There’s nothing quite like a good horror twist on Christmas folklore. Last year we had Jalmari Helander’s fantastic and unique Finnish film, Rare Exports, and this year we have Dick Maas’ Dutch take on the evil Santa story, it’s called SAINT(Sint) and stars Huub Stapel, Egbert-Jan Weeber, Caro Lenssen, Bert Luppes and Escha Tanihatu.
In 1492, Bishop Niklas and his black face companions, Black Pete as he is now known, used to go around a village kidnapping children and looting their homes. One night the villagers had had enough and burned Saint Nick and his gang alive. Looking to seek revenge on the city’s decedents, Saint Nick returns every 32 years under the Christmas full moon and makes sure to leave a bloody trail in his wake. Fast forward to present day and Saint Nick has become just another commercial selling point, whose murderous story remains a myth to the ignorant until that night, when a teenager named Frank encounters the evil ghost and works with a police conspiracy-theorist to rid the city of Amsterdam of “Sinterklass and his minions” forever.
The first question you’re probably asking yourself is how does this compare to Rare Exports? Well, to be honest, it doesn’t even come close. Saint felt like your run of the mill bloody ghost story with a few cheap scares, a bit of blood, average story and, thank god, some great and gory kills. Santa’s staff is quite badass at times, think skull bashing. Rare Exports was a gem compared to this piece of common granite but much of that has to do with Rare Exports being a lot funnier.
I was really looking forward to this movie because I like folklore and learning about the different types of myths that each nation has towards a holiday celebrated around the world. Unfortunately, the consistency is what killed this movie for me and let me explain. There were a couple of ways in which you knew that Saint Nick and his gang were nearby, you either smelled fumes as if something was burning and the electricity would go out. Sounds pretty standard for a horror, but here’s the catch, throughout the movie some of the electricity stayed on in the area and only select items were turned off which makes absolutely no sense. For example, a girl went into a house to find her missing friend, all of the electricity was off except a TV that had static. Why was that the only thing? Another example is some guy’s cellphone stopped working but yet the car continued to run, how is that possible? None of it added up and left me angered at how one of the most important suspense tactics in the movie lacked the consistency to give it credibility.
The film’s acting was your typical horror fare, average, and the dialogue was actually appropriate which is rare in this day and age. Lately, many horror films either intentionally or unintentionally have bad dialogue resulting in roars of laughter from the crowd, but Saint, on the other hand, did not have that, it was actually quite serious for most its duration. There were a few comical sex references in the beginning of the movie but other than that it stayed clear of the sexy realm that the genre tends to drift towards, instead it offered a few witty random lines. I can commend Mass on his script and directing when it comes to these specific aspects.
Overall, Saint isn’t anything special and not something to rush out and see. It tries to grab your attention by being a Christmas slasher flick but, in the end, the idea and plot ends up being much better than its result. While you’re probably better off sticking to Rare Exports for your European anti-Santa nourishment, this Dutch take is worthy of a watch on a late saturday night if you want some good old fashion brainless entertainment (which I’m all for!)
Rating: An average slasher in every aspect of the genre, it’s good for a late night watch (6/10)
You can catch Saint at the Tribeca Film Festival on April 21, 23, 24, and 27th.
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