- Director: Damien Leone
- Screenplay: Damien Leone
- Cast: David Howard Thornton, Lauren LaVera, Elliott Fullam, Samantha Scaffidi
- Cinematography: George Steuber
- Editing: Damien Leone
- Score: Paul Wiley
- Genre: Christmas supernatural slasher
- Runtime: 125 minutes
Silent night, holy fright!
Who’s dressed in a suit and got a big bag full of treats for all the good boys and girls? Santa Claus? Hell no! It’s Art the Clown!
In this Christmas-flavoured third entry in the cult slasher franchise, Art’s back to finish what he started in the previous movie – to kill ‘final girl’ Sienna Shaw. Set five years after Sienna’s first tangle with the killer clown, she’s recently been released from psychiatric care and recuperating at her aunt and uncle’s house.
The kills are gruesomely inventive as ever and the stomach-churning practical effects would make Tom Savini proud (he actually has a cameo as a eyewitness on television news). There’s a scattering of darkly amusing moments; one especially seasonal – Art making blood angels instead of those of snow.
My main problem is with Art the Clown. Though visually creepy and certainly a welcome addition to the modern horror movie villain canon, I find his execution flawed. If you’re going to do the whole ‘silent but deadly’ thing, constantly gurning and scowling means I won’t be able to take you seriously. And maybe that’s the point; he’s meant to be a little goofy. But herein lies another issue – if you’re a deliberately campy character (à la Freddy Krueger), at least have enough panache to pull it off – Krueger could do his over-the-top shtick and terrible one-liners AND still be genuinely terrifying. Adding an accomplice into the mix in the form of Vicky, the deranged survivor of ‘Terrifier 1‘, detracts from Art’s presence and power as the big bad, too.
The unnecessary supernatural elements in the plot are a distraction from what could’ve been a more straightforward gore-fest, tipping an already pretty silly story into the territory of the downright ridiculous.
My rating: 6 / 10
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