From Jonathan Klotz
| Published
Christmas movies are usually feel-good films with heartfelt sentiments about the true meaning of Christmas, or a small town girl who moved to the big city to become a successful lawyer has to return home for some reason and runs into her old one High school crush, now grown up, sculpting Santas out of ice cream imported from Sweden, and they bond over their love of Christmas. But a Christmas film stands on its own, and in 40 years nothing has come close to achieving the perfect blend of Christmas joy and dark comedy: Gremlins. The ’80s horror-comedy is still part of pop culture today thanks to the mischievous Gremlins themselves, but it’s a dark and traumatic monologue that makes the film unforgettable.
Fried Santa Claus
Gremlins is about Gizmo, a Mogwai given to Billy Peltzer as a Christmas present by his father, and after he breaks the first rule imposed on his father by the mysterious Mr. Wang: “Don’t get him wet.” Eventually a catastrophe occurs. The town of Kingston Falls is devastated by a horde of evil gremlins. But no matter what the evil Stripe and his cronies do to the townspeople – whether they crash a valuable truck into a bedroom or turn a chairlift into a launch pad – nothing compares to the terrible tragedy that affects Billy’s girlfriend Kate a little more than in the Film experienced in the middle of the year.
Played by Phoebe Cates, years after the infamous Fast times at Ridgemont High Scene, Kate starts into one monologue for example, when her father went missing when she was nine years old. He missed Christmas and the family had no idea where he was until a few days later when they lit a fire in the fireplace and the smell alerted them that something was wrong. Her father, dressed as Santa Claus, tried to get down the chimney with presents, but broke his neck and got stuck dead in the chimney. The story relies entirely on Cates in a monologue that makes it seem like Kate is struggling to finish once she starts. It may seem out of place, but it’s the perfect summary of Gremlin‘S black humor.
The fine line between tragedy and comedy
The first time I heard this story was while watching Gremlinsand it’s haunted me ever since, but it predates the film. Ever since Coca-Cola invented the modern Santa Claus, urban legends about stuck Santas have existed, and while some tales are tragic, like Kate’s, others make fun of big men who get stuck and need rescuing. Director Joe Dante inserted this story into the middle of the film to provide some background on Kate and her post-traumatic stress disorder surrounding Christmas, but it fits the film perfectly as it’s something so absurd that it might make people nervous laugh about it and find dark amusement in it, but if it happened to you it would be devastatingly tragic.
Like no other film before, it dances between comedy and horror. Gremlins pushed the envelope so far that it was together with Indiana Jones and the Temple of Deathcaused the MPAA to create the PG-13 rating. Not only do most of the deaths occur off-screen, but only 15 people die in the film, and most of them are nameless background extras. One could argue that the most terrible moment in the entire film is the death of Kate’s father, who only wanted to make his daughter happy and paid for it with his life.
A unique Christmas film
Joe Dante’s masterpiece has stood the test of time thanks to the extreme risks he took when writing the screenplay he wrote Home alone And Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone Director Chris Columbus was created with the support of Steven Spielberg’s production company. Gremlins is such a singular success that Dante never wanted to make a sequel, and when he did, he made the most absurd, insane, franchise-killing film ever, replacing the black comedy with straight-up slapstick comedy. Gremlins 2: The New Batch is also a great film and is still one of my favorites to this day, but it is much more light-hearted.
Gremlins That might not be what comes to mind when you think of edgy Christmas movies from the 80s Die Hardbut it has been a Christmas classic for decades. Just be careful if you watch the film with children, not because of the violence or murders, but because Santa broke his neck in the chimney.
Gremlins is currently available to stream Max.
