Silent Night, Bloody Night is an underrated classic

I first watched SILENT NIGHT, BLOODY NIGHT at age 19 while staying with a college friend over the Christmas holiday vacation. The moody, gothic, noir atmosphere made a deep impression on me that lasts till this very day.

I own three different DVD versions of this horror movie, hoping to find a good copy. All claim to be digitally remastered. I realized there's only so much digital remastering can do if the original celluoid film is in deteriorated condition. Given with what they had to work with, the Digiview Entertainment does a decent job of remastering. Don't expect vivid color and clarity but the quality is acceptable.

I agree that the early 1970s represented some of the best horror films, especially as many were produced on low budgets yet retained respectable production quality with average to excellent scripts and decent to excellent actors. Most did not include vulgar language, graphic violence, or sex. The horror relied on drama, noir atmosphere, gothic suspense, and the always reliable, jump-out-of-the-shadows routine.

Silent Night, Bloody Night remains up there with another little-known, but classic cult gem, Black Christmas. These old-fashioned movies really knew how to make us adolescents jump with fright back in the early 70s.

SNBN is unique in that for a low-budget movie, it featured a number of known Hollywood actors and actresses, thus affording drama quality.

I'm always bemused by the interaction between Diane Adams (Mary Woronov, very attractive back in 1972) and Jeffrey Butler (James Patterson, who died of cancer before the movie's release). James Patterson was obviously an experienced actor but he was no handsome dreamboat here. Pretty Diane Adams quickly develops a crush on Jeffrey Butler on the same night that she met him, first unbelievably inviting him into her house so she could keep him at bay with a .38 caliber revolver. Among the rifles stacked on the wall behind her in the house is a antique Springfield Allin trapdoor carbine. (nice trivia). I have a hard time believing there are women out there like Diane Adams who upon detecting a stranger walking up to the door would tell the man to come in, "Come in...it's unlocked." just so they can hold up a revolver pistol in his face. And then later that night, fall in love with the guy. Still this didn't detract me from having a quirkly fascination for the movie. It was all part of the quirkiness.