Review of Initiation: Silent Night, Deadly Night 4 (1990) by Ennis Brokeback L — 02 Dec 2012

Kim can't seem to get a leg up unless it's with her co-worker boyfriend Hank. She's an aspiring journalist for the L.A. Eye and has been stuck churning out classified ads. She wants something different, something she can report on. So one day while rolling around with Hank, she notices on the television of a woman who died of spontaneous human combustion. She sees a story in this, but her boss Eli doesn't want her to report on it. She's a woman in a man's world and decides that the only way to get the story she wants is to do it herself. Look out Nancy Drew!

Her investigation leads her to a book shop where the young woman who leapt to her fiery death had died. There she meets a woman named Fima and a homeless man named Ricky (not the Ricky from the other films, but a different one). Fima lets Kim borrow a book as an invitation to a picnic and Ricky introduces her to a larva inside a vent on the roof. Something starts to bug Kim in the form of roaches in her apartment. They begin to invade in every corner as if something is drawing them there. One particularly gross scene involves a giant roach scurrying around her apartment, making her sick in the process. Could it have something to do with the book she borrowed from Fima?

The fire of Lillith becomes a topic of discussion at the picnic where Kim meets Fima and three other women. It's mentioned that Lillith was known as the serpent who tempted Eve and was the spirit of all that crawls (Roaches included). If you're unable to spot the sinister atmosphere in the first few seconds of the picnic than you're blind as a bat. From this point, it becomes obvious that something concerning Fima and the other two women are responsible for the death of that young woman.

This film in the Silent Night Deadly Night franchise fails to include what made the original worth watching: a Killer Santa Clause. It's like making 'A Nightmare on Elm Street' and not including Freddy Kruger. Instead, they go for something of a witches delight in the form a 'Rosemary's Baby' homage except it's about getting Kim to take the form of, well, Lillith. There are some really disgusting moments in this film that actually make it worth watching. If it wasn't part of the Silent Night series, it'd make a good stand alone occult film.