Tuesday Terror: A Christmas Horror Story (2015)

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Once a month, Graveyard Shift Sisters hosts #FridayNightHorror – it’s an extremely fun live-tweet of a horror movie. This month’s selection was A Christmas Horror Story.

This anthology movie has a variety of horror baddies woven together like a scarf: Krampus, evil elves, angry ghosts, teens who make stupid decisions, families whose dramas are propelled by trauma and William Shatner.

All of the characters in A Christmas Horror Story are on team bad decisions but not annoyingly so. Some of the tales may have you re-thinking the way you interpret traditional Christmas stories. This isn’t really a gory movie, but there is a moment or two that’s uncomfortable.

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The scariest part of the movie? A black family in the woods – trespassing – to get a tree. The red flags were waving red flags here. (Yes, the wife tries to be the voice of reason; love with make you go along with things.)

In the big showdown between Santa and Krampus – you win. Trust me on this.

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Tips:
*If you hear William Shatner on the radio, just skip the holiday. Everybody doesn’t need to celebrate Christmas.
*You’ve spent the whole year being naughty? Suddenly doing the right thing may get you into heaven. Krampus don’t care.

Tuesday Terror: Jigoku/Sinners Of Hell (1960)

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Have you ever had a day where every decision you make is a bad one? The shortest line in the grocery store turns out to have a cashier who is hungover and no longer sure how to work the register? Get bluffed out of a winning poker hand? Did you take a shortcut that made you 45 minutes late? This is the movie for you!.

Meet Shiro, a man who wants to be honorable but has a knack for making the wrong decision. The man attracts death; he puts Jessica Fletcher to shame.

Shiro has been courting Yukiko, the daughter of one of his teachers. Just as the professor is giving the couple his blessing to wed, evil asshole Tamura pops in to cast his nasty shadow on the event.

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Tamura gives Shiro a ride home. Along the way they run over a man and flee the scene. To be fair, Shiro does want to stop but he’s not the driver, so… Once Shiro discovers the victim has died, he decides to go to the police with Yukiko and tell the truth. She wants to walk to the station; he insists on taking a taxi. The cab crashes, killing Yukiko.

Guilt ridden, Shiro visits his parents in a rundown nursing home. Meanwhile, the two deaths have also destroyed other lives. Loved ones of the dead seek out Shiro for their own purposes. Then, Tamura shows up. Lies, deception and anger swirl around propelling everyone into a living hell.

When Shiro dies, it is revealed that the torment he has suffered on Earth is only an appetizer.

The Buddhist version of Hell (aka Jigoku) is gory. Bodies get sawed in half, teeth get smashed in, etc. However, these are 1960 effects. Some may find this depiction visually disturbing, but it’s not vomit inducing torture-porn.

What’s worst than the physical torment? Characters who lied while alive are propelled to tell the truth.

Watch this movie and get your eternal life together.

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Tips:
-Your evil friends are not your friends. They will turn the poison on you eventually.
-Seriously, get your life together.

Tuesday Terror: The Snake Woman (1961)

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In ye bad ole days (early 1900s), a small English town is hit be a wave of deaths via snakebite. Could the local myth of a beautiful but deadly serpent girl be true? Well, duh! This film is about educated medical men finally catching up with local and folk wisdom; it just takes a death or ten for them to figure it out.
As our story opens, we learn that a scientist has been treating his wife with snake venom for an unspecified illness. The woman is afraid this cure is having a detrimental effect on her unborn child. The husband dismisses her concerns.
When the baby is born (the mother doesn’t make it), the midwife knows something is unnatural about the child. The infant is cold and never closes her eyes – traits of a snake. She believes the baby is evil and should be killed.
The scientist/husband and the doctor, however, are fascinated by this and want to keep the baby alive to study it. As the mid-wife rallies the townspeople to action, the men flee with the baby. They almost immediately give it to a stranger to raise.
From here, our were-snake grows up on the outskirts of the village. She attacks people for the hell of it. Luring men and boys close while in human form, she transforms into a giant snake and sinks her teeth into them. We don’t see any of the murders – this is a 1961 film – but reactions from townspeople suggests the deaths are horrible.
Meanwhile, a hip, new man of science in the village. Eventually, he’ll come to realize that the midwife and townsfolk aren’t superstitious fools.
There are so many unanswered questions: why does the snake woman wear clothes? Is she slithering down to the village at night and stealing the latest fashions? Perhaps she’s robs women…is frock-jacking a thing?

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Tip: Sure, follow that sexy, mysterious women into the woods. Make sure your have your affairs in order first.