Adam Scott and Toni Collette play Tom and Sarah, two frustrated suburban parents who’re dreading the yearly visit from their backwards extended family. Sarah’s sister Linda (Allison Tolman) and her gun-toting, loud-mouthed husband (David Koechner), along with their drunken matriarch (Conchata Ferrell) and their two brutish children, complete this RV-driving nightmare family that seems hell-bent on ruining the perfect holiday weekend for Tom and Sarah’s youngest boy Max (Emjay Anthony). When Max gives up on the possibility of his family getting along he tears apart his handwritten letter to Santa Claus and, in doing so, inadvertently conjures the dark magic of the Krampus, a massive horned and hooved beast that turns every Christmas tradition into a deadly trap. Having experienced something similar in her youth, Tom’s elderly German mother Omi (Krista Stadler) tries to warn the group against going outside or letting the fireplace stay unlit.
Dougherty’s previous holiday-themed cult-horror movie “Trick ’r Treat” was a tryptic, portmanteau narrative that brought together different story elements within the same group of characters, shifting from one plot thread to the other. “Krampus” is a much more traditionally structured three-act story, and because of that has more responsibility to its build-up and its pay-off. The movie’s set-up is pretty loose and given enough to air to inform the characters and comedy. Structurally, National Lampoon’s “Christmas Vacation” certainly played in similar water, as far as the awkward family dynamics go, but Dougherty’s screenplay never seems to penetrate the surface of these character’s one-note identifiers, underselling the potential for anything more than a mild chuckle. The actors do their best with what little they’re given, but before the horror-element kicks in, the movie’s foundation as a story is disappointingly thin.
Where Dougherty excels here is with his visual flair and his wild imagination when it comes to the effects and movie’ atmosphere. The Germanic pagan design of the “Krampus” himself, along with the wooden faces of his demonic elves are delightfully sinister and brings to mind the playful and practical creature effects of 1980s B-movies such as “Troll” and “Pumpkinhead.” Dougherty is clearly having fun within his limitations and plays the story like a director putting on a perverse puppet show for an unsuspecting audience. Unfortunately, the PG-13 rating dampens the levels of violence and shock necessary for the film to be anywhere near as subversive as it often thinks it’s being, forcing the movie to rely too heavily on its hacky and tepid comedy.
As a mostly-silly genre exercise, “Krampus” is acceptable pop-corn fodder and destined to be a cable-television curiosity. The plot mechanics and characterizations are certainly lazy and it’s never fully commits to the sense anarchy it teases throughout, but it’s filmed with visual confidence and it has just enough schlocky exuberance to keep you entertained.
Grade: C+
Originally published in the Idaho State Journal - Dec/2015
Listen to more discussion about "Krampus" on this this week's episode of the Jabber and the Drone Podcast.
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