Silent Night – Film Review

A couple invite their closest friends to join their family for Christmas dinner at their idyllic home in the English countryside. As the group comes together, it feels like old times — but behind all of the laughter and merriment, something isn’t quite right. The world outside is facing impending doom, and no amount of gifts, games or wine can make mankind’s imminent destruction go away. Surviving the holidays just got a lot more complicated.

We live in a world where we’re so used to Christmas movies that are created to feel warm, cozy, and uplifting. After all, not many people are going to be put in the holiday spirit by watching some deeply dark and ominous film set during the Winter season. But personally, I actually kind of enjoy darker Christmas movies if they’re done right ala Black Christmas and Krampus. Sadly, though, Camille Griffin‘s Silent Night feels like a missed opportunity in more ways than one.

It often feels like it tries to be two completely different films with two distinct tones that don’t mesh well with each other. For the first forty minutes, this is just a straight-up comedy with Keira Knightley‘s character Nell and her family gathering around for a big Christmas dinner. Of course, because there are so many people in the house of varying generations, there are bound to be some disagreements, and more than a little arguing occurs over the course of the night.

These scenes are intended to make you feel uncomfortable, and I have to say that these moments did work. The problem, though, is that the film constantly strives for humor, and yet I didn’t find myself laughing even once during the entire running time. Roman Griffin Davis (the director’s son) was an absolute treat in 2019’s Jojo Rabbit, and he definitely has a promising career ahead of him. However, Silent Night does not do him any favors.

Here, he portrays a young boy who feels as though he was written to be the comedic relief character with little thought put into any other area of who he is. It’s not until about fifty minutes in that we finally start to see some much-needed development with his character, but by that point, it’s just too little too late. Keira Knightley does a fantastic job in the role of Nell, but she, too, doesn’t get much development. The same can honestly be said about everyone in this film.

The whole reason I wanted to watch Silent Night was because of its amazing concept. I was hoping that the film would be a legitimately unnerving look at one family’s despair during Christmas, realizing that they’re all going to die. Sadly, these darker elements don’t come into play until approximately thirty minutes before the film is over, meaning that we don’t get to see too much of this film’s sinister side.

Gratefully though, whenever the film does make the attempt at being menacing, it works great. The entire final act is absolutely terrific and it just made me wish the entire movie beforehand had a similar feel. These final thirty minutes are chalked full of tension, unease, and a disturbing sense of forboding that will stick with you after the credits roll. Silent Night is a bleak movie with some truly great performances, but it rarely attempts to flesh out its cast of characters, instead spending more than half of the running time trying to be a comedy – one that doesn’t pack any real laughs.