SOMETHING WICKED THIS WAY COMES
The dynamic Better Watch Out will fill you full of Christmas fear
The small but dynamic Christmas-horror genre includes classics (Gremlins), should-beclassics (Finland’s Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale) and bad-pun classics (Happy Helladays, Santa’s Slay and my favourite, a short about angry conifers called Treevenge).
Better Watch Out — which has a killer sequel title ( just saying) — is better than most, although viewers should beware that the comic Home Alone tone gets decidedly darker by the time its 89 minutes are over.
It opens with Luke (Levi Miller) hanging out with his friend Garrett (Ed Oxenbould) and awaiting the arrival of his babysitter, Ashley (Olivia DeJonge).
The reason a 12-year-old needs a sitter is sort-of explained when we discover he’s been sleepwalking lately, and needs someone to keep him safe.
Luke is more than happy to have Ashley over: He’s decided tonight’s the night he’ll profess his true feelings for her.
But almost before the kid can get started, Better Watch Out treats us to a bizarre assortment of horror tropes, from the noone-on-the-phone-when-it-rings trick to spiders, slashed car tires and a lonely tree swing, twisting in the wind.
Is this going to be a ghost horror? A killer horror? Or just the horror of watching a bunch of Australian actors try to maintain Middle American accents through a range of emotional states? (The movie was made in Sydney by Canadian-Australian director Chris Peckover.)
To reveal the story’s true nature would be like unwrapping a Christmas present a week early. Suffice to say there are some wicked twists in store, and the gift of turning Home Alone into a verb, as in “You’re Home Aloneing him?”
There’s also decent acting from the principals. DeJonge in particular is carving out quite the horror niche of late, with roles in Scare Campaign and The Visit, but Miller is really the one to watch: Mr. Cool one moment, voice cracking in pubescent panic the next, as the horror mounts slowly but inexorably.
Take the star rating down a half-notch if you’re faint of heart, up a half if you like your Christmas stories dark. Better Watch Out puts the ho ho ho in horror.