Trigger Warning: The following contains discussions of sexual assault.
The Big Picture
‘Tis the season to hunt down some frat bros. The 2019 slasher horror remake, Black Christmas, is a celebration of sisterhood that highlights the comradery women have formed on college campuses across America as they face ongoing violence brought against them. It’s been well documented that there has been an epidemic of violence against women in universities for centuries, and it was placed under the spotlight thanks to former President Barack Obama’s initiative, “It’s On Us.” Highlighting the lack of response surrounding assault, it demanded action from colleges, particularly men, to not stand by and allow women to be victimized any longer. Writers Sophia Takal and April Wolfe hold this issue at the forefront of our minds in Black Christmas. Takal is also the director of the film, and she uses masked serial killers hunting down women during Christmas break on campus as a metaphor for the ongoing issue that is plaguing American universities.
A group of female students is stalked by a stranger during their Christmas break. That is until the young sorority pledges discover that the killer is part of an underground college conspiracy.
What Is ‘Black Christmas’ About?
A remake of the cult-classic 1974 slasher film, Olivia Hussey stars in the original as a sorority sister who is hunted by a masked killer over Christmas break, and it saw little success at the time of its release. In the years since it’s become an acclaimed feminist classic, and its remake is bound for the same destiny. Starring Imogen Poots as Riley Stone, she attends Hawthorne University and lives in the Mu Kappa Epsilon (MKE) sorority house with several of her sisters. A sexual assault survivor, she was assaulted by the former president of the Delta Kappa Omicron (DKO) fraternity, Brain Huntley. Dealing with PTSD as a result, she and her MKE sisters, Kris(Aleyse Shannon), Marty (Lily Donoghue), and Jesse (Brittany O’Grady), decide to perform a song protesting rape culture in fraternities at the DKO fraternity holiday talent show, and the song causes an uproar. It’s the best Christmas-themed performance since Mean Girls, and the violence that ensues is a powerful reminder of the repercussions that come when women come forward to speak their truth. The violence in question includes a gruesome string of sorority sister murders at Hawthorne University. As masked men hunt the girls down through the frigid snow, it turns out they are not just any men, they are DKO frat bros.
Black Christmas begins as most slasher films begin, audiences witness the brutal murder of the first victim. Up there with Scream and A Nightmare on Elm Street as one of the scariest opening scenes in horror movies, a sorority sister leaves the library at night and walks home alone. That alone could be a horror story for any woman. As she begins to receive threatening DMs on her phone, she is hunted down through the snow and killed with an icicle by a masked killer. As her paranoia grows leading up to her murder, she can’t help but shake the feeling that someone is following her. Takal puts audiences in the girl’s shoes, and we feel the true terror of what it’s like for women to walk home in the darkness. It’s a harsh way to begin the movie, but it grabs viewers’ attention and forces them to confront the problems female college students face head-on.
‘Black Christmas’ Is a Modern Day, Feminist Slasher Classic
As the four girls along with a couple of other sisters stay behind for break, they begin to face the deadly consequences of their performance. As it turns out, the DKO frat brothers’ hazing process includes a mandatory rite of passage: killing sorority sisters. It’s symbolic of the toxic culture that begins freshmen year when men rush fraternities and the encouragement of certain behaviors that involve violence against women. But the film importantly notes that the instillment of toxic masculinity does not only begin in fraternities, it begins in the classroom. College is a place where the next generation of young minds are shaped, and unfortunately, it is sometimes not for the better. Cary Elwes plays Professor Landon, a misogynistic English teacher who rarely teaches any books written by anyone other than white males, which leads to a petition for him to be fired from the university. He seeks his revenge by becoming a mentor to the DKO fraternity in more ways than one, and Black Christmas exemplifies how toxic masculinity is passed down through generations.
Black Christmas is too clever for its own good, and for some reason, audiences and critics alike could not stomach its female empowerment. There is an abundance of high school coming-of-age films thanks to the likes of John Hughes and Richard Linklater, but the college experience for women is rarely touched upon. The Black Christmas remake decides to engage with that experience in full force, and the character of Riley is one of the fiercest final girls in recent memory. She begins the movie as a survivor and ends it as a fighter. While the frat house is a literal dungeon of rotting minds, Riley and her sisters, especially Kris, battle for change. Men in the movie are not affected by the ongoing violence and are permitted to be out of touch with reality while the girls are painfully aware of what is going on. They cannot afford ignorance because it would cost them their lives, so they decide to grab snow shovels, car keys, and Christmas lights to fight back.
In ‘Black Christmas’, the Final Girls Are Fierce Fighters
The masks the DKO fraternity wear in this slasher movie as they continue their plight against sorority sisters symbolize the anonymity college men are granted. They are protected from their crimes against women, while the women bear the brunt of those crimes and are left exposed and vulnerable. College lays the foundation for men to behave badly as they transition from boys to men, and Black Christmas argues that it is not only the education system that sacrifices women but society as well as the privileged white male takes what he learns from school and incorporates it into his adult life. Additionally, the irony of the fraternity praying to the bust of the University’s founder, Calvin Hawthorne, is not lost on the movie either. By honoring a wealthy white man who was a known sexist and racist, the school is upholding ancient traditions that have no place in this modern world, and it encourages men at the school to never change their ways. But if the movie knows anything, it is that women are resilient, and the sorority sisters take matters into their own hands by refusing to be the prey as they’re stalked on campus.
As Riley and the girls hunt down the frat brothers, Black Christmas is an invigorating call to battle that serves as a wake-up call to college campuses everywhere that the violent behavior towards women exhibited in countless fraternities cannot continue. Poots gives a revelatory performance as Riley, and by the film’s end, she is a masterful hunter who takes down masked men while reclaiming her power. The film should absolutely be on everyone’s list as the holiday season comes up, and also just happens to be a great slasher film with many final girls to root for. One of the most powerful scenes comes when Riley begs college campus security for help after receiving threatening DMs, and she is dismissed for being paranoid. She and the rest of the girls are then forced to seek other avenues of retribution if they want to survive the night. It’s a sobering thought, but the girls decide to step out of line to speak their truth anyway and wield an icicle or two as they go down a bloody path of revenge among the Christmas carols and snow. They’ve never been more jolly.
Black Christmas is available for rent or purchase on Apple TV, Prime Video, Google Play, and more.
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