It's a Wonderful Knife

Sometimes cheap but largely cheerful, this is a fun stocking-filler for horror fans — with plenty of heart to pump all that blood.

But despite a few fun kills, a promising premise, and a few performances that really hit the right tone of the film, it doesn’t live up to those ambitions, a redundant and contrived script holding it back from true slasher glory.

It sort of lurches from moment to moment as far as being dreary and being inspired.

I think it is solidly entertaining.

It’s a Wonderful Knife is just the latest in a string of horror comedies making the same genre jokes Wes Craven did better in the ‘90s.

Long steals the show once again. His have-at-it fun and eerie eyes provide a manic glee that the rest of director Tyler MacIntyre’s oddly tempered slasher riff on Frank Capra’s Christmas classic could stand to match.

Despite a killer performance from Justin Long and a mostly fun mashup of slasher tropes and seasonal flair, the concept barely hangs together and this cinematic tree topples fairly easily.

[D]espite the movie clocking at just 87 minutes long, It’s a Wonderful Knife runs out of steam before it even reaches the finale.

Genre fans may know Michael Kennedy as the screenwriter behind Freaky which was another mash-up style film. He knows the horror genre and has really found his voice in this niche subgenre while continuing to add more queer stories into the mix.

I mean, it's not It's a Wonderful Life. It wants to sort of be.