Black Christmas (1974)

Well, it’s that time of the year again and you know what that means! While I would have ideally had some Christmas horror movies prepared to last the entire month of December, things just haven’t worked out that way, and so now that half of the month is already over, I’m putting my back to the grindstone and discussing with you guys an important film in the development of horror as a genre that just might be my favorite horror film to watch over the holidays.

So first off, how many of you have seen Bob Clark's A Christmas Story? Yeah, yeah, I know: it’s old and creaky and so no one watches it anymore, I get it. But for those of you who do still enjoy films with heart and a not insignificant amount of edge, especially when it comes to the holidays, rejoice! Because Black Christmas was directed by the very same man, only much earlier. And it shows too, what with all the humanity and hilarity on display in the film alongside edgy, progressive content that still feels fresh in 2022. So whether you need a mainstream family Christmas film to warm you up, or a Christmas slasher to cool you down, Bob Clark has you covered and then some.

The premise is simple: at Pi Kappa Sigma, things are wrapping up for the holidays. Most of the students and staff have gone home to be with their families, leaving behind only stragglers who are still waiting on a ride and misfits with nowhere to go. Initially, spirits are rather high as said stragglers get cozy, preparing to wait out a particularly cold Christmas armed with nothing but alcohol and dirty jokes. That is, until one of them disappears one night after going to her room to pack, leaving no clues as to where she could have gone. To make matters worse, a mysterious caller continues to harass the girls with obscene sexual threats and bizarre theatrical performances over the phone, and when they go to the police to file a missing person's report, they discover that the body of a teenage girl was recently discovered not far from their campus. Could all of this be a series of unfortunate coincidences? Or is there someone, or something, out there, picking off isolated young women? 

First off, let’s get a few things straight. Despite what you may be thinking, Black Christmas is not a film that follows in the footsteps of John Carpenter’s Halloween, only transplanted to a Christmas setting. In fact, Black Christmas actually beat Halloween to the punch by four years, making a strong argument for itself as the very first true slasher film. The big knock-on effect that this has as far as the experience of watching the film goes is that none of the ‘rules’ established by Halloween are followed here, making this a film that has, in many ways, aged far better than that one has.

Yes, Black Christmas is more resonant and progressive in this original incarnation than even its obligatory "girl power” remake that would come nearly fifty years later. For starters, the film centers around a troll that harasses women over the phone with extremely vulgar language that is still as shocking in ’22 as it was in ’74; a troll whose threats of sexual violence aren’t taken seriously by the authorities until it's too late. Secondly, there’s the fact that the nebbish girl with a heart of gold (who very well could be a virgin) is actually the very first girl to die, while what could be considered the ‘final girl’ is a fledging career woman who wishes to abort her unwanted pregnancy against the wishes of her controlling boyfriend. And finally, the whole cast of fairly realistically-drawn women is depicted in a way that feels very human and especially sex-positive. There’s no hint of that particular brand of judgment that Hollywood loves to dole out, especially back in its day; only a commitment to telling the story from a decidedly feminine point of view that somehow still feels fresh in a day and age where ‘girl power’ has become so ubiquitous that they use it to sell everything from cars to shitty superhero films.

We’ve already discussed Jess, the closest thing to our protagonist, and her unwanted pregnancy, along with poor Claire, the missing girl, but that’s only the tip of the iceberg. There’s Barb who, true to her name, comes on strong at first, drinking like mad and always making herself the center of attention with various filthy jokes, even engaging in a bit of back-and-forth with our antagonist when he calls to harass the girls at the start of the film. She could have easily been depicted in a less-than-sympathetic light, but not here: an easy-to-miss line of dialogue in the opening scene gives her a Freudian excuse for her desperate behavior (her mother is leaving her alone over the holidays because she’s got other plans) and a snarky jab at Claire early on ends up torturing her once the poor girl goes missing and it stands as the last thing anyone ever said to her. Barb’s a hot mess, sure, but she’s human and she certainly doesn’t deserve her grisly fate.

My favorite character, however, just might be Mrs. Mac. There are the obvious reasons, like the fact that she drinks like a fish whenever no one is watching her (from a variety of well-hidden stockpiles throughout the sorority) and always has something snarky to say behind the backs of various characters, especially the stuffy ones. But what really makes it work is the same reason she almost comes across as a feminist figure in ’22, which is that she has to wear a ‘respectable’ mask when dealing with men or authority figures (which are mostly men, it is ’74 after all) and can only be herself when she is alone. Hell, she even hides her excessive drinking from the sorority sisters, begging many questions about the repressed nature of women during the era the film is set in, right up until the modern day.

But none of any of this would matter if the film wasn’t scary, which it is in spades. From the moment the film begins, the atmosphere is thick: the distant sound of choirs caroling filtered through a bitterly cold wind, the soft glow of Christmas lights and decor, the muffled sounds of various characters enjoying themselves inside the sorority house, and the ragged breathing of some creep climbing the lattice. The sense of place is impeccable, and the spirit of the holiday is inverted admirably so that the Christmas setting doesn’t feel incidental the way the holiday theming of something like My Bloody Valentine feels.

A great deal of the film’s ability to unsettle comes from its enigmatic antagonist “Billy,” who is given little backstory or motivation besides tiny scraps that are revealed when he’s doing his little ‘performances’ over the phone. It’s just enough that we’re able to get the best of both worlds, combining the psychological aspect of a Norman Bates with the total lack of human characteristics or backstory of a Michael Myers, which results in a truly terrifying horror villain. We almost never see this guy either, except for a few glimpses that are still mostly obscured by shadow. In one such spot, we can even see that Billy seems to possess red eyes, furthering confusing matters: could this creep actually be some kind of supernatural force? All of this does a great job of capturing the feel of the boogeymen in classic urban legends like “The Licked Hand,” “The Hook,” or even the legend on which this film was based, “The Babysitter and the Man Upstairs.” You know When a Stranger Calls? Well, this film came out years before that one and adapted the same story with far more creativity and raw filmmaking talent. It’s actually the first feature-length horror film to feature the classic twist (here downplayed because we witness the antagonist entering the attic at the beginning of the film) “The calls are coming from inside the house!”

All of this leads to an ending that really sticks with you, emphasizing ambiguity and horror over tying up every detail of the plot. It flies in the face of proto-slashers that had come before, which always ended with the killer being unmasked and turning out to be Uncle Bob or whatever, who just really needed that inheritance money. Here, things aren’t so simple, and the whole film sets you up for the final cruel twist that sees our protagonist’s efforts not only dashed but also revealed to have led to the murder of an innocent man. When the credits begin to roll over silence and the distant ringing of a telephone, the effect is positively disquieting. It’s shocking and guaranteed to turn off more than a few viewers, but what great ending doesn’t piss at least a few people off? Overall, Black Christmas is a gem that’s worth watching regardless of the time of year, and a film that proves that an assuming little film from the seventies can have just as much power today, if not more so, than in the decade in which it was originally released.