10 Most Underrated Christmas Horror Movies, Ranked

Holiday horror films are a fairly varied subgenre, ranging from obvious holidays like Halloween and New Year's Eve to more obscure ones like Arbor Day. They appeal to filmmakers because they know there's a new audience to be found every year, and viewers often put their favorites on annual rotations. The biggest holiday for horror is Christmas (as evident in our ranking of 82 different Christmas horror movies back in 2017) because it's meant to be a day of joy, wonder, and giving, and that makes it the perfect setup for terror, suspense, and bloody eggnog.

There are a lot of great examples of Christmas horror — we ranked 25 of the best here, and new ones arrive every December — but there are also plenty that have been lost in the shuffle over the years or given a bad rap by naughty critics. The films below are a mix of those underseen and underrated good times, and as usual for these kinds of lists, our general metric is that they're sitting under a 3.0 on Letterboxd and/or lacking a fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes. It's not an exact science, but it's telling enough that critics and/or viewers aren't seeing their merits.

Now, keep reading for a look at 10 of the most underrated Christmas horror movies!

We're starting our list of underrated Christmas horror films with arguably the best film on the list — but we're putting it in the number 10 slot because the Christmas element is limited to the final 20 minutes. Tetsuya Nakashima's 2018 horror opus "It Comes" has yet to get anything resembling a U.S. release, but don't let that stop you from seeking it out, as it's an exorcism tale unlike any you've seen before. Its closest comparison would be "The Wailing," which lands at number one on our list of the best exorcism movies.

A young couple gets married and has a daughter, and the bliss is evident across their faces throughout — but the truth beneath isn't as joyful. Both parents are failing each other, themselves, and, most importantly, their child, and that failure leads to tragedy when little Chisa attracts the attention of an immensely powerful and evil force. Good people are manipulated and brutalized, including strangers who step up to help fight the evil, and it's only through community and bloodshed that they'll have any hope of surviving and defeating the threat.

Nakashima's film is a big, dense commentary on the choices we make at the expense of those we love (and who love us), and while its first half features scares and gory beats, things truly come alive in the back half. Similarly, the specifics of this supernatural threat are both vague and all over the place, but that rumbling unknown works to heighten the horror. All bets are off once the exorcism sees priests, shamans, monks, and more using faith in gods of all kinds as a shotgun blast to the entity's heart. This is a wild, messy, fantastic ride.

1984's "Silent Night, Deadly Night" is a film about a killer dressed up like Santa Claus, and the immediate sequel followed suit. The next three, though, detour away from that premise to varying degrees, with the fourth film being the most egregious on that count. Heck, Christmas itself is barely even present in "Silent Night, Deadly Night 4: Initiation."

A woman engulfed in flames jumps from a Los Angeles rooftop and dies on the pavement below. Kim is a nascent reporter who sees a story here, but her attempts to investigate are stymied by confusing clues, a disheveled homeless man (Clint Howard), and a love interest who prefers that she focus her attention solely on him. Soon she's caught up in the bewitching hobbies of a group of women who insist she join them.

Brian Yuzna directs this Lilith-centric horror thriller about women whose need for men is nonexistent, and it's a solid little horror tale about sex, desire, and the pressing weight of grief. Hunter gets put through the wringer here and does good work, but the film's real star is surrealist special effects wizard Screaming Mad George. A year after elevating Yuzna's "Society" with some spectacularly slimy and weird practical effects (that helped land the film on our list of the best body horror films), he's back with giant cockroaches, hot dog fingers, squirming larvae, and more. There might not be a killer Santa, but we get Christmas lights, indoor fir trees, and an earlier film in the franchise on TV, so that's something.

Who among us hasn't gotten temporarily lost in a parking garage? Now imagine it's Christmas Eve, you're in no mood for such frustrations, and a psychotic security guard is intent on making you his life partner. That's the situation that Angela (Rachel Nichols) finds herself in when she's the last person out of the office and finds herself in the clutches of Thomas (Wes Bentley). He's been watching her on the security cameras, and he really, really wants her to like him.

Single-location films can be tough to execute without feeling and looking fairly one-note (here are 15 that succeed beautifully), but "P2" keeps its multi-leveled parking garage alive with threats, discoveries, and the tease of escape. Director Franck Khalfoun's best film remains his 2012 remake of "Maniac," but this simple Christmas-set thriller holds its own thanks to a growing sense of desperation and suspense and two committed leads. The Christmas touches are more window dressing than narratively integral, but they hang as a constant reminder that this is a lovely time of year, interrupted by terror.

Some of Nichols' best work throughout her filmography is in overly physical roles, and that continues here as she spends the bulk of the film fighting, running, and struggling to stay alive. It's an intense turn that's still somehow more subdued than Bentley's. His performance moves from creepily helpful to creepily stalkerish to flat-out creepy psycho killer, but what he lacks in nuance here he makes up for in, well, truly effective creepiness.

It's Christmas Eve, and folks are rushing for last-minute items at a small-town grocery store in Arizona. Another group comes in, but they're not shoppers — they're heavily armed and looking for something more elusive than cash. They take customers and employees hostage, and one by one, they inspect the people to see if they "might be one." The unlucky ones are killed immediately, while the rest are in for an even more harrowing holiday evening.

Look, "Alien Raiders" is a terrible title and half the reason this movie is so underseen. Get past that, though, and you get a nifty little piece of horror/sci-fi that kicks off with a claustrophobic siege before slowly revealing its hand. Our invaders are tough as nails, military trained, and looking for alien presences hiding in human bodies. Questions are immediately raised, chief among them being, are these people nuts? Or are there actually aliens hiding in plain sight? The answers come with some fun practical effects and set pieces.

Director Ben Rock got his start making faux documentaries that flesh out the "real" world behind "The Blair Witch Project," but his first (and still only) narrative feature shows a sure hand with a tighter story. The bulk of the film unfolds inside the grocery store, and Rock makes good use of its aisles and stagnant atmosphere while still allowing it to pop when the genre beats hit. As with a couple of others on this list, the Christmas elements are left solely to timing and decoration, but it still counts.

Indie horror filmmaker Joe Begos pitched an idea for a "Silent Night, Deadly Night" sequel a few years back involving a robotic Santa on the fritz that starts slaughtering folks during the holiday. The producers passed on it, but happily for those of us who like our holiday horror paired with gnarly violence, Begos went ahead and made it an original film instead and called it "Christmas Bloody Christmas."

Tori (a terrific Riley Dandy) closes up her record store on Christmas Eve, looking forward to two things — getting drunk and getting busy (in bed). She succeeds on both counts, but her holiday high is squashed when a military robot repurposed for consumer life as an animatronic-like Santa Claus decides to start killing anyone and everyone it comes across. The robot is a merciless, seemingly unstoppable being, but Tori isn't going down without a fight.

Begos' indie horror offerings frequently ape older classics — "The Mind's Eye" is a "Scanners" riff, "VFW" seems inspired by "Assault on Precinct 13" — and his Christmas story lifts a faceoff straight out of "The Terminator." His eye for homage has never been more successful, though, as the action and kills have a gritty, bloody immediacy, and Dandy makes for a fantastic final girl/Sarah Connors-type with a very physical performance. First act is very, very chatty, to the point that some people check out early, but that hang-out vibe serves Tori well and creates a calm ready to be shattered. Stick with it as Begos finds real bang for his buck and builds an impressive scope, turning a small town's streets into a violent warzone. Also worth celebrating, there's barely a scene that goes by without a heavy dose of Christmas decorations and/or lighting.

It's 1985, and a group of kids pass the Christmas holiday break playing outside, enjoying zombie movies on TV, and biking around. Plans change when they find a pit in the woods with an injured woman stuck at the bottom. She's dressed as Santa, and while they initially work to help her out, those plans change, too, when they discover she's a thief who's hidden loot somewhere nearby. Greed and cruelty become the kids' new games, but they're not as close to winning as they think.

Two years before Paco Plaza co-directed the still-brilliant "[REC]," he made this little TV movie that feels like a Spanish nod to the Amblin era. Young friends are caught up in a vaguely dangerous adventure, but there are a couple of key differences here. First, while the kids are endearing at first, that changes when their true selves are revealed, and it works to turn them from protagonists to the film's real monsters. Second, while American counterparts like "Explorers" and "The Goonies" dabbled in action and sci-fi, "A Christmas Tale" is a horror film.

As mentioned, the kids become a petri dish of differing moralities, with some truly ugly and cruel behavior winning out. Viewers will see their allegiances waver, and it makes for an engaging watch because of it. There's also a shift in the third act that, while maybe a bit extraneous, ramps up the horror atmosphere even more, leading to a tense stalk and chase through an amusement park. Don't worry, though, as it keeps enough of that Amblin spirit through to the end.

Sometimes you just want your holiday horror to be as nonsensical and weird as possible. If it's Thanksgiving time, you watch "Blood Rage." But for Christmas? You won't find anything more bonkers than Fabrice Zaphiratos' feature, "Blood Beat." It's his first movie, and it's also his only movie, and that won't surprise you once you've seen this Wisconsin-set oddity. And you'll be thinking that even before the ghostly samurai shows up!

Ted heads home to rural Wisconsin for the Christmas holiday with his new girlfriend, Sarah, in tow. The young woman has an immediate psychic connection to Ted's mother, Cathy, and soon people start turning up sliced, slashed, and disemboweled. What's going on, exactly? That's a great question, and it's one you'll have a fun time finding the answers for as the locals face off against a sword-wielding vision from the past.

Reincarnation, possession, psychic visions, lightly fleshed out connections between sex and murder, low-tech optical effects, a wildly out-of-place string-heavy score, a full-frame presentation because the cinematographer was under the impression they were making a TV movie, and more come together for a regional genre effort that will have you drinking before you've hit the halfway mark. Look, some movies have one or two psychics, but there are four here. Four! That's not a criticism, either, as you can't help but appreciate Zaphiratos' commitment to all things weird (and honesty in interviews when he admits to being high while writing the script and making the movie). 

A rogue bishop and his roving band of ruffians lay regular siege to a small seaside village, but on one December 5th, the people grow tired of the threat and strike back. They set the bad guys and their ship ablaze and live happily ever after... but now, whenever December 5th falls under a full moon, St. Niklas and his devilish helpers return to slaughter adults and steal children.

Writer/director Dick Maas is as underrated as his 2010 Christmas horror film, "Saint," and he's that rare genre talent that makes hugely entertaining movies on relatively small budgets. Here, he brings a legend from the past into the present as a modern-day Sinterklaas celebration — a tradition in the Netherlands focused on St. Nicholas and his helpers, known as Black Petes (a controversial Dutch tradition), that sees parades, costumes, and presents exchanged — devolves into chaos when the bishop and his sidekicks tear through Amsterdam's streets. Sketchy CG effects be damned, the film's mayhem delivers genuine fun, exciting thrills, and plentiful practical gore.

There's a high body count, action set pieces, and a heavy dollop of humor here, too. It's undeniably goofy but takes its threat seriously while committing to its bit, and it's just a good, silly time all around as our heroes face off against the demonic saint on horseback. Fans of fun horror movies should seek out the rest of Maas' filmography too, including his canal-set slasher ("Amsterdamned"), his possessed elevator thrillers ("Lift" and "Down"), and his man-eating lion romp ("Prey").

Like "A Christmas Tale" above, 1989's "Dial Code Santa Claus" aka "Deadly Games" is a Christmas horror film with a child protagonist that almost feels like it could be a gateway horror film. It's once again a European film, though, and the pacing is definitely not for American kids. Those of you who used to be kids, however, will find plenty to enjoy here as a little boy squares off against a deranged man dressed as Santa Claus on Christmas Eve.

Thomas is a precocious child who's frequently and basically left home alone by his busy single mother. One lonely day, Thomas connects with Santa Claus online, but the man on the other end is actually an imbalanced guy who becomes obsessed with the boy — and arrives at his home on Christmas Eve. Thomas realizes his mistake and sets up elaborate booby traps throughout the house inspired by his love of action movies, but will it be enough to stop a Santa who's growing increasingly homicidal?

Similarities to 1990's "Home Alone" didn't go unnoticed by director Rene Manzor, but while this one has some laughs, it's far more of a genre bender delivering action thrills, moments of genuine terror, and legitimate emotional beats. The production design and cinematography craft a world straight out of a kid's imagination, both the light fun and the dark madness, and the home invasion becomes a dangerous but playful fight for young Thomas' life.

When people debate what should be considered the first true slasher film, the usual contenders are "Halloween," "A Bay of Blood," and "Black Christmas." This made-for-TV movie from 1972 deserves to be part of the conversation, though, as it delivers a stormy night, a pool of victims/suspects, and a mysterious killer dressed in a yellow raincoat. It's that last element that moves "Home for the Holiday" from mystery whodunnit to slasher territory with some fun results.

Four women, sisters, return to their childhood home for Christmas to find their father on his deathbed. One suspects their stepmom is poisoning him, and as Christmas Eve turns into Christmas Day, a figure in yellow starts killing them off. This being a TV movie in the early 1970s, it's obviously devoid of bloodletting and fairly small in scope, but it's still an effective little thriller. Director John Llewellyn Moxey takes full advantage of the storm to create and build atmosphere and suspense, and it works to make the sight of the yellow-coated killer more than a little unsettling.

The film is also a winner on the casting front with talents that help elevate the material beyond what could have been a slight exercise in genre. Sally Field, Julie Harris, and Eleanor Parker are all Academy Award nominees/winners, and Jessica Walter is an Emmy winner, and they all do great work balancing the family drama and the heightened terror of what follows. The film is undeniably tame compared to theatrical releases and later films, but it still works to create suspense, terror, and thrills on Christmas Day.