Don’t Open Until Christmas — Don’t Open Until Christmas(Blu Ray)
Don’t Open Until Christmas is a British slasher. The early 1980s film features inventive murders, a creepy masked killer, a fair bit of sleaze, and some unintentional humour- due to the more ropy/ bad acting. It’s set in London, and regards people dressed as Santa being murdered. Here from 88 Films, as part of their Slasher Classic series, is a release of the picture. The Blu-ray takes in a 2k scan, a new commentary track, and a few more extras.
Don’t Open Until Christmas is from the year 1984. It was directed by Herefordshire-born Edmund Purdom, who also plays a lead role in the film as a police investigator- this was his one and only directorial credit. Though running from the early 1950s to the early 2000’s he had ninety-seven acting credits to his name- taking in the likes of Euro slasher Pieces (1982), cheap sword and sorcery film Ator: The Fighting Eagle (1982), and period set mystery drama The Prodigal(1955).
The film gets straight into the POV slashing action, as the heavy-breathing killer nears a car parked in a nighttime city alleyway, where a man dressed as Santa is getting into a car with a woman. The man tells the killer to go away several times, before a knife is drawn & both victims are stabbed. Then we move into the set to flame, then melting Santa doll credits
As the film unfolds, we get a fairly steady flow of Santa killings- these are fairly inventive/creative- moving from a pole thrown through a head in a disco, strangling and then pressing a face pressed onto a chestnut fire, a bottle forced into the head with eyeball coming out, a razor blade castration in the gents, and a few others
Investigating the crimes, we have the middle-aged, long-coated, rather cynical, though at times charming/ caring Chief Inspector Harris(Purdom). He’s joined by balding and neatly bearded Detective Sergeant Powell(Mark Jones). Otherwise, main characters-wise we have Kate(Belinda Mayne), who is the daughter of one of the killed Santas. Mulleted, leather jacket-wearing, and flute-playing Cliff(Gerry Sundquist). Rather shifty journalist Giles( Alan Lake). Bubbly blond glamour model/ sex worker Sharon(Pat Astley), and a short musical cameo from Caroline Munro.
The film has a run time of one hour and twenty-six minutes, and remains fairly pacy throughout. Our killer has quite a neat, creepy look- wearing a plastic/slightly hazed plastic mask and a tight-fitting anorak hood. The acting is mixed, from being just about competent to be plan bad- with the latter causing the unintentional amusement. Don’t Open Until Christmas is an engaging and distinctive English take on the slasher form.
This recent region B Blu-ray features a 2k scan- this is largely fine, though still a little murky in some of the nighttime scenes. The dialogue and music tracks balanced well enough.
On the extras side, we find a decent selection of things. First is a commentary track from commentators/ writers Troy Howarth and Eugenio Ercolani. They begin by discussing the opening pre-credit kill- talk about the POV camera work influenced by the original Halloween. And point out that this scene/ many of the film's scenes, take place in Soho, which at the time was the centre point for all things sleazy in London. They talk about how, though this was a British production, it had more than a few Italian connections. They discuss how Edmund Purdom initially took his directing job seriously, though due to a lack of experience and interference from the film's producer Dick Randal, he gave up the director's chair fairly quickly, with a few people taking up the job over its production. We find it took a total of two years to complete, and they declare the film to be a terrible mess. They discuss Purdom's acting career, saying he’s not the greatest of actors. Later on, they talk about easter themed slashers and Caroline Munro’s cameo. They talk about the film's body count, and of course, a lot more. All in all, another decent track from these two commentators.
Otherwise, we have: Naughty or Slice (16.31), which finds Critic Kim Newman discussing the film. We find out he first saw it on VHS, and his initial thoughts were that it was a sleazy and shoddy affair. He talks about how the film wasn’t favourably reviewed at the time of its original release. He moves on to discuss Munro’s cameo and the career of Dick Randal. Before touching on other Christmas-based horror films. Screaming Cameo ( 34.04) Interview with actress Caroline Munro. Santa’s Substitute (19.06) Interview with co-Director Alan Birkinshaw. Edward the Conqueror (16.18) Interview with Lilan Purdom. And an original trailer- the finished release features a booklet with writing by genre expert Calum Waddell.
I’ll have to say I was rather entertained by what Don’t Open Until Christmas had to offer. It’s an original enough take on the Christmas slasher genre, with creative/varied kills, and a sleazy/ grim tone. Sure, some of the acting is somewhat mixed, and things become a little muddled in places- but none of this takes away from the film's appeal. It’s great to see 88 Films reissuing the film, with a new 2k scan, and interesting/ worthy extras.