Review of Violent Night (2022) by Rebecca31 — 11 Dec 2022

If you’re going to remake Die Hard……don’t. T’was the night before Christmas, when all through the house, not a creature was stirring, except for the group of mercenaries that show up to rob the estate of a very wealthy family. Only one man can save the day and that man is John McClane......oops sorry, no that man is Santa Claus. Yes, the criminals are unfortunate enough to show up just as Santa Claus (David Harbour) is delivering presents. Santa, who after many years delivering presents to increasingly greedy and selfish children has grown weary of the job and is in some desperate need of rediscovering the true meaning of Christmas. And if he has to smash a few bad guys heads in to discover that well then welcome to Violent Night.

Violent Night is violent and it’s set at night. If you expect any more than that, well then you’re probably going to be disappointed. My expectations were too high for this and yes it’s a little unfair to compare Violent Night to Die Hard but then again this is basically a half-hearted attempt at a remake. But you can’t remake Die Hard, it’s just not possible, there’s been four sequels trying to recreate the first one and they’ve all failed spectacularly. Sorry guys, substituting McClane for Santa Claus sounded good on paper but the result is far from a violent delight. John Leguizamo is hardly Hans Gruber. The scenes and dialogue straight up lifted from Die Hard will only remind you of what a good Christmas action movie is.

The only good thing Violent Night got right was the casting because David Harbour as the drunk pissed off Santa was perfect. There was more potential there that ends up being completely wasted. Just a shame the movie itself wasn’t better. Violent Night is a dragged out, boring action movie not worth freezing yourself to sit through. That’s right, yet again I unexpectedly got the 4D experience in another Odeon cinema. Seriously lads, why try turn the 6 people who showed up to Violent Night into icicles? That hardly seems like a good way to get people to come out to the cinemas.

Violent Night is a piss-poor Die Hard remake with a dash of Home Alone thrown in the mix in the desperate attempt to create something entertaining. So many Christmas references and puns, not to mention all the creative was to kill the bad guys with all the festive decorations. Christmas lights, tinsel, sharpened candy canes, they’re all in there. There was a good idea here but badly executed.

Clearly my expectations were set far too high so if you are planning on seeing Violent Night this Christmas, be sure to lower those expectations as much as possible and hopefully you’ll get more out of it than I did. Recommended for anyone looking for a mindless action flick. Or you could go ahead and book yourself a ticket for Die Hard and/or Home Alone in the cinema. Most cinemas will bring back the classics during the Christmas season so pick a cinema that will actually turn on the heating and enjoy.