 5th of December, on a full moon) one village has finally had enough of this bullshit and decide to put paid to this "Saint." They slaughter some of Nick's men and set his ship on fire.

Flash forward to 1968.

A family are looking forward to spending St. Nicholas Eve together and celebrating. The father hears the pigs outside raising Cain and send his eldest son out to check on them. A good thing he did. Son avoids the massacre that happens while he is checking on the piggies. He sees who the culprits are and though he says nothing for fear of being discovered where he is hiding out, you know this little dude is plotting revenge.

Another flash forward to present day.

We see a classroom where (I'm guessing that they are seniors. There's nothing to suggest otherwise, but plenty to make one think they should be in their third year of college, or at the very least working a full time job) the students are passing out gifts and reciting poems, some of them inappropriate. The teacher and student body have zero problems with some of those gifts being on the very adult side. That particular class is up one dildo than from the class the year before. This chick, Sophie (Escha Tanihatu: SPLASH! [TV], HOT NEWS.NL [TV]) breaks up with her boyfriend, Frank (Egbert Jan Weeber: NECROCAM, GODFORSAKEN, SNOWFEVER, BELLA DONNA'S, REDBAD) during this little gift exchange. Apparently he cheated on her, and it comes to light, she also cheated on him. So, they're even.

But wait! There's more!

Lisa (Caro Lenssen:), Sophie's best friend, was the one that Frank cheated with, but Sophie, doesn't know this (you still with me, gang?) let me step right up and cut you in on a little secret, my friends: There isn't a sympathetic character in the whole movie until the end, and even then...

Remember the kid from earlier on?

Well, he is grown now and works for the police department. He hasn't forgotten what happened to his family and even when he gets bounced from duty to take an unplanned vacation, guess what he decides to do with that time off? Yes, Goert Hoekstra (Bert Luppes: MY BLUE HEAVEN, AMSTERDAMNED, BLACK BOOK, WILD ROMANCE, PORCELAIN) knows St. Nick is coming, as it is a full moon and December 5 is on Amsterdam. He means to end it all, once and for all.

Once the night sets in, Saint Nicholas and his ruffians come calling once more and start with the looting and murder. The police, always seemingly incompetent in Horror movies for some reason, think Frank, since he had a fight with his girlfriend and was humiliated in front of the class earlier in the day, blame him pretty much for everything going down. Witnesses say they saw Saint Nick riding a horse and killing people.

The Keystone Kops don't take into consideration that there are a thousand characters running about the city dressed like Saint Nicholas (Frank is as well, and his friends were in costume as Black Pete's) and there's no possible way, Frank could have been in all those places at once, even if he had the luxury of riding a horse (He didn't.) it's just not remotely in the realm of possibility.

The real one is spotted, on horseback, as witnesses described, when the police are driving Frank from the police station to the jail. Even with all the radio activity and shots fired, Frank is STILL the prime suspect. Man, are these guys on the stupid side. Frank eventually does escape, and he meets up with Goert after the pair drive the wayward Saint away with a blow torch.

The police department still have a raging hard on for Frank and want him found at all costs. When they find out Goert is also mixed up in this little zany caper, they put out an APB on this poor man too. I guess everyone needs a scapegoat every so often.

Goert knows just the way to stop Saint Nicholas and his cohorts. He lets Frank in on the plan and together, they set out to do the evil Zombie Claus in for not only present-day Amsterdam, but for generations to come.

This flick is enjoyable on many levels, but it is also problematic. It has a lot of dark humor, bloody violence, and is just downright weird. It looks good. I don't know how much of budget it had, but it looks like it was money well spent. Very little is off base and despite the subject matter, this is convincing from every angle of what it is supposed to be: a Christmas Horror film.

Apart from Frank, I didn't overly care much for the rest of the characters. They were all self-serving individuals with no regard for anyone but their own needs and desires. Even Goert, who was on a one man mission to take out the pirates and their ship, didn't much give a damn about Frank in the beginning and reluctantly let him tag along for the ride to do his self-appointed duty.

There were some jump scares here and there and some of the effects were pretty cool where it came to the kills. Sadly, a lot of them fell flat because of seeing obviously fake decapitated heads and appendages. In this case, if you can't make then look authentic, keep them out of the film altogether. A quick flash will do. Nobody will give you a hard time about it.

The ending worked for me, but I figured that was the way Director Dick Maas was going to go because I have seen dozens of films play out like this and coming to the same conclusions. It totally fits here.

FINAL THOUGHTS
Don't let my review throw you off too much. Even thought the movie could have been better, it wasn't a dud. If I saw it was playing on TV in the house as I was passing through the living room, I would sit down and watch it again. It's worth any amount of time you would spend on it.

Three Shriek Girls

This review copyright 2020 E.C.McMullen Jr.

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