Holidays is a dark and disturbing look into the mythology and traditions that bring life to our holiday celebrations. The film, which was produced by ArtCastle Productions in association with Distant Corners Entertainment Group and XYZ films, is an anthology made up of eight separate stories written and directed by different people.
This short story style of filmmaking works particularly well with horror and the dark acts that make up a good horror story. Each segment is approximately fifteen minutes long so the writers and directors don’t have a lot of time before they need to terrify you. The end result is similar to a roller coaster that is all long drops. You barely recover from one scare before the next one is ready to hit you in the face. I was on the edge of my seat throughout the 93-minute film and don’t think I took a deep breath until the credits began scrolling on the screen.
Although written and directed by different people, each segment has a unique feeling and tells a different story. These diverse acts are tied together by not only the holiday theme, but the old-fashioned greeting cards that close each story and get you primed for your next scare. The use of the old-time style cards worked particularly well since this style of greeting card is creepy even without the horror stories that are attached to them here. The featured holidays are Valentine’s Day, St. Patrick’s Day, Easter, Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, Halloween, Christmas and New Year’s Eve.
The writers/directors of this film are: Anthony Scott Burns, Kevin Kolsch, Nicholas McCarthy, Adam Egypt Mortimer, Ellen Reid, Gary Shore, Kevin Smith, Sarah Adina Smith, Scott Stewart and Dennis Widmyer. Kevin Smith also appears in one of the segments as does Seth Green and Madeleine Coghlan. TNWU spoke to Maddy last week about her role in the Valentine’s Day segment and you can read what she had to say about her segment as well as the film in its entirety here. Maddy’s character doesn’t say one word of dialog in her segment. It is chilling.
The film is available from Amazon, Vudu and other On Demand services for rental. I urge you to rent the film, make some popcorn and lower the lights as you settle in to see just how twisted some of our traditions can become.