It is those controversial events that speak of catastrophic horror stories, including Valentine's Day, St. Patrick's Day, Halloween, New Year's Day and other horrific events that everyone is living with on those holidays. Directors Kevin Smith, Gary Shore, Matt Johnson, Scott Stewart, Nicholas McCarthy and Dennis Widmeier are an ideal model of horror that seems quite different during these events.
As is (almost) always the case with anthology films, Holidays is best described as a "mixed bag." And yet it's the wildly different collection of tones, attitudes, and storytelling styles that makes the collection so interesting.
Every single segment in Holidays is of a certain quality and every single one holds your attention. Some are just more refined and impactful than others.
If you don't connect the stories in a smart way (say, having the same actors play different roles in each story, or tying each narrative together with a single theme) or provide a great 10-15 minute story, what's the point?
Murder, paranormal pregnancies, and damn creepy kids dominate the octaptych, the parts of which waver between clever -- if not straight up unnerving -- and banal.
Seeing how visionaries new and old foster an idea of things that go bump in the night is what keeps viewers coming back for more, and when anthologies add as many twists as Holidays, aficionados are always ready for the next installment.
It's a middle-of-the-road anthology but boasts great energy and a sense of humor that runs throughout, helping make even the mediocre entries watchable.
Some of the films are haunting, some of them more macabre, but all of them play with holiday symbolism in way that will make viewers rethink a lot of their favorite celebrations.
