SILENT NIGHT, BLOODY NIGHT (1972)

 

(a.k.a. NIGHT OF THE DARK FULL MOON; a.k.a. DEATH HOUSE; a.k.a. DEATHOUSE. Director/co-screenwriter: Theodore Gershuny. Co-screenwriters: Jeffrey Konvitz and Ira Teller.)

 

Review

Christmas Eve Day, 1950, East Willard, Massachusetts. An old man, Wilfred Butler, dies after running out of his massive house while fire engulfs him. His will dictates that the mansion be used as an asylum.

Christmas Eve Day, 1970. The mansion-turned-asylum is empty. Lawyer John Carter and his assistant/mistress, Ingrid, show up on Christmas Eve from out of town to collect the money the townspeople are offering his client (Jeffrey Butler, grandson of Wilfred) for the giant house. The town council, secretive and suspicious, tersely agree to get Jeffrey’s money the next day. The lawyer and his assistant spend the night in the mansion, unaware that a black-gloved, Bible-reading killer─whose progress we sometimes see via Killer POV and strange angles─is in the house. When they repair to bed, the killer attacks them with an axe. Quick closeup cuts of cherry syrup-looking blood, stained sheets, and clutching hands are shown. The whispery killer, identifying himself as "Marianne," calls Sheriff Bill Mason and tells him to investigate the mansion. The switchboard operator (Tess Howard), hearing this, panics.

Later that night, Jeffrey Butler (James Patterson) arrives in town and meets Diane Adams (Mary Woronov), the mayor’s daughter. They become fast friends. More murders occur. More phone calls are made by Marianne, one to Diane: “Tell them I have the diary─1935,” the killer says. This inspires Diane to delve further into the mysterious, tragic and deadly history of the Butler family.

Filmed in Oyster Bay, Long Island, New York in 1970, but not released until 1972, two years before BLACK CHRISTMAS, SILENT features the Killer POV shots and whispery killer phone call elements that BLACK popularized. Like BLACK, it is atmospheric with dark tones, visually and thematically, with a compelling mystery and a few twists─although SILENT’s is more explicitly resolved than BLACK’s.

If SILENT is not good as BLACK, it’s close. Its cinematography (courtesy of Adam Giffard) is appropriately dark, grimy, and wintry. Gershon Kingsley’s score is striking in parts and contributes to the overall miasmic mood, while Tom Kennedy, Charles Baum and Jonathan Kroll’s editing─which occasionally verges on artsy─furthers SILENT’s weird Christmas hell vibe. This makes sense, considering that several former Andy Warhol players and crew members worked on SILENT: Mary Woronov (WARLOCK, 1989); Candy Darling (her final film); Ondine; Tally Brown; and others. Woronov was married to director/co-screenwriter Geshuny at the time.

Other notable actor appeared in this film─John Carradine (THE HOWLING, 1981) as Charlie Towman, mute owner of the town newspaper, and Patrick O’Neal (THE STEPFORD WIVES, 1975) as John Carter.

If you’re okay with a notably flawed film with an intense, grim, and sometimes oddball-artsy mood, you might enjoy SILENT, a public domain/uncopyrighted work. Its offbeat pacing may make it confusing for some viewers. This is not surprising─one of the screenwriters, Jeffrey Konvitz, is known for laying on thick, effective atmosphere with a touch of strangeness; he wrote the 1974 novel THE SENTINEL, and later co-produced the resulting 1977 film as well.

A remake, SILENT NIGHT, BLOODY NIGHT: THE HOMECOMING, was released in 2013, followed by a 2015 sequel, SILENT NIGHT, BLOODY NIGHT 2: REVIVAL. Mary Woronov, according to IMDb, is appearing in the third film, tentatively titled SILENT NIGHT, BLOODY NIGHT PART 3.