Five festive holiday horror picks from Shudder’s Unhappy Holidays collection

Oh, how I love Christmas movies of all genres! Of course, holiday horror is a favorite category of mine, and Shudder has plenty of options included in their Unhappy Holidays collection.

These selections are just my personal favorites, of course, and you may not necessarily agree with them, but I hope you might give at least a few of them a go if you aren’t already familiar with them. I tried to reach a good balance, with some gorier picks and some slightly comedic choices as well.

These films are in alphabetical order, since I always have a hard time when it comes to putting movies into order of preference. After all, no two films of any genre are exactly the same, so my preference on any given day could be entirely different from another day.

The Advent Calendar – This 2021 French horror film does not sugar coat anything. There’s not really a warm, fuzzy core to it, it’s just bleak and dark…which I kind of love about it.

Eva (Eugenie Derouand) was a gifted dancer in the past, but a car accident three years earlier took away the use of her legs. Now confined to a wheelchair, Eva lives with her dog. Her dad is suffering from late-stage Alzheimers, and she barely gets to see him, thanks to her cruel stepmother. Suffice it to say, Eva has not gracefully accepted her current physical state, and she is quite a Bitter Betty.

One night, Eva’s friend Sophie shows up with a gift: a large wooden advent calendar, which comes with a set of off-putting rules. The first one is that if the receiver eats the first piece of candy, she must eat them all. The other various rules all end with the caveat “or you will die.” Each night at midnight, a creepy little wooden character pops out to remind Eva it’s time to open another door and eat another treat.

These treats at first result in good things for Eva, but eventually the events become dark and even deadly. By the end, Eva must decide whether or not to continue down her current path (which has the potential to cause her to regain the use of her legs) of sacrificing others, or if she will be the bigger person and accept her fate.

Black Christmas – This one is my OG horror movie. When I was a mere child of 11 years, my Uncle took my younger sister and I to see Silent Night, Evil Night. That’s what Black Christmas was titled when it was released in the US.

Though I had always loved what I called “scary movies,” I was positively enthralled by Black Christmas. Not only was it truly scary, it managed to do so while staying away from excessive gore, and the characters were likeable and real.

The plot is simple: A group of sorority sisters are terrorized in their house by an unseen killer known as “Billy.” Over the course of the night, he manages to kill several of them in vicious (but creative) ways, while still calling them on the phone to torment them.

Honestly, if you have never watched the original Black Christmas, do it. The 2006 remake is decent, the 2019 one is simply horrible, but you just can’t go wrong with the 1974 version. It’s still surprisingly nasty (those phone calls are horrific), and the cast is *chef’s kiss*! For added fun, watch it as part of The Last Drive-In’s Red Christmas special. That way, you will get JB’s signature trivia and shenanigans, along with the perfect Christmas horror movie.

A Christmas Horror Story – For something a little less dark and grim, Canadian film A Christmas Horror Story is a good choice. It’s an anthology film, so you are treated to several different stories, with a connecting storyline involving a radio DJ known as “Dangerous Dan.” As the night progresses, Dan (delightfully played by William Shatner) gets drunk, and reports on some events going down at the local shopping mall.

There’s a ghost story involving a group of teens who go exploring at their school, which was a convent where a murder took place. In another, a police officer persuades his reluctant wife and child to go into the woods and chop down a Christmas tree. The boy gets lost, and is thankfully found…but something is different about him.

Story number three involves a family taking a road trip to visit an elderly Aunt. Krampus even puts in an appearance in this one. And the final tale involves an action movie style Santa who has to deal with both Krampus AND a zombie outbreak in the North Pole.

Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale – This Finnish film is another delightful / action packed holiday horror movie, and my local arthouse theatre has an annual showing (that’s where I first saw it).

A boy named Pietari is convinced that Santa is not a jolly old elf, but instead spies on children and tortures the ones who are bad. Local reindeer are being slaughtered en masse, something that infuriates the local hunters, including Pietari’s dad.

When a strange, skinny, naked old man’s body is found frozen in one of Pietari’s Dad’s traps, they discover that he isn’t really dead. Could this be Pietari’s evil Santa?

Rare Exports is fun, fast-moving, and will keep you on the edge of your seat as you follow along with the adventurous group who are trying to make things right again.

The Sacrifice Game – The newest entry on this list was released on Shudder last year. Written by Jenn Wexler and Sean Redlitz and directed by Wexler (The Ranger), it’s another nasty little Christmas tale with sharp corners.

A girls’ boarding school called Blackvale is shut down for the Christmas break, but two students (Samantha and Clara), their teacher Rose, and Rose’s boyfriend are staying through the holiday. Their little celebration is interrupted by a group of four killers who are set on calling forth a demon.

One of the killers, Maisie, was once a student at Blackvale, and learned the summoning ritual while she attended the place. As the group terrorizes Samantha, Clara and Rose, the two girls must work together to stay alive and evade the killers.

The Sacrifice Game has a nice twist, and the actors do a good job of portraying characters you really have feelings about – be they good or bad. It’s a quick, clever story that keeps you guessing.