Movie Review – Santa’s Slay (2005)
Everybody knows that Santa Claus is a kind and friendly person who distributes presents on Christmas Eve to good little boys and girls.
But what if Santa was really an evil person who kills others, and the only reason he’s been nice for the past thousand years is because he lost a bet? What if Santa was really a killing machine who was finally free to kill again?
That’s basically the premise for Santa’s Slay, a 2005 comedy horror film that gives us an alternate version of Santa Claus. Directed by David Steiman, Santa’s Slay stars professional wrestling icon Bill Goldberg as Santa Claus. The rest of the cast members are mainly nobodies, but you will catch glimpses of Dave Thomas, James Caan, Fran Drescher, Chris Kattan and Rebecca Gayheart.
Santa’s Slay begins on Christmas Eve in 2005.
Santa’s Slay (2005) – (c) Media 8 Entertainment
The Mason family is bickering with each other as they sit down to a formal dinner. Suddenly Santa Claus (Bill Goldberg) comes crashing down the chimney. He stabs Mr. Mason’s (James Caan) hands to the table with a pair of knives. Daughter Taylor Mason (Annie Sorell) faints and falls backwards onto the dogs’ fancy bed and accidentally impales herself through the throat. Santa drinks a bottle of alcohol, lights a lighter, and then sprays the fire onto Mrs. Mason’s (Fran Drescher) hair.
Jason Mason (Chris Kataan) tries to fight Santa, but Santa easily kicks him into a shelving unit, knocking him unconscious. The fire is out on Mrs. Mason’s head and she’s badly burned. But that doesn’t stop Santa. He drowns her in a container of eggnog. Gwen (Rebecca Gayheart) pleads with Santa that she’s been good right before he bashes her head with one of the table’s legs. Beth (Alicia Loren) tries to run away, so Santa takes the star off the Christmas tree and throws it into her back, killing her.
Santa then grabs a drumstick from the turkey and shoves it into Mr. Mason’s mouth. He then rams his head against the table, jamming the drumstick into his mouth and killing him.
Santa’s Slay (2005) – (c) Media 8 Entertainment
After the opening credits showing a more violent version of Santa Claus, the film goes to the Heaven Scent Delicatessen, a Jewish-owned restaurant in Hell Township. Nicolas Yuleson (Douglas Smith), a teenage worker, helps a senile elderly woman with an attitude problem. After she leaves her car is run off the road and wrecked by Santa Claus and his sled pulled by a massive “hell-deer.”
The owner of the deli, Mr. Green (Saul Rubinek), presents Christmas gifts to his two workers, Nicolas and Mary “Mac” Mackenzie (Emilie de Ravin). Nicholas’s gift turns out to be a digital clock that can show the time in any time zone around the world. It seems like a fairly useless gift. Perhaps it’ll have some sort of significance later in the film.
Santa’s Slay (2005) – (c) Media 8 Entertainment
Nicholas is raised by his grandfather, and neither of them have much affection for the Christmas holiday. After mac gives him a ride home, Nicholas finds his grandfather (Robert Culp) downstairs in the basement and working on his secret bunker. Why is he building a bunker? What does he think is about to happen?
Santa’s Slay (2005) – (c) Media 8 Entertainment
When Nicholas asks his grandfather why he dislikes Christmas so much, his grandfather finally tells him part of a secret that he had been withholding for many years. Grandpa opens his safe and removes an ancient book titled The Book of Klaus. Written in Norwegian, The Book of Klaus tells a biblical tale of the birth of Santa to Satan himself. The anniversary of Santa’s birth would always have a large number of unexplained deaths and murders. The day became known as “The Day of Slaying.”
Christianity spread and when “The Day of Slaying” arrived, the town’s people would have a mass of Christ, or a Christ mas, where they would pray for protection. In the early part of the eleventh century, an angel took the form of a man. The sound of a doorbell interrupts grandpa’s story. Mac had come to visit Nicholas and give him a small gift for Christmas.
Grandpa retires for the evening, and Mac and Nicholas spend some time talking. Nicholas manages to offend the teenage girl and she leaves his house, instructing him to give her a call when he wants to have a mature relationship.
In town, Santa Claus is standing outside of a store and ringing a bell to collect money. A young punk tries to rob Santa, but Santa kicks his ass and throws his broken body into a dumpster.
Santa’s Slay (2005) – (c) Media 8 Entertainment
The film then jumps to Pastor Timmons (Dave Thomas) giving a sermon to his church. As the collection plate is being passed around the congregation, the pastor encourages people to donate BILLS, and not COINS. He emphasizes that the needy could benefit more from dollar bills.
Santa’s Slay (2005) – (c) Media 8 Entertainment
As we see, Pastor Timmons takes the donation money and spends it on strippers at a local topless bar named Gold Diggers. A few moments later Santa Claus also arrives at the topless bar. He has the valet park his sleigh while he kills a bouncer and then heads inside. Inside the bar, Santa kisses a dancer, which causes the other bouncers to try to remove him from the bar. That doesn’t work. Santa Claus easily beats up and kills all of the bouncers. He then lights a piece of coal and tosses it into the middle of the building. The floor catches fire and the rest of the building quickly begins burning. Pastor Timmons makes it outside to safety, but many of the workers and dancers are killed in the fire.
Meanwhile, Nicholas continues reading The Book of Klaus and learning more about the violent history of Santa Claus. It turns out that in 1005 AD, an angel in the form of a man challenged Santa in a game of curling. Santa lost the bet and was forced to deliver Christmas presents to children for the next thousand of years, something that he has hated with a passion.
Now it’s 2005, one thousand years after the bet was made. Santa is no longer obligated to deliver presents and be nice. He’s free to resume his killing like in “The Day of Slaying.”
Santa’s Slay (2005) – (c) Media 8 Entertainment
It’s now Christmas Day and Santa Claus is riding around on a rampage. He destroys religious artifacts and delivers deadly presents to children. At one point Santa is passing through town when he spots the Heaven Scent Delicatessen. Mr. Green tries telling Santa that they’re closed for the day, but Santa doesn’t care. He breaks his way into the restaurant and fight and kills Mr. Green. He pins the restaurant owner against a wall and stabs him through the neck with his own menorah.
Nicholas is at a gas station purchasing chewing gum when he hears the worker’s police radio announce the damage to the delicatessen. He races to the restaurant and discovers that Mr. Green is still alive, but not by much. All Mr. Green manages to say is that Santa is real. He then dies and the police finally arrive. They take Nicholas down to the police station for further questioning.
Santa’s Slay (2005) – (c) Media 8 Entertainment
After being questioned by the police chief, Nicholas calls Mac and asks her to give him a ride home. The two of them leave right before Santa Claus arrives and kills all of the police officers. They don’t get too far away until they’re pulled over by a police officer. But it’s not a cop. It’s Santa! He tries to climb onto Mac’s pickup truck and attack them, but Nicholas shoots Santa with a shotgun and knocks him off their truck. Mac then speeds away to Nicholas’s house.
Santa Claus is still hot on their heels as Mac and Nicholas enter the house and make it down to grandpa’s bunker. Grandpa is upset that they led Santa there as his bunker is not a fortress. Santa enters the house and finds the steel door to the bunker. As he pounds and tries to break open the door, grandpa leads Nicholas and Mac out through a secret exit into the garage.
Santa’s Slay (2005) – (c) Media 8 Entertainment
Santa eventually breaks into the bunker, but it’s empty. He then leaves the house and finds grandpa standing outside. Grandpa taunts Santa and holds his attention while Nicholas and Mac fire up a pair of snowmobiles. Unfortunately, only one of them is able to start. Grandpa is then run over and killed by Santa’s hell-deer, and Nicholas and Mac drive away on the snowmobile.
Santa’s Slay (2005) – (c) Media 8 Entertainment
It’s a chase as the two teenagers try to make a getaway to the Hell Township to warn everybody about Santa. Santa flies after them in his sleigh and tosses explosive packages. It’s not enough and Nicholas and Mac barely make it to town. While Santa lands and creates more chaos, Nicholas and Mac seek refuge inside of a school. Nicholas uses his digital clock and figures that Santa will only have his powers of destruction for a few more hours. Once the North Pole reaches midnight on Christmas Day, as measured from Greenwich Mean Time, then they’ll be safe again until next year.
Santa’s Slay (2005) – (c) Media 8 Entertainment
Santa breaks into the school and chases the two teenagers. He pursues them through classrooms and to the school’s indoor hockey rink. Nicholas and Mac are trapped against a wall as Santa climbs into a zamboni and tries to crush them. Just as he’s about to kill the two teenagers, Santa’s zamboni suddenly stops. The wheels are caught on a glowing curling stone. It was placed there by grandpa!
Grandpa is there in the hockey arena in his angel form. It turns out that Nicholas’s grandpa was the angel in human form who challenged Santa a thousand years ago. It’s also revealed that Santa Claus has hated him since that day, and he’s been hunting for the last members of the Yuleson family since that point. One of Nicholas’s old letters to Santa inadvertently led Santa right there to Hell Township.
Santa’s Slay (2005) – (c) Media 8 Entertainment
Grandpa then challenges Santa to another high-stakes game of curling. This time Santa cheats to gain an upper hand. Nicholas uses a nutcracker (a gift from his grandpa, though instead of cracking nuts it shoots them) to shoot a chestnut into Santa’s chest. The chestnut wounds Santa and sends him fleeing outside. It’s also an indicator that it’s past midnight at the North Pole and Santa’s powers have diminished.
Outside the school, Santa knocks out Pastor Timmons, who is dressed as Santa Claus in honor of Christmas, and places the pastor’s body in his sleigh. He then has his hell-deer pull the sleigh into the air and fly around town.
Santa’s Slay (2005) – (c) Media 8 Entertainment
Nicholas and Mac say their goodbye to the angel version of grandpa, then they go outside and round up the local hunters. Now is their chance to finally defeat the evil Santa Claus. They spot the flying sleigh and open fire. Mac’s father uses a bazooka to fire the fatal shot that destroys Santa’s sleigh. Later, the body of Santa Claus is found impaled on a flag pole.
When the locals find the dead body, they see that it’s really Pastor Timmons dressed as Santa. Was he really the person responsible for the death and destruction? Nicholas and Mac choose not to say anything since they believe that Santa has really disappeared. They two of them officially become a couple and start dating.
Santa’s Slay (2005) – (c) Media 8 Entertainment
Santa’s Slay ends with Santa Claus checking into the airport for his flight to Winnipeg and connection to the North Pole. A short scene at the end of the credits has Santa checking his list and then asking us who is next.
So is Santa’s Slay a good movie?
Yes if you like plenty of violence and a really twisted version of Santa Claus. Santa kills a lot of people, there’s quite a bit of profanity, and there’s even some nudity in the strip club. This is definitely NOT a Christmas movie for the children.
This film caught me off guard. I wasn’t expecting to laugh so much at Santa’s sheer violence and attitude towards people. Bill Goldberg steals the show in this violent version of Santa. It’s a pleasure watching him kick ass and kill people, whether they deserved it or not. In a way, Santa’s Slay is one of those films that’s a guilty treat. You really shouldn’t be enjoying a low-budget and fairly corny film such as this one, but many scenes are just funny as hell, and the violence is plentiful.
What’s not to like about the idea of Bill Goldberg, a former professional wrestler, playing an evil version of Santa Claus? This idea alone is sheer brilliance.
What’s scary is that if this film was a little less corny and had a more developed plot, then Santa’s Slay would actually be a really good film. Sadly, that’s not the case. While the evil version of Santa Claus is awesome, the rest of the film could use some work. The bottom line here is that Santa’s Slay is still a low-budget film and it clearly shows, from the actors to the special effects to dialogue to the corny situations.
Santa’s Slay (2005) – movie trailer
If you’re looking for an alternate Christmas film this year and also want to see some violence, then you need to definitely check out this relatively unknown film. Santa’s Slay is a short Christmas-themed movie that has plenty of laughs and even more violence and destruction. Grab your friends and prepare yourself for a truly twisted version of Santa Claus.
[entering the strip club]
Santa Claus – “Ho, ho…”
[oogles topless waitress as she walks past him]
Santa Claus – [lustily] “HOES…”
——————-
Santa Claus – “I’m Santa Claus, not fuckin’ Dracula!”
——————-
Nicholas Yuleson – “The clock just struck midnight at the pole. Christmas is officially over for you, Santa!”
Santa Claus – “You know, most people make the same mistake. The correct time at the pole is completely discretionary, because the poles are where all the time zones actually converge.”
Mary “Mac” Mackenzie – “He’s scary, yet educational.”
——————-
Santa Claus – “Christmas is over when I say it’s over!”