(spoiler free)
This year hasn’t provided audiences with much in the way of quality festive films. There haven’t been any future classics released so far and with the end of the season fast approaching 2017 was looking like a bit of a write off in terms of Christmas movies. However, maybe all wasn’t lost as new horror ‘Better Watch Out’ looked like it could be a lot of fun. This genre twist of the classic feel good Christmas movie has worked before, sure just look at ‘Gremlins’, so could this more sinister slant pay off again?
When 17 year old Ashley is left to babysit 12 year old Luke it doesn’t take long for strange things to start happening and the pair quickly realise they aren’t alone. The performances of the young cast are largely average. Levi Miller plays the main character Luke and whilst he’s pretty good at portraying the awkward preteen with eyes for his babysitter as the film develops so does his character and I’m just not sure his performance makes this work. Miller isn’t entirely to blame though as I think the writing makes things pretty difficult for the young actor, he copes with the odd role adequately he just wasn’t wholly convincing. The rest of the cast do slightly better however they have easier, more stereotypical roles to deal with. Luke’s on screen father played by Patrick Warburton is criminally underused as he shows great comedic potential in the opening scenes, this is as much as we get though which is a shame as a more well known presence like his would have helped the film along massively.
The narrative is a bizarre mix of slasher horror and dark comedy all wrapped up in the Christmas context. It’s unfortunate that none of these elements really work in isolation, with the exception of those horrific spiders seen in the trailer, let alone when they are fused together. The film struggles with it’s pacing too, featuring large scenes of nothing more than dialogue for the sake of exposition. This all resulted in the film edging dangerously close to becoming boring on too many occasions, saved only by the truly absurd story which at least offered some much needed intrigue.
So whilst I thought that ‘Better Watch Out’ might just end up being my favourite film of the season it’s turned out to be exactly the opposite. The screenplay tries to be too many things and in the process fails to deliver much on any narrative level. Some of the cast struggle with this awkward tone and whilst enthusiasm is clear it just didn’t translate that well in the finished project. For some viewers the nods to previous films from the different genres it plays with might be enough to make it a good time however the lack of anything overly original or entertaining meant, for me at least, this was a missed opportunity and a definite festive flop.
Written by Hamish Calvert
Rating ‐ 4/10
Question: What is your favourite genre of Christmas movie?
(Leave your answers in the comments section below!)
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