IT’S A WONDERFUL KNIFE
IT’S A WONDERFUL KNIFE
WRITER MICHAEL KENNEDY TEARS UP CHRISTM AS IN SLASHER FLICK
ONE OF THE REASONS I wanted to make a Christmas horror movie was there’s not enough of them,” writer Michael Kennedy tells SFX. He’s not wrong. Of what there is, his favourite is the 1974 Black Christmas, a film he watches “several times a year”; he gave the 4K Blu-ray to all his friends last December.
For his own entry into the (decked) halls of notoriety, he’s only gone and splattered gore over one of the most beloved festive films of all time. “I knew when I set out to do a Christmas slasher I wanted to riff on It’s A Wonderful Life,” Kennedy explains. “I jokingly put [the title] on an outline document when I started writing, as a gag to myself.
“Then once I had just smaller story beats figured out, I went and called Adam Hendricks, who’s a producer on the movie – he produced Freaky [scripted by Kennedy] – and was like, ‘Hey, I have an idea that you might want to do with me.’ I ran him through my quick thoughts, then I just said, ‘And right now I’m calling it It’s A Wonderful Knife’ and he guffawed and was like, ‘Don’t change the title.”
Yellowjackets’ Jane Widdop stars as Winnie, a teenager from Angel Falls, “The Christmas Capital Of The World”. A year on from surviving being attacked by a killer – the Angel – on Christmas Eve, she wishes she’d never been born. Her wish is granted when she finds herself in a parallel universe where no one knows her and the Angel has caused more havoc than she thought possible.
When it comes to creating an instantly classic new slasher, Kennedy knew right from the start how he wanted the Angel to look – even down to their iconic weapon.
“I always envisioned an angel-like figure because I didn’t want to do the Santa Claus thing. It’s been done to death,” he says. “They did a really good job of designing the knife based on my description, but the actual final look at the angel was Tyler [MacIntyre, director] and Matea [Pasarić], our costume designer, and then her team going through different looks.
“I wanted it white because of the snow. I think there’s something creepy about a person in all-white too, walking around killing people. When we were in Toronto, an audience member’s question during the Q&A was, ‘What was the dry cleaning bill for the villain?’ I was like, ‘Whatever, they’ve probably got a closet full of them.’”
“With the mask – which I think is a fun tidbit – Tyler describes it as he wanted the mask to look like a frosted lightbulb that you see at Christmas, then he also wanted it to reflect lights.”
