PART FOUR: NETFLIX IS POO, SHUDDER IS GOLD - Shudder.com is the IDEALChristmas Present. Here are reviews by Greg Klymkiw of perfectChristmas fare, including the cannibalism of Jim Mickle's remake of WEARE WHAT WE ARE and the completely Bunyip Finnish Ode to Naked PsychoSantas in RARE EXPORTS.

Psycho Santas and Cannibals for XMAS on Shudder.com

I tried Netflix for the free one-month service. It took one day to realize I would never pay for it. Shudder launched October 20, 2016 (in Canada, the UK and Ireland). It took about one hour to decide it would stay with me forever.Netflix was stuffed with unimaginatively programmed product: bad television, (mostly) awful mainstream movies, a lame selection of classics, indie and foreign cinema, plus the most cumbersome browsing interface imaginable. Shudder, on the other hand, is overflowing with a magnificently curated selection of classics, indie, foreign and mainstream cinema, plus a first rate browsing and navigation interface which allows for simple alphabetical listings as well as a handful of very simple curated menus. Yes, Shudder is all horror, all the time, but a vast majority of the product is first rate and, depending upon your definition of horror, there is plenty to discover here that's just plain great cinema!

Why is Santa Claus in a cage? Who are those men with guns?

Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale (2010) ***1/2
dir. Jalmari Helander
Starring: Onni Tommila, Jorma Tommila

Review By Greg Klymkiw

While it is an indisputable fact that Jesus is the reason for the season, the eventual commercialization of Christmas inevitably yielded the fantasy figure of Santa Claus, the jolly, porcine dispenser of toys to children. Living with his equally corpulent wife, Mrs. Claus, a passel of dwarves and a herd of reindeer at the North Pole, Santa purportedly toils away in his workshop for the one day of the year when he can distribute the fruits of his labour into the greedy palms of children the world over. Is it any wonder we forget that Christmas is to celebrate the birth of Our Lord Baby Jesus H. Christ?

Naked Santas must always be scrubbed and tubbed.

I wonder, however, what Baby Jesus might have made of Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale, a creepy, terrifying, darkly hilarious and dazzlingly directed bauble of Yuletide perversity that takes us on a myth-infused journey to the northern border between Finland and Lapland where a crazed archeologist and an evil corporation have discovered and unearthed the resting place of the REAL Santa Claus. When Santa is finally freed from his purgatorial tomb, he runs amuck and indulges himself in a crazed killing spree - devouring all the local livestock before feeding upon both adults and children who do not subscribe to the basic tenet of Santa's philosophy: "You better be Good!" Read my full Film Corner review HERE.

Can you pass me the napkins, please?

We Are What We Are (2013) ***
Dir. Jim Mickle
Starring: Bill Sage, Michael Parks, Julia Garner,
Ambyr Childers, Kassie DePaiva, Jack Gore, Kelly McGillis

Review By Greg Klymkiw

I'm not prone to knee-jerk negative reactions towards movie remakes, but sometimes, the originals are so damn good that the mere notion of a redo is enough to induce apoplexy (of the "nervosa" kind). Jim Mickle's well directed 2013 American version of the identically-titled 2010 Jorge Michel Grau shocker from Mexico is just such a film. That said, this creepy, slow-burning tale of cannibalism and madness is a taste-treat nonetheless. Read my full Film Corner review HERE.