Elves, 2018.
Directed by Jamaal Burden.
Starring Deanna Grace Congo, Lisa May, Amy Jo Guthrie, Stephanie Marie Baggett, and Lily Martinez.
SYNOPSIS:
The Holiday Reaper, a ruthless killer that terrorized a small Texas town, has been caught. While celebrating, a group of friends find an elf inside a magical toy box. When a freak accident kills one of them, they discover a group of elves have been scattered throughout town, each representing one of the seven deadly sins. It’s a race against time to survive the elves’ wrath before Christmas ends. (Reviewer’s note: Um, half of this doesn’t even sound right.)
If you – like me – endured 2017’s godawful The Elf, you’ll understand my apprehensive dread before screening 2018’s sequel no one asked for: Elves. Three pre-movie glasses of moonshine *still* couldn’t register levels of intoxicated midnight hollering at murderous “Elf On A Shelf” mutiny. Unlisted screenwriters and director Jamaal Burden end up plagiarizing Blumhouse’s Truth Or Dare to a prosecutable degree. Zero shame. These “creators” soaked in one of the year’s worst horror movies – Truth Or Dare – and relished, “What a masterpiece! Let’s steal every idea for ourselves!” You’d need all the Christmas magic in Santa’s sack to convince me of a worse creative omen (besides following The Elf).
After an unwatchable kiddie-cooker introduction, undefined friends drink in an abandoned warehouse when one party member suggests they play a game (folding chairs and seclusion just like Truth Or Dare). She produces a wooden elf doll – ventriloquist size but no moving features – and states participants must write their darkest secrets on personal “Naughty Lists.” Once done, she confesses the game is real and she was forced to bring more players to the slaughter (HEY TRUTH OR DARE). It’s not long before cursed victims’ confessed deeds lead to torment by multiple elves who possess anyone around whoever’s next. Represented how? An exaggerated up-turned grin, bulging eyes, and a digital face mod filter like in, don’t tell me, I’ve seen this before – TRUTH OR FUCKING DARE.
At least Asylum swaps a word to alter their films slightly (Snakes On A Train). Elves is tragically unoriginal and downright offensive to viewers.
So, you’ve got this concept in The Elf where a mannequin jingle-jangler hops to life and murders people. In Elves? They don’t even have to budget for puppetry effects. Mr. Elf and his cohorts – there’s at least a female dressed duplicate – appear plopped on shelves before Truth Or Dare grins affront our eyes. No Child’s Play inspiration this time around even though a punkish goth pawn tosses Elfy to mimic said doll “leaping” at prey – then the camera cuts away as “angry elf” sounds drone. We’re led to believe seven elves exist representing the seven deadly sins (also talk of Gospel passages, more Wise Men, blah blah), but zero narrative cognizance benefits random-as-hell death sequences. Truth Or Dare feigns reason. Elves permits inept copycat wishes.
I’ll never sharpen my proverbial pencil to trash an indie film for trying. The problem is, Elves only claims originality by repurposing multicolored Christmas light strands for a choke-out death (seen-it-before Xmas themed “terror”). Burden happily retrofits Christmas alterations over someone else’s intellectual property. BOOOOOOO. I’ll allow slams against any movie that knowingly misrepresents itself on poster promises of three murder-ready elvish psychopaths standing as anthropomorphic demons, no strings attached. In reality, one exists in the film and he sure as cinnamon ain’t slicing necks with a switchblade. That’s a masked Krampus minion’s job.
Oh, right. Elves’ mythos building introduces a skulking, Krampus-mask-wearing assistant who slays those victims not psychologically manipulated by elvish toys (candy cane spear included). One character dies via stab to the head – completely off camera not even to show Crapus’ weapon protruding. Another woman dies after being softly brushed with a fake Christmas tree, “bludgeoned” by whacks that appear they’d tickle at most. Someone’s mouth starts bleeding from an orally inserted cookie, too? As far as slasher appeal goes, budgetary restraints emerge in the worst way. Cue a satanic worshipper getting barbeque forked in the face via unblended CGI effect.
What isn’t there to dislike? Performances are more wooden that Mr. Elf; sedate actors in need of a pulse-check mumble through dialogue and “thrills.” Kill sequences are either rendered impotent by ugly CGI or pull punches without cinematography blocker workarounds. Storylines explain themselves useless as nonsense religious scripture rewriting ends up meaning nothing in the grand scheme of devil dolls ruining Christmas. Horrendously paced, blandly procedural in “market holiday” skewering, and inexcusable when it comes to how namesake “Elves” are downgraded in presence. Dare I say The Elf is a better movie?
Elves is an inexcusable cheat of genre embarrassment that deserves to be burned on a pile of coals. It’s a lie sold to viewers expecting a very different outcome. Ornaments with glitter-glue threats don’t make up for Blumhouse’s class-action lawsuit in the making. Worse off? Jamaal Burden DOESN’T EVEN HIDE what’s going on. Verbatim, a character states, “This sounds like that movie Truth Or Dare except with SnapChat filters.” On. No. You. Fucking. Didn’t. You don’t get to cheekily play that “look what we’re making fun of!” card when your movie is an ungodly rehash that BARELY registers Christmas themed separations of topics, does NOTHING to suggest satire over stealing, and disrespects audiences by laughing in their faces. My Christmas-horror-lovin’ heart weighs heavy tonight, folks.
Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★ / Movie: ★
Matt spends his after-work hours posting nonsense on the internet instead of sleeping like a normal human. He seems like a pretty cool guy, but don’t feed him after midnight just to be safe (beers are allowed/encouraged). Follow him on Twitter/Instagram (@DoNatoBomb).
