Christmas Horror Watch: Silent Night, Deadly Night Part 2 (1987)

Watched:  12/13/2025

Format:  Amazon?

Viewing:  First

Director:  Lee Harry

Sometimes horror fans complain that critics will say "this is pretty good for horror" or something of the like.  And I agree - that's a bit dismissive of a whole genre.  But my suspicion about why this happens is that sometime in high school, a person who would one day become a critic was with friends who rented something like Silent Night, Deadly Night Part 2 (1987), and their takeaway was "this is what you guys are watching?"

On its face, yes.  This is a movie with problems.  It's three years after the first film's release, and this sequel - put out well into the age of VHS where most people probably saw the first Silent Night, Deadly Night - spends 36 minutes doing a mix of clip show of the first movie and having our new villain/ protagonist relay the story of the first film to a psychiatrist.  Then it spends ~30 minutes relaying the fate of the brother of the first Kill Krazy Kris Kringle (our hero/villain) before it unleashes our guy onto the world, where he immediately goes after his abusive former Mother Superior.  

There is, to my surprise, an added bit of pretension at the end as we learn the surviving nun was the same woman our Second Santa avenged after near SA - killing the dude with a Jeep.  I did not think this was the sort of movie to include dramatic irony, but here we are.

By the way, I did figure out immediately that at some point I'd seen the first half of Silent Night, Deadly Night, but I must not have finished the movie.  

But if your critics' only takeaway was "that wasn't very good", I am afraid they're missing the point.  This is the opposite of "elevated horror" - this is Santa Exploitation Horror.  This is a mad man walking around a suburban street firing off something like 20 shots from a six-shooter while he laughs stiffly and badly.  This is a guy murdering people for talking in the movie theater and punishing "naughty" people with an axe to the head.  It's not scary - it's basically a comedy.

So does it succeed as a film delivering on that premise?  

I mean, I think so.  This is a Rental movie to watch while drinking beer, and maybe cheer a bit when some murders happen.  

Thanks to the merging of the first film into the first act of this movie, it's also a wildly overcomplicated movie for a movie about a guy who puts on a Santa hat to kill people.  And it's part of the movie's charm.

I am only sad that I watched it by myself.

One day I need to do a post about how maybe the usefulness of critics and awards is minimal, and that what really makes a movie survive is a culture that can sustain those movies.  And horror and the horror fanbase is amazing about keeping movies alive and making lowkey celebs out of people who made a cheap movie 40 years ago.