🎄 Silent Night (2021) — Review

“Apocalypse, but make it festive…and emotionally devastating.”


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🎬 Let’s start by showing y’all the trailers, shall we?

No nothing to do with relating to the original horror slasher Silent Night.
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⚠️ Warning

This film is NOT a cheerful holiday movie.
It’s dark, upsetting, bleak, and laced with anxiety, dread, and uncomfortable humor.
It’s basically a Christmas movie wrapped around the literal end of the world.
Not for kids. Not for the easily triggered. Not for anyone expecting joy.

🎄 A Quick Rant About the Title “Silent Night” Because… WHAT?

Okay, let me just get this off my chest real quick because this has been driving me insane.

How — and I mean HOW — did Silent Night (2021) and Silent Night (2023) get away with using the exact same title as one of the most iconic horror-Christmas movies ever… and yet have ZERO relation to the original Silent Night, Deadly Night franchise??

Like bro, when horror fans hear “Silent Night,” the brain IMMEDIATELY jumps to:

1984’s Silent Night, Deadly Night

2012’s remake

the entire “killer Santa slasher” vibe


But these newer movies?
They just took the title, slapped it on totally unrelated films, and dipped.

It makes searching for them a nightmare.
It makes organizing reviews a nightmare.
It makes talking about them a nightmare.

Because if you mention “Silent Night” out loud, EVERY horror fan assumes you mean the original two.
Nobody thinks you’re talking about the apocalypse Christmas movie…
or the Joel Kinnaman revenge thriller…
unless you immediately slap the year onto it like it’s a college essay.

Honestly?
The title reuse feels like studios going:

> “Eh, Silent Night is public domain-ish enough. Just steal it. Who cares.”



It’s lazy. It’s confusing. It’s misleading.
And it absolutely makes horror fans everywhere want to yeet their phones across the room when trying to Google these things.



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⭐ Non-Spoiler Plot Overview

“Silent Night” (2021) follows a group of upper-class British friends gathering in a country home for one last Christmas together. They’re drinking, bickering, reminiscing, and trying way too hard to pretend everything is normal.

Problem is…

The world is ending tonight.
A toxic cloud is sweeping across the planet, killing everyone painfully — unless they take the government-issued suicide pill.

So the whole movie is basically:

friends lying to themselves

people faking normalcy

holiday chaos masking existential dread

and everyone trying (and failing) not to emotionally explode


It’s not horror in the slasher sense.
It’s horror in the “I feel uncomfortable in my own soul” sense.


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🧑‍🤝‍🧑 Character Rundown

Keira Knightley as Nell — trying to keep everything peaceful and holiday-cheerful while clearly falling apart inside.

Matthew Goode as Simon — the dad who looks like he’s seconds away from a breakdown but won’t admit it.

Roman Griffin Davis (the Jojo Rabbit kid) as Art — the only person smart enough to question what’s REALLY happening.

The extended family/friends — each one masking trauma with partying, jokes, alcohol, and denial.


The cast is great.
Too good, honestly — it’s uncomfortable because they sell the dread so well.


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🕰️ Pacing / Flow

The entire movie is one long buildup of tension disguised as a Christmas dinner.

It’s awkward on purpose.
Funny in a “should I really be laughing?” way.
And then depressing in the last 15 minutes.

This film FEELS like a panic attack wrapped in tinsel.


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👍 Pros

Fantastic acting

Dark, risky premise

Realistic family dysfunction

A Christmas movie that isn’t afraid to be uncomfortable

Great final 20 minutes that hit like a gut punch



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👎 Cons

It’s extremely bleak

Slow for anyone expecting action

The tonal whiplash between comedy and dread can throw people off

Definitely not a rewatch-for-fun holiday movie

Ambiguous messaging some viewers hated



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💭 Final Thoughts

This isn’t a “fun” Christmas horror film.
It’s not campy. Not silly. Not cozy.

It’s an existential holiday meltdown.

It’s bold, it’s weird, it’s gut-wrenching, and it leaves you staring at your wall afterward wondering what the hell you just watched.

If you’re in the mood for something SAD, disturbing, and emotionally heavy?
This film goes HARD.

If you’re looking for fun Christmas horror?
This ain’t it.


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⭐ Rating: 7/10

It’s well-acted and extremely bold, but very bleak.
Good film — but NOT a crowd-pleaser.


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🚨 Spoiler Warning

Turn back now if you don’t want to know how depressing this Christmas gets.


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🎁 Spoilers — Full Breakdown (no bullet points)

The entire film builds toward the moment everyone has been trying to avoid: the suicide pills. The government claims they are painless, the humane way to avoid the horrific death caused by the poisonous storm sweeping the earth. But Art, the only kid asking questions, discovers something horrifying: the pills might not work. People who tried them early still suffered painful deaths. Now the group realizes they are about to kill themselves for nothing, or take their chances with an even worse fate.

Dinner turns into panic. Parents try to justify giving their kids the pills. Some people argue. Some panic. Some break down crying. Some numb themselves with alcohol. It feels disturbingly real — like watching a real family collapse under pressure.

Art refuses his pill and runs outside into the poisonous storm. He collapses and looks like he dies. His parents find him and assume they failed him. One by one, characters take the pill in different rooms while holding each other or crying. It’s slow, quiet, and unsettling.

The next morning, Nell and Simon lie dead in bed. Their friends are dead scattered around the house. The storm has passed. And then the most shocking moment: Art wakes up, perfectly fine. He survived the toxin without the pill. He looks around at the bodies of his entire family, realizing they all died believing there was no other choice. The movie ends on that devastating note — silent, empty, and cruel.

That’s the horror.