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There's Something In The Barn
Manage episode 454623939 series 98583
Whoo hoo! What a load of Christmas cheer we received with this delightful murderous elf tale! Brimming with holiday goodness from beginning to end, this Norwegian film from last year turned out to be the PERFECT beginning to our annual month of holiday horrror! Thanks for the recommendations, guys!
There’s Something In The Barn (2023)
Episode 418, 2 Guys and a Chainsaw Horror Movie Review Podcast
Todd: Hello and welcome to another episode of Two Guys and a Chainsaw. I’m Todd.
Craig: And I’m Craig.
Todd: We are kicking off the Christmas season, Craig.
Craig: It’s pretty exciting.
Todd: I love it. I just so look forward. I mean, Halloween is fun, but there’s something about these Christmas horror movies that are really fun to pick out, really fun to watch, and it’s almost like a challenge, like no matter what, Halloween’s scary, right?
So, you know, Halloween’s going to be about horror, but can this movie put me in the Christmas spirit? And be adequately scary, fun, whatever. That is the challenge. It’s kind of in my mind, as we turn on one of these movies that we’ve selected for holidays. Now, what, in our ninth year? Yeah, this is the ninth time that we have done Christmas horror movies.
Craig: There for a while, we were getting a little worried that we’d, do all the good ones and run out, but it seems like, I don’t know, in the last 10 years, they’ve been making a lot of them.
Todd: It’s so crazy, actually.
Craig: Some of them bad, obviously, and a lot of them cheap knockoffs of some of the better ones. But there are some good ones out there, and I’m excited about the stuff we’re doing this month.
Todd: You’re so right. Like 10, 15 years ago, like Christmas horror movies were kind of a rare commodity. And now there’s 10 every year. It seems like again, like you said, differing in quality, this one that we’re doing today. Well, you know, we put it out to our patrons. What would you guys, do you guys have suggestions for us?
We have a running list that we have going all the time. I think this one came up from several people this year and you seemed very keen on doing it. And it only came out last year as well. It’s a 2023 Norwegian horror comedy. called There’s Something in the Barn, directed by Magnus Martens, and, uh, man, I was getting serious Rare Export vibes from this one, which was one of the, one of the first movies we ever did, also a Norwegian horror film.
And several of the Christmas horror movies that we’ve done over the years have been Norwegian for some reason. I don’t know why that is. I really have no idea, but it’s been fun. Just the fact that this was a Norwegian movie was exciting me because I just love the quirky humor And I was looking forward to potentially really beautiful like scenery and stuff like that Maybe some cultural stuff and in those ways it didn’t disappoint me at all.
Craig: No. Not at all, it was Super cute. Yeah. I didn’t know anything about this except for any image you see of it kind of shows like an elf peeking out of the barn. So you know what the something in the barn is.
Todd: There’s something in the barn, probably an elf, maybe more, but definitely an elf.
Craig: I didn’t want to read too much about it because I thought if there are going to be any surprises, I don’t want them to be spoiled for me.
So I didn’t know much about it. When it comes right down to it, I really enjoyed it. I read a review after I read it that said it’s like Gremlins meets National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation. Yes. And I had definitely thought about both of those movies while I was watching this. In fact, I think there are at least one or two direct homages.
At one point, somebody climbs up on a ladder and it gets pushed back and he falls flat back on his back and it shows an aerial shot of his face. It’s the exact same shot from Christmas Vacation, basically. And I feel like there were a couple of others. Definitely thought of Gremlins 2.
Todd: There was a point where I think the dad made a big show of plugging in the Christmas lights, even though it doesn’t have the same result.
Yes, yes! It’s like the same shot, it’s so cute. Yes,
Craig: yes, exactly. But then also, Krampus, just because they’re similar, not because it necessarily reminded me of it. Actually, if I have any critique of this, and I don’t have a lot, I thought it was Good. I would say it’s kind of like Krampus light. It’s going for the same things.
This is one of those movies that you and I love that don’t shy away from the violence and gore, but also have like the heartwarming element, you know, like, like, love your family because it’s Christmas. And I thought that it delivered on that. Uh, level two, maybe not to the, you know, Krampus is one of my now favorite Christmas movies of all time.
Yeah. This is not one of my favorites of all time, but I feel like that’s what it’s going for. Yeah. And it, it does a good job.
Todd: Well, Krampus surprises you at how dark it gets and that’s something that’s so charming about it. This movie, I, I was on edge thinking that it could get that dark and it never does.
That’s not a criticism, but you’re right. It was approaching that, you know, what’s going to happen here to this family? What’s going to happen to everybody here? Are they going to survive? You know, it seemed to be willing to kill people off at one point. I wasn’t sure
Craig: right
Todd: at one point I thought that was going to kind of avoid killing people or avoid overtly gore even with the first kill I thought this might be one of a few because The first kill happens to a guy in a mask and so it’s not even that good I mean, it’s gruesome, but, you know, they’re clearly avoiding, like, anything, like, really in your face disgusting when you see the body there.
I thought, okay, well, maybe this means the movie’s gonna try to keep it a little light. Eh, not really.
Craig: Oh, yeah, that wasn’t the first kill. There’s the cold open or whatever.
Todd: Oh, that’s right.
Craig: There’s this older Norwegian man, and he’s like bustling about the barn at night.
Todd: Cause there’s something in there.
Yeah.
Craig: He says he’s going to tear it down once and for all. And, and weird things happen. Like a baby carriage rolls out into the open and he uncovers it and there’s a huge bear trap in there. And it was so funny. Which he puts his hand in, what the, what the heck, you moron? I
Clip: don’t, I
Craig: guess he triggers it on purpose, I don’t know.
And then there’s, there’s like a red killer POV, so you know somebody’s in there. Something swings out of the rafters on fire and hits him and knocks him out the window.
Todd: Like a burning tire.
Craig: Yeah,
Todd: it’s so bizarre that you’re like, okay, what, where, where is this going? You know, what is this? So, uh, I really liked the cold open actually.
Craig: I did too. I mean, cause obviously there’s something in the barn, just so you know, and it might set you on fire, who knows, but then it becomes. Every holiday movie, where the family is driving to their new home, and we get the aerial shot of the car. You know, they’re in the car, and they’re talking about, you know, a fresh start.
Clip: Did you guys know the happiest country on earth? Yeah, doesn’t surprise me. It’s like Disneyland for Europe. Now we move to Disneyland. Hell luck. I just wish global warming would hurry up already. Don’t worry, in a couple of years when California is just a scorching desert, I’ll be back. Norway will be just like Santa Monica.
Craig: It’s very cliched in many ways. I don’t care about that. That’s fine. Yeah. horror movies are cliched all the time. It doesn’t bother me. It’s cliched in that way. It’s also cliched in that the mom is actually this. She’s been around for a couple of years, but she really hasn’t connected with the teenage daughter who’s like rebelling, and she’s so mad that she has to leave her friends and move to Norway.
Todd: It’s so typical. It’s so typical. But that’s what’s charming about it. I mean, I was in this all the way. Plus, it has this sense of humor. It’s got humor. Like you said, it’s following the National Lampoon kind of strategy of the family’s a little dysfunctional, but not really like dad’s a goofball kind of out to lunch in a way like he’s just overtly positive, but a nice guy just trying to, you know, keep everyone together and do the best and hijinks ensue, you know, I mean, it’s it just has so much of that flavor that I thought this is a movie I’ll probably come back to.
Oh, yeah, because it’s so full of Christmas warmth.
Craig: Oh, my God. God, I was, I was, I was 10 minutes into it and I texted Alan cause obviously he wasn’t watching with me. He was in the other room and I texted him. This movie is so f ing Christmassy. There’s so much like upbeat Christmas music in it. Jam packed.
Yeah.
Todd: It’s like every minute of this, there’s some Christmas tune playing in the background and it’s great and it’s widescreen. I mean, we’re talking, I don’t know what the aspect ratio is, but it’s super widescreen. And they made every bit of use of that. Like the, every frame is just filled with beautiful stuff.
Whether it’s a landscape, whether it’s inside the barn, whether it’s inside the house. These people are like my parents decorating at Christmas. They go to the nines. There are candles everywhere. Everything’s kind of has a glow to it. Mm hmm. It just felt so warm and cozy. Oh God. It was just so nice. I just loved it.
And what a great way to kick off this month. You know? Oh, I was so
Craig: glad we did
Todd: it first. It’s like
Craig: beautiful, snowy mountains with pine trees, you know, covered in snow. Like it’s just. It’s gorgeous. It’s, I know nothing about this director or cinematographer, so I have no information to share, but based on this beautiful work, loved it.
Yeah. And, and you’re right. It is funny. Okay. So Bill is the dad and he’s played by Martin Starr, who I think I’ve seen in a bunch of stuff, but he’s never like the leading guy. I do remember him from a movie called like, this is the end or something with a lot of really funny, famous. Yes. Bro comedians. He
Todd: was also in a movie we did, uh, he and Amrita Acharya.
Who plays the mom. Who plays the mom. Yeah. They were both in Dead Snow 2, Red vs. Dead, which is another Norwegian horror movie, the zombie one that we just loved. Yeah. They were both the two stars in that, so I’m sure they were plucked from that, but that was like God, what, 10 years before this, at least?
Craig: Martin Star, to me, just kind of has a, uh, kind of awkward, I don’t know, almost uncomfortable air about him, and, but it’s, it’s funny to watch. And he’s kind of like, he doesn’t know what to do. Like, he doesn’t know how to make this relationship between his wife and his kids work. He’s just trying to figure things out.
And it just so happened that he inherited this big, beautiful house. It’s literally in the middle of nowhere, that’s the only, I kind of get it, the teenage daughter, like it literally is in the middle of nowhere. He’s trying to give them a new start, and that’s admirable, and he is, like you said, like he’s ridiculously optimistic, like everything’s gonna be fine.
It is so Christmas Vacation because they pull up. Like they’re driving through the mountains in the snow and he stops the car and he’s like Is that a moose on a sign? Oh, so
Clip: cute. Have you ever seen a moose on a sign before? Come on Let’s take a photo with it. Yeah. Yeah Oh, this is gonna make the most amazing family christmas photo for this year.
Oh,
Craig: yeah. Great idea And so they all get out of the car to take A picture with the sign. And as they’re taking the selfie, an actual moose walks into frame behind them, and then they turn around and they notice, but the dad it’s so Clark Griswold, like he starts like walking up to it, but then the mom moose shows up and like chases them to the car.
It’s very Christmas vacation. Oh,
Todd: a hundred percent.
Craig: But, but that’s before they even get to the house and then they get to the house and it’s gorgeous and there’s a barn. And there’s something in the barn.
Todd: There’s a lot of shit in the barn, for one thing. The barn is as big as the house. Maybe even bigger than the house.
Craig: Well, barns are big. I mean, it is a barn.
Todd: Of course, they have to be big. We find out later that Bill and Carol, as you said, she’s the stepmoms. They’ve been together for a couple years, I guess they said. I don’t remember exactly how long. But Carol apparently is a life coach who has this system that she calls Happy Vision.
Where you just envision things happy. I was actually kind of sad that they didn’t do more with that. I thought we’d, I thought that would be kind of more of a running gag. It’s a bit of a running gag, but, but we don’t hear too much about her whole system, except that it just involves envisioning things happy.
So it’s, it’s simple and dumb. I don’t know how people feel about life coaching out there, but you know, I do kind of, I’m a little skeptical about the whole concept myself, so it’s ripe for parody and that’s her. And it turns out that Bill was one of her. Clients I guess or whatever and she completely turned his life around he
Craig: went to one of her seminars Yeah, they met at one of her seminars.
Todd: That’s so funny I just thought that itself was hilarious and I just cannot help but like this guy
Craig: Well, you know, look he lost his wife and he’s, uh, single guy with two kids now. Like I can totally see like going to an aspirational speaker or whatever. Falling in love. He’s trying Todd. Give
Todd: the guy a break.
Yeah, I get it. I get it. But he’s just so enthusiastic. And that’s the other thing. Like, you know, this may be me as an expat. I’ve been there before where you come to a place and you just want to love it so much because you have no choice. You know, it’s new and it’s fresh and everything’s exciting. This guy’s going over the top.
I love that. They all have hats that say norway on them.
Craig: Oh my gosh. Yes stocking caps
Todd: And just as you expect like you said, you know, they walk through town in the carol older sister is just bitching the whole time And lucas just seems kind of okay Like he’s exploring things and they wander into town the next morning and lucas wanders into this little park It’s called a museum later, but it looks just like a little setup with all these like garden gnomes and elves and these little huts and homes that are, you know, like a display.
Yeah, outdoor.
Craig: Yeah, almost like a little Christmas village or something like that.
Todd: Yeah, it’s a cute little thing, and he’s looking at that. Meanwhile, the rest of the family just wanders right into a coffee shop next door, and they see, they’re talking to each other. Kind of openly trying to make friends with the locals.
Craig: It’s that great moment. It’s the shady locals, you know, like the new, the new folks walk in and silence, like everybody stops what they’re doing and just stares at them. I love that. I do too.
Todd: And there’s a lot of You know, again, this is Norwegian, the director’s Norwegian, the, one of the, the main writer, at least, is Norwegian, and so, like, there’s a lot of poking fun at Norwegian culture in here as well.
I’m not an expert on Norway, I’ve never been there, I’d love to go sometimes. I’ve known a couple Norwegians, we’ve talked about Scandinavian culture in general, and just how people aren’t as overtly friendly. Initially, as Americans, they can come off as kind of cold, just because they’re rather reserved, and they don’t, you know, just smile at you the minute you walk in, like, you kind of have to earn it, in a way, you know, like, Why would I smile at you?
I don’t know you. But, once I do know you, you know, we can become really close and really good friends. So, I just feel like there’s a lot of, there’s a lot of jokes about Norwegian culture kind of poking through in here. Yeah, the locals, it’s so funny because these locals, we know that there’s something in the barn.
Craig: Right.
Todd: And we know that as soon as they say where they are staying, they’re, one of the, one of the guys comes up to him. I think his name is Raymond, right? This bearded guy?
Craig: Yeah, I think so.
Todd: We don’t hear it till later, but he comes up to them. Are
Clip: you the family that’s taking over the Newtown farm? Yeah, that’s us.
Eric was my uncle. I inherited the farm after he passed away.
Yeah, and now we’re moving here.
So these are the happiest people on earth.
Todd: Everybody knows that there’s some problem there. You know, it’s like the family that moved into the haunted house. Right. But nobody is willing to just say something to them about it. Like, they’re just like, kind of oblivious. But like, little things are dropped and it slowly dawns on them that, wait a minute, what’s going on here?
That the house has a reputation for being haunted.
Craig: Yeah, which I actually thought was kind of interesting because I just, I assumed That they knew the truth. I assumed that they knew there was an elf in there.
Todd: Oh, the town you mean?
Craig: Yeah, the town. Yeah, not the family. Yeah, me too. But as it turns out, they don’t.
All they know is that weird things have happened up there, and so they think it’s haunted. Before they went into town, they also met this cop who shows up several times. And I didn’t, I didn’t write down the actress’s name, but she’s really funny. She’s comic relief. And I loved, well, the first thing she speaks to them in Norwegian.
People typically speak to them in Norwegian first, but when they say they’re American, everybody can speak English, so they don’t have any. problems at all, which is my experience too. I visited the Netherlands for a weekend. So it’s not
Todd: like
Craig: I have extensive experience, but my experience was that everybody spoke English.
Clip: Oh, you’re Americans. Yeah. I just got to tell you, I love the Kardashians.
Craig: And, and she’s dropping jokes all over the place. It’s hilarious. There’s later, something happens. We’ll get there, but the cop comes. She’s like, yeah, it looks like something bad happened. And the mom’s like, well, what are you going to do?
She’s like, well, I’ll dust for fingerprints and then I’ll get there. Forensics.
Todd: Forensics out
Craig: here.
She cracked me up. I thought she was hilarious, but you were talking about the, the boy Lucas is just wandering around town and he ends up at that little Christmas village looking kind of place. And a guy comes up behind him. I didn’t figure that guy’s name out until way later either. It’s
Todd: a Tor, Tor. You really don’t hear his name until the last 15 minutes of the movie, I think.
Yeah.
Craig: He tells the kid about. Elves? Does the kid tell him he saw something in the barn because he did see something in the barn?
Todd: The kid sees his display and the guy walks up behind him and says, oh, that’s a barn elf.
Clip: Oh, okay. Are they good or bad? Uh, if you treat the barn elf nice, he will be good to you and help look after the farm.
But if you make him angry, he will do what?
Todd: But he has had, you’re right, like an experience in the barn where he’s been wandering in there and he’s seen things move or shift around or he’s seen the door creak open and close when he was up in his room looking out the window. So he’s kind of prepped to be interested at this point. He
Craig: saw glowing eyes from, yeah, from his window.
But this is where it gets even more gremlins y because there are rules. Three of them. The elf hates changes to the farm and that’s going to be a problem because they’re planning on turning that barn into a hotel, which we should talk about.
Clip: Secondly, he doesn’t like bright artificial light, you know, and he hates loud noises.
So don’t take him to a rave party to put it that way.
Craig: So then they all go home up to this point. And we’re like a half hour in at this point.
Todd: Yeah.
Craig: This feels like a sweet family Christmas movie. I didn’t know at this point what I was getting into and I actually went back to IMDB to check. I thought, I thought this was rated R and I went back to check and I’m like, yes, it is rated R.
I’m like, what is happening? Is it just because they say f every once in a while? No, I mean, it earns its R rating later, but up to this point, it just seems like a sweet family Christmas movie.
Todd: Even with the next scene, it kind of feels that way too. Because, what I didn’t expect, is that, you know, it’s nighttime, and Lucas goes into the barn, intending to see this elf, and he sure enough does.
Like, this elf literally walks out. And he looks great, by the way. Yeah. All the elves. in this movie are fantastic. They’re all played by little people, I think. The main elf, the main barn elf, is played by an actor named Kiran Shah. This guy, ugh, is
Craig: He works all the time.
Todd: veteran of the movies, like, he was, um, Abu in Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark.
Ended up doing the Star Wars movies with Ewok. Legend. You know, we did Gothic. He was the Fuseli monster in Gothic and just, he’s been working nonstop in every movie you’ve seen that, that needs a little person in it. So, uh, he’s pretty old actually.
Craig: But you were saying like, yes, this scene too, when he meets the elf, this feels like ET or something.
And yes, the score behind it feels like those old, like Amblin. Movies, or those old Touchstone movies where this is, this is Mac and me, this is E. T., this is, you know, like, Oh, look, they’re gonna have a nice little friendship. And they do, for a second. For a
Todd: little while, they do! I’m thinking, this isn’t gonna be horrible.
Except, the family has other Airbnb or something.
Craig: That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever, like It’s so
Todd: stupid.
Craig: Heh heh. That barn, it looks sturdier from the outside than it looks from the inside. Like, it is nothing. They, there’s nothing there. Like, it’s just a frame.
Todd: You’re gonna have to basically build a new building in here.
Yes,
Craig: absolutely. At one point, she shows somebody pictures on her phone of the mock up and they had, like, it’s like this luxurious, Condominium kind of thing like much nicer than their house. Yes. Anyway, it’s silly But obviously that’s gonna change some things. Yep barn elves not gonna like that. That’s rule number
Todd: one screwed up
Craig: They’re going to throw a party in the barn.
But first the dad goes to Clear snow, but it’s already done. And not only is it done, it’s just beautiful. Like it’s just perfectly, perfectly cleared.
Todd: He just thinks the town did it for him. I love this library comes in. He’s like, and now you see how social democracy works. Lucas, pay your taxes and they fix stuff for you.
Craig: Oh, the elf then visits Lucas’s room. Cause they’re buddies and there are a lot of fun Christmas songs. And then there’s a whole montage. To Holly Jolly Christmas, where tons of work is getting done. Like, they’re working, but then also the elf, I think, is doing a lot of work, too. But, then, that’s when dad, Clark Griswold’s And so now things are changing, and Lucas tries to tell them about the elf, but nobody will listen.
Todd: Yeah, he even posts the rules on the fridge. It’s so like Gremlins, it’s so cute. You know, obviously this is going badly. So Dad has put Christmas lights up everywhere, Clark Griswold fashion, like you said, and the next morning they get destroyed. Lucas is telling them about the barn elf.
Craig: I like that the cop, because they called the cop, and the cop was like, It could have been the moose coming back for revenge.
Todd: And she cackles as she takes off again in her little snowmobile. It’s so funny. At one point, dad and mom are inside the barn talking and, uh, there’s, I think that’s when they’re setting up for the party and he turns to her and goes, you’re in Norway now, nothing bad ever happens here. And shortly thereafter, he gets whacked by a barrel.
Craig: Yeah. The elf rolls a barrel onto their heads. And Lucas is like, how could you do that? I thought we were friends. They’re not
Todd: then the party
Craig: and then they, they have their party. Yeah. He’s been trying to learn. Norwegian, like with Duolingo or something. Every time he tries, he’s totally off it. Like, he tries to give a toast, but what he says is, My wife and I have made a concoction with my nuts.
Todd: It’s such an old gag, but it just, it works really well.
Craig: It’s, it’s Clark Griswold. It is. So obvious, but the party’s super boring and like super awkward. Like nobody’s talking to each other until they all start drinking and then they all get wasted and the party, they have a great party.
Todd: Carol turns to Bill and says, Norwegians are so friendly.
They just needed alcohol. Lots of it. Who knew? Who knew? So, a woman mentions the Haunted Farm rumors to Carol, so that kind of like clues her in about that. And then Nora, who is still not happy with being here, kind of makes a little friend who cajoles her into drinking some alcohol, and she’s drinking this like, Moonshine?
Moonshine, yeah. That that guy made that says like 96 percent on it, and she ends up puking. On the elf because the elf is underneath the floorboards just like bristling and angry staring up at this party happening And then she pukes on his face
Craig: Yeah, and I guess lucas is worried like he keeps trying to turn the music down and he eventually he shuts the music off And he says party’s over and I don’t remember if everybody leaves at that point or not But the museum guy talks to him.
He’s like, hey, what’s wrong? And he’s like, it’s He’s gonna be mad and like the guy doesn’t believe him, but he can tell that the kid is really upset. So he’s like, well, look, all you have to do is on Christmas Eve put a bowl of porridge with like cinnamon and sugar on the top in the barn as a peace offering and everything will be fine with the elf.
And then they all go to bed for the night and the elf destroys the kitchen. I mean, I guess this guy. Like, even though he doesn’t believe, because he’s the curator, I guess, of that museum, he knows the lore. He doesn’t believe it, but he knows it, so that’s handy. Yeah,
Todd: all of that really surprised me, you know?
Like you said, I just thought everybody knew there was an elf there. It wasn’t like that town was hiding this big secret. And even this guy, I thought, well, he’s the one guy who, like, knows, you know, or at least believes. I mean, he’s got the museum for God’s sake, but no, he doesn’t either. He’s just like, no, these are just, uh, stories.
So, um, that surprised me that even he took a long time to come around to believing that there were elves there. This is where we kind of get our first bit of violence. You know, Bill comes downstairs, sees smashing plates and the kitchen trashed, uh, wanders around with a knife and finds the elf’s hat by the door to the basement.
And when he bends down to pick it up, the elf runs up behind him and kicks him down the basement staircase. And I thought, is Bill dead? No. No, he’s not dead. He’s not dead at all. No, he’s actually fine. Carol picks up a giant leg of lamb from their dinner, I guess, to use as a club, and the elf follows her.
Lucas comes in the room and turns on the lights, and suddenly he’s gone. The elf is gone. And the policewoman comes. And she blames a fox, which, which Bill is only too happy to believe. Like, he’s like, Oh, well, that’s a relief. Thank goodness. Oh, it’s a fox. Aren’t you happy to hear that?
Craig: And it was at that point that I was like, okay, that’s stupid.
Like something forcibly pushed him down the stairs. A fox doesn’t push you down the stairs and close and lock the door. Like foxes don’t do that. But I think that that scene was to establish that. This elf will hurt and or kill them. Like, let’s just make that very clear. The cop also, again, I can’t do her justice.
You re If you, if you haven’t seen this movie, folks, you should watch it. Yeah. You’ll find this cop very funny. She’s like, oh yeah, I guess the party got a little out of control. That can happen when you have a little too much to drink. And she just talks to them like they are Alcoholics. And like, she’s like, yeah, maybe lay off the booze a little bit.
You know, the kids as she’s walking out, she’s walking out. She’s like, don’t drive drunk.
Todd: I halfway expected a Minnesota accent coming out of her mouth. You know, she just has that look and that feel what other movies. You know, is there a character like this? I mean, there’s there’s several like this is a very stereotypical Fargo, maybe that’s the one she was really channeling there.
But anyway, lucas is doing as is instructed. He’s made the porridge He’s put it in the fridge He’s prepared it for for later in the evening when he’s going to bring it out and dad because he’s been Looking up this on the internet is so happy to make lutefisk which You get your Ludovic gag because everybody, if there’s anything anybody knows about Norway, it’s that Ludovic is awful, but they eat it up there.
And Carol freaks out, Bill eats the porridge. And
Craig: the kid’s like, God, it’s just funny as I’m remembering it. It strikes me as funny when the kid says, that was all the porridge we had. What? You
Todd: couldn’t make
Craig: more? What? Make some more. Like, did you use, like the last couple of days? Half a cup of rice? Like?
Todd: As concerned as he is that they follow the rules, ultimately, when he doesn’t or when he can’t, he just kind of is like, eh, about it, you know?
Yeah. It’s not like he storms in to try to stop the party, he puts up with it for a while before he shuts it down. And this thing with the porridge, he went through all this effort, he’s not going to stay up late if necessary just to do that to appease the elf.
Craig: The line suggests something. to me like, oh no, I can’t make more.
But that was, that just seemed ridiculous to me. Yeah, it’s silly. And so instead he gives the elf the lutefisk. Again, I get it. It’s a joke. It’s a gag. I get it. But kind of dumb. It is dumb. Give him a Twinkie or something.
Todd: Just give him a pile of cookies. He loves those cookies. He
Craig: loves those cookies.
Exactly. A
Todd: huge pile with a bow around it or something. But. Of course, the elf doesn’t like Ludafisk, and that’s the joke. He’s enraged. And so the elf turns evil, looks up at the sky, and his teeth are now pointy, and his eyes are black, and he grabs a hammer, and a storm’s outside. And that’s when we get our second kill, basically.
Mm hmm. It’s kind of clunky here. I think this setup is kind of clunky, because the Come on. Okay, so Bill enlisted Raymond to come and play Santa for his, like, teenage kids?
Craig: Well, not on purpose. He was gonna ask Raymond for some other favor, but I don’t remember what that other favor was. That was Raymond was I don’t think that was it.
Raymond was drunk, and Bill said, Can I ask you a favor? And Raymond said, You want me to play Santa on Christmas Eve? I’ll do it. I love playing Santa on Christmas Eve and I, I, I felt like Bill was like, uh,
Todd: Oh, I felt like Bill.
Craig: Yeah.
Todd: I felt like Bill, he nailed it. What Bill was asking for. I, I don’t know. Well,
Craig: maybe you were right.
Maybe you’re right. I don’t know. But yes, I mean, it, Bill is expecting him. So yes, they have this arrangement, but he shows up and he sees the elf standing there, you know, by the barn with the hammer, but he thinks it’s the kid. I mean, he’s really drunk. So whatever. Yeah. But he follows the elf around the side of the barn.
The house, actually. Isn’t it the house? No, it’s the barn. It’s the barn.
Todd: Oh, okay.
Craig: They’re just standing there, facing each other, standing next to the barn, and the elf starts banging his hammer against the barn, which I don’t understand why the family wouldn’t have heard that, but whatever. And he bangs it like two or three times, and the guy’s like, what are you doing?
And I guess eventually he looks up, so the camera looks up too, and there’s a bunch of icicles up there, and It falls right through his head, doesn’t it?
Todd: Yeah.
Craig: I thought it was, I don’t know, I mean, I like a good icicle kill, that’s fun. I thought that he was trying to make the snow fall off the roof. I was like, oh, he’s gonna bury him in the snow.
But, I was wrong.
Todd: And then Bill comes outside and sees Raymond and he’s hanging by the Christmas light. The elf has strung
Craig: him up. Yeah, strung him up outside the barn. So he’s like dangling from Christmas light.
Todd: And this is when pandemonium starts.
Craig: Yeah, exactly. Well, I’m glad that Bill runs inside and is like, we have to get out of here right now.
Like, it’s, it’s so rare that people do that.
Todd: Right.
Craig: But they try to leave. And of course the car won’t start because cars never start in horror movies. And the elf attacks in it. They Somehow get him in front of the car and the kid says turn on the lights and it they turn on the lights and that Like knocks it out.
Yeah, it falls over backwards. This is an unconscious.
Todd: They really don’t like bright lights
Craig: That I don’t know that rule kind of comes and goes It does.
Todd: They’re an awful lot of light, a lot of the movie. They’re in an awful lot of light, and they don’t care. But you shine a flashlight in their face and suddenly it’s like kryptonite.
Craig: It burns them. Yeah, right. I don’t know. But it knocks them out, but the kids run inside because the parents tell them to, and the parents walk over and stand over its body like dummies, and eventually its eyes open up and it screams, and it’s like, It’s projected to us because the parents cover their ears and they show it radiating across the land That this is like a super super loud scream and within seconds an army of elves arrives They just come they just come flooding out of the barn.
Todd: It’s so great.
Craig: I don’t really understand this
Todd: No, I don’t either. Oh, do they have underground tunnels?
Craig: They have underground tunnels. They have Like an elf village, not very far away. So, and it appears to be out in the open. Do those tunnels go to a mystical land? Like, I, I really don’t understand that. And also like.
Are these Woods Elves? And are Woods Elves and Barn Elves friends? I know, right? There’s a lot we don’t know. Yeah, when they showed the call, radiating like, you know, through the wilderness, I thought, oh, well, he’s calling all the other Barn Elves and the Barn Elves will get there somehow. But that doesn’t seem to be the case.
Todd: Yeah.
Craig: This seems to be like a village of a huge village of like what roughly 20 or more
Todd: At least yeah, because at first it looked like a small group, but then they just keep coming at first I thought oh, it’s like it’s like, uh, maybe eight or nine six. Yeah, but then It becomes a home invasion movie where they retreat to their house and the elves are coming in like zombies, breaking through the windows, running, you know, in, and they just keep coming, and it’s like they seem to dispatch them, but more are still there.
I never really got a good handle on how many elves there actually were. I don’t know if it was just like, we were supposed to believe there were just dozens of them, or if they just kept getting up. You know, because it seems really hard to kill these things. You think they’re killing them, but they’re not.
Craig: Yeah, right. Like, it seems like Mom kills one with, like, the star from the top of the Christmas tree. Like, she throws it at its face or something. And then Nora, who it’s been established was a softball player back in the States, sees a bat and picks it up. And it’s, you know, that scene from Signs. And, like, it’s, like, Nora swings away and she just starts, she just starts like nailing them with her bat and the mom protects the kids.
Like, look, the mom, she really loves them and they’re going to see, and they’re, they’re going to bond through this.
Todd: Yeah. There’s definitely that vibe throughout.
Craig: The cop shows up. And it’s, they’re like, Oh my God, you have to help. Blah, blah. And she doesn’t believe them. She thinks they’re drunk again. And they’re like, where’s your gun?
And she’s like, I don’t have a gun. This isn’t America. We don’t just go around shooting people in the face.
Todd: This was a running gag that got a little old, I think. But I mean, I thought it was funny.
Craig: I thought it was hilarious.
Todd: Yeah.
Craig: I, I, I fully, fully believe that that’s how much of the world views us. Oh, yes.
And they’re not far from wrong. So Dude,
Todd: I was literally talking about this at brunch today with a German person. So yeah. That is how they view
Craig: us. Anyway, but she doesn’t believe them until they hear her snowmobile fire up outside and they go outside and one of the elves is just joyriding on the thing.
Like that’s why this is also, it’s so much like Gremlins because I don’t know. When it happens, like, the cop, like, runs out there and, like, tells the elf to get off the snowmobile, but it doesn’t, and then it runs her over, and, like, the snowmobile, like, spews blood all out the back, all over the family, like, just, right in their faces.
Todd: That was hilarious. It was also shocking. I did not expect the cop to go.
Craig: Uh, I kinda did.
Todd: You’re thinking gremlins, yeah, I guess so. But She was so charming.
Craig: She was. I liked her. It’s not like I wanted her to die. I just figured she was disposable, you know? She’s just comic relief. Because I thought they are not going to kill anybody in this family.
They’re just not. True. If they had, I would have been shocked, and I think I wouldn’t have been happy about it.
Todd: Yeah.
Craig: There was a moment when I was scared for the stepmom. But we’re not there yet. Anyway, the elf cra crashes the uh, snowmobile into the barn and we see that gas is leaking out which, remember that for later.
But then the elf gets the gun off the snowmobile, shoots another elf, and then himself, I think more gun. Commentary there. That was so dark. Yeah, cuz he doesn’t know what he’s doing with it He’s not to get too dark, but he’s just like a kid with a gun like he doesn’t get it
Todd: Yeah
Craig: and then there seems to kind of be like an elder elf that is in charge of the Tribe and they’re speaking gibberish language But they’re clearly making a plan and and we kind of get the sense that our main elf like the barn elf isn’t Totally down with the plan.
But at this point, I don’t know All the elves get drunk, which again, it’s totally gremlins. Like it’s the scene in the bar where they’re all just being goofy and drinking and having a great time. But this was also the part where it bothered me because they’re in the house and all the lights are on now, to be fair, or, or were those candles, they were fairly damn, I guess.
Todd: Even they did not have candles that many candles in their house. Plus they crowd around a big, bright TV
Craig: and they’re playing loud music.
Todd: Yeah.
Craig: Maybe woods elves have different rules. Well it could
Todd: be. That could be. Maybe we just say that. The bright still hurts them though. So like
Craig: Maybe barn elves are barn elves because they’re like introverts and they just like to be by themselves and they’re so they’re just like grouchy old people and they don’t like noise and they don’t like change.
So they’re so so basically me.
Todd: You’re a barn elf.
Craig: And the woods elves are cool. They’re like partying, they’re having a good time. Yeah. That must be what it
Todd: is. I mean, they are kind of like isolated from the rest of the tribe, right? I mean, they’re off in somebody’s barn instead of in that little village.
Craig: Right. They’re just the grouchy old men of the elves. I get it. I get it. I feel that.
Todd: You
Craig: feel
Todd: for her. Yeah.
Craig: I do. I mean, they’re not bothering anybody. They’re helpful. I could have a, like, I would love to have a barn elf, like, we’ll just keep to ourselves.
Todd: That guy chopped up so much wood for this dude, and just for a couple cookies.
I could keep it down. I could keep a barn elf happy if that’s the result. Not this result, though. This is, this is shit. This is horrible. They’re, they’re all trashing the place downstairs.
Craig: Yeah. But while they’re downstairs trashing the place, the family is just up there. Hold up in the daughter’s bedroom, and I also thought like what are you doing?
Like you can tell they’re obviously preoccupied downstairs like get out of it out Now is the time. What are you waiting for?
Todd: Yeah, no, nobody’s coming. This is the moment the family comes together This is their big come to Jesus moment. Dad has his big apology speech, but
Craig: somebody says Well, we’ve had worse Christmases.
That was hilarious. Oh my
Todd: god, that was hilarious. And then they’re just describing like some Christmas where they all had to take shits in the bathroom and like one Christmas where they were walking around On the airplane,
Craig: it was even worse.
Todd: I’m like, that was worse than these people being murdered around you?
I don’t know about that. The
Craig: younger than 12 year old son walked in on his grandmother and her lover, Stefan, more than once.
Todd: That would be pretty traumatic, though. I mean, I have to admit.
Craig: Yeah. Anyway, but the elves are destroying the house and the main elf doesn’t like it. So Dad and Lucas go for help on the sled.
Finally. The mom and the daughter, yeah, the mom and the daughter stay behind because the mom got stabbed in the leg. She’s okay, apparently, but she can’t walk.
Todd: They jump out the window onto a conveniently placed pile of snow. That’s helpful.
Craig: I thought that was a funny joke, though, too, because It almost seemed like they expected the same thing I expected.
Oh, we’ll jump onto this pile of snow that will cushion our landing. No, it’s rock hard. Yeah,
Todd: they hit it and slide down. But, but this next bit is just total comedy. Like, they start skiing down the hill. So there’s like, it’s like one of these sleds, kind of a, I guess, like an adult sled or whatever, with a proper seat on it that the kids sitting on and the dad standing behind it.
And as they’re, as they’re, careening down the mountain on this sled. There are two elves behind them in a similar sled and he has a stack of saw blades, like circular saw blades that he is chucking an
Craig: endless stack of them, apparently, but
Todd: you know, it just creates this moment, this action scene.
Craig: Well, and it’s, I know I keep bringing it up.
I apologize if it’s annoying listener, but it, to me, it was the sled scene from national Lampoon.
Todd: Oh yeah. Right
Craig: with a, with a little bit more. You know, higher stakes.
Todd: Right. You’re right. You’re right.
Craig: Meanwhile, the mom and the sister are back at the house and having their
Todd: moment
Craig: and They’re like we’re gonna have to fight or something.
The mom’s like, well, they seem to be afraid of fire Do you have anything flammable in here? And the daughter’s like, well, I Might have some moonshine and the mom says we’re gonna talk about that later. But great get it. It’s perfect And so then they start making, this is, this is so funny. I mean, it’s, the movie jumped the shark a long time ago and again, I don’t care.
Todd: That’s funny. Um,
Craig: but they, they start making Molotov cocktails out of Christmas tree ornament,
Todd: moonshine and sparklers. Yep.
Craig: Yeah. Is that what those were? Were they sparklers? I couldn’t figure it out. I was like, okay, alright, I’ll buy Molotov cocktails and these Christmas ornaments, but where did they get wicks?
But okay, sparklers, alright, fine. And they start throwing them down. Well, I don’t know, I feel like the elves get in there at some point, but
Todd: Eventually they do. Yeah, what happens is they toss them down, they seem to scare the elves off, some of them explode, and you know, all that stuff, so then they’re really happy with themselves, so they just sit down again.
Like, like, okay, and have a heart to heart. What was your purpose here? You know, you’re throwing those Molotov cocktails down there, presumably to destroy the elves or distract them so you could get away, right? But, no, they just, like, okay, well we did that, and they sit down again. I mean, I’d be worried that the elves are gonna try to come up now.
You know, like they do and they do. So it’s kind of silly, but they got to have their moment, their mother and daughter moment, but they hear a noise in the chimney because in the daughter’s room is a fireplace that they haven’t really paid attention to. I guess it’s got doors on it. So, so yeah. So another action scene ensues where these elves try to burst through and they try to shut the door.
And then the mom yells to her daughter, go get help. And she’s like, okay, so she leaves her mom in this room that is about to be besieged by elves to just go, do what? Go after the other two? Like, I didn’t get that at all. It was kind of dumb. But, mom
Craig: I don’t know. I mean, again, it’s the mom, you know, she’s She’s making, she’s sacrificing, like, I mean, you get out of here.
I’ll hold them off. I’ll sacrifice myself for you. And, and the elves get in there, but we don’t see what happens. And then Nora’s in the woods and she’s surrounded by glowing eyes. And then it cuts away from her and we don’t know what happens. And the whole reason that the dad and the son left was because the son knows that the museum guy lives just down the road.
So the elves that were chasing them get hit by a semi and they make it to, uh, The guy’s house and they are like, yeah, it’s true. There’s barn elves and he still doesn’t believe, but he agrees to go with them and take them back home and they get there and immediately see the elves. And he’s like, Oh, they’re real.
And the dad’s like, uh, yeah, we told you. And he’s like,
Todd: what did you do to make them mad? And the kid’s like, we broke all the rules. He’s like, all of them? I’m thinking, yeah, he did. They broke every single rule. They didn’t even get the porridge to the poor little kid. The poor little guy. Oh my God.
Craig: Yeah. So they, they follow, they’re very obvious about it.
They follow the elves into the barn. It’s almost as though.
Todd: They’re being led. They’re not
Craig: scared of them anymore. It’s weird.
Todd: Or the elves don’t care anymore. It’s, or, yeah.
Craig: It’s hard to believe that the elves don’t notice, but whatever, who cares? They see two elves go down into this hatch in the barn that we’ve never seen before, and so they follow them down there into these tunnels that you mentioned before.
And they go through these tunnels and come out, back into the forest, seemingly, and there’s this weird, like, village of these little huts. I mean, they’re tiny, tiny. They almost look like Big eggs or pods or
Todd: something
Craig: But nora and the mom are tied up to a stake in the middle And so they go they run up and they start trying to untie them, but that leader elf shows up with the gun The museum guy tries to negotiate peace.
He’s been talking about this He makes the same joke about not shooting people in the face
Todd: And then he’s talking about the oslo accords. Actually. I thought what what he was saying was quite funny but god the It doesn’t play well now,
Craig: you know? It’s not well timed right now, but yeah, I mean, I understand, I get the concept.
I think they’re making a joke of how, Whatever. I get it. You get it. We all get it. It’s like, here’s, you know,
Todd: you dumb Americans, you think we should rush in and just like destroy everything. It’s kill or be killed. And then, you know, everybody dies. Us Norwegians, we believe in making peace and negotiating.
And so he’s going to do that. But of course, yeah, the gag is going to be that the negotiations don’t work or do they, right? So he starts his negotiations. And the elf shoots him. And the old elf
Craig: shoots him.
Todd: That’s it. Yeah, I wish I saw something.
Craig: I did too, and I thought it was a funny joke. I mean, that elf is kind of like the spike of gremlins, you know?
Yes. You’re not, you’re not going to negotiate with them. I thought it was funny, but I, I also don’t understand this because, again, I’ve only watched it once on my laptop, but I’m pretty sure I saw blood fly. And then here in about three minutes. He’s fine. Even, his arm’s even fine,
Todd: you know, it’s just like, come on.
Craig: Yeah. He was
Todd: shot in the shoulder. The
Craig: L’s, yeah. Yeah. I know, but, people act like that’s not a big deal, like, oh, I’m fine. No, you are
Todd: down. I really thought he was dead at this point, yeah.
Craig: But Lucas sees the, the barn elf and he, when they were friends, he like, made like a sign of peace, like he touches his chest and that means like we’re friends or peace or something, I don’t know.
So he makes that to the main elf. And so the main elf comes and helps cut mom and Nora free, but all of them now are surrounded in the barn. The barn elf argues with the gun elf, and the gun elf goes to shoot him, but the gun is empty.
Todd: Yeah.
Craig: So I guess they run, and they run up into the loft.
Todd: Yeah.
Craig: The, the, the women are like, yeah, we got this.
And so the, the guys jump out. The barn again,
Todd: and the girls blow up the barn because the daughter had been making these little paper airplanes because she was bored in her room pouting earlier. So she makes a paper airplane, lights it on fire and tosses it down. So, you know, it spins in a spiral circle that everybody watches and then hits the, the gasoline that’s on the ground, which, you know, she could have just dropped a piece of paper down there.
It would have been the same. I mean, it was just kind of a dramatic moment. It wouldn’t have looked as good though. Yeah, it wouldn’t have looked as good. It wouldn’t have been as dramatic.
Craig: I thought it was a great shot. And I also kind of liked, I liked the slow shot and it’s over some beautiful slow Christmas carol.
Like, um, I don’t remember which one it was, but you know, the, the, it goes to slow mode to follow this plane, this flaming paper airplane and some beautiful Christmas carols playing in the background
Todd: and
Craig: the elves are all watching it like in awe and wonder.
Todd: Um,
Craig: and then it hits. And we’ve also seen that there’s like tanks or bags of something that’s explosive.
I don’t know what that was, but we’ve seen it a bunch of times.
Todd: Blows up the bomb.
Craig: And so, yeah. It, yeah, it starts to explode. The girls jump out and get there jumping out of a building explosion, which is great. But now, the main elf is sad. Cause he lost his home. Cause he lost his home. And I love that.
Todd: One of the kids says, I think, can he live with us?
And mom says, honey, he can’t stay here. We just piss him off again.
Craig: I, I thought that was funny. I thought that it was going to return to. The cute like fun family thing like we’ll build him a new barn and we won’t break the rules And we’ll all live happy and the ending will be over a montage of family goofy family vacation shots with us in the barn elf and But she’s like my and I thought you know, it’s the it’s the chunk and sloth moment like oh you can live with us now But he’s like can he live with us?
Oh, no No, no, no. That ain’t happening. That’s out of the question. And the kid’s like, but where will he go? And the museum guy is like, I’ve got an idea. So they take him to live in the Elf Museum in town. Now, I don’t understand this either. Uh huh. I guess he just has to be really good at hiding? Cause he’s literally like, in the town square.
Yeah,
Todd: also it’s not a barn. There’s nothing barny about that. I mean there’s a tiny little barn. Well he could, he could help keep it up. I suppose. Yeah, but he’s a new kind of elf now. Now he’s a museum elf. He’s not a barn elf. That’s true.
Craig: Yeah. Yeah. I don’t know. I don’t think he’s going to like it there.
Todd: He’s probably pissed off his fellow elves as well. So like, uh, I don’t, I don’t think screaming and getting it. I mean, he’s probably going to have to take what he can get is what I’m trying to say.
Craig: Yeah. I don’t think it turns out so great for him in the end, but they all stand and look at the Northern Lights and it’s beautiful.
And the dad says, when all said and done. This was a pretty good Christmas. And again, it’s almost that exact shot where the Griswolds are standing outdoors all together, looking up at the sky and all said and done. It was a pretty good Christmas. And then Darlene Love starts singing.
Todd: No little zinger or anything like that.
Craig: I liked it.
Todd: I liked it too. You know, I just, I went online and I saw the reviews are just kind of middling about this and I don’t understand that. I know. We’ve seen a lot of other, you know, Christmas movies that try to be this cute. And they fail. They’re just like, awkward, or a little uneven, or maybe a little too cliche.
I mean, this had it, this was cliche in many ways, but I don’t know, there was just, there was just enough about it that was interesting and different that I, that I really enjoyed it. Plus, you know, we said it a million times in the beginning, it’s just very heartwarming. It’s just Christmassy through in and throughout, and I enjoyed it a lot.
Craig: Yeah, it’s really fun. Like, it’s not a 10, you know, like, it’s not, We’ve, we’ve reviewed better Christmas movies, but I still think it’s good. I had a lot of fun watching it. It certainly wasn’t boring. It was very funny in places. There were lots of fun gags. There was a funny gag where two of the elves were after they were drunk, they were standing in the yard peeing and one obviously looks over at the other one’s dick and starts laughing.
Just goofy stuff like that. Yeah. The family stuff was cliche, but. Typical, but whatever. I still enjoyed it. It’s still, you know, it landed. I totally thought it landed. I didn’t think, you know, there were parts that were goofy. It certainly jumped the shark in places, but movies like this do all the time. Was it entirely unique and creative?
No, we’ve seen elf movies before. We’ve seen these kind of home invasion Christmas movies before. But I like them and this is a good one. So yeah, I will recommend this to people. I think it’s a lot of fun and I think it’s got a lot of appeal. Again, Christmas, family stuff,
Clip: Christmas
Craig: music, comedy. Some people might be turned off by the gore.
And if you’re not big into gore, then you probably, you know, it’s probably not going to be for you. Cause it does get gory in that second half. It does. There’s lots of blood.
Todd: There’s a lot of blood, but even then it’s not too bad. It’s just
Craig: CGI blood splatters.
Todd: Yeah, it’s some blood splatters here and there, like, when we talked about, for example, the two elves, like, the one shooting himself in the face and the other one, it’s an off screen thing.
So, like, they do actually restrain themselves considerably on, on making things too graphic. They could have gone further and they didn’t. I felt like they were trying to keep it light, you know, that’s what made it a little different from Krampus. Krampus felt kind of deep. Krampus had this, like, serious message, more or less, by the end of it.
Whereas this, you know, it doesn’t, it doesn’t really have the serious message. It’s just, uh,
Craig: well, appreciate your family.
Todd: Yeah. Appreciate your family. You come together at Christmas time to solve your problems and your challenges and, and don’t piss off the barn elves.
Craig: Right. Keep it down.
Todd: Yeah. Keep it down and keep the lights dim.
Well, thank you guys so much for listening. Really, we’re so excited about this holiday season coming up. If you have ideas for movies that are coming to your mind as you hear this, that we haven’t done yet, send us a message anywhere you can find us online. You just Google two guys in a chainsaw podcast.
You’ll find our website at ChainsawHorror. com. There’s even a speak to us button at the top where you can just record a one minute message, actually, and send that straight to us. Or you can just shoot us an email, leave us a review as well on your favorite podcast channel. So there are a lot of ways to get through to us and let us know what you think of the show and what you’d like to see us do this holiday season and beyond.
We hope you’re going to have a good, safe, and happy one. And we will be with you every step of the way these next three weeks. Until next time, I’m Todd. And I’m Craig. With Two Guys and a Chainsaw.
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Manage episode 454623939 series 98583
Whoo hoo! What a load of Christmas cheer we received with this delightful murderous elf tale! Brimming with holiday goodness from beginning to end, this Norwegian film from last year turned out to be the PERFECT beginning to our annual month of holiday horrror! Thanks for the recommendations, guys!
There’s Something In The Barn (2023)
Episode 418, 2 Guys and a Chainsaw Horror Movie Review Podcast
Todd: Hello and welcome to another episode of Two Guys and a Chainsaw. I’m Todd.
Craig: And I’m Craig.
Todd: We are kicking off the Christmas season, Craig.
Craig: It’s pretty exciting.
Todd: I love it. I just so look forward. I mean, Halloween is fun, but there’s something about these Christmas horror movies that are really fun to pick out, really fun to watch, and it’s almost like a challenge, like no matter what, Halloween’s scary, right?
So, you know, Halloween’s going to be about horror, but can this movie put me in the Christmas spirit? And be adequately scary, fun, whatever. That is the challenge. It’s kind of in my mind, as we turn on one of these movies that we’ve selected for holidays. Now, what, in our ninth year? Yeah, this is the ninth time that we have done Christmas horror movies.
Craig: There for a while, we were getting a little worried that we’d, do all the good ones and run out, but it seems like, I don’t know, in the last 10 years, they’ve been making a lot of them.
Todd: It’s so crazy, actually.
Craig: Some of them bad, obviously, and a lot of them cheap knockoffs of some of the better ones. But there are some good ones out there, and I’m excited about the stuff we’re doing this month.
Todd: You’re so right. Like 10, 15 years ago, like Christmas horror movies were kind of a rare commodity. And now there’s 10 every year. It seems like again, like you said, differing in quality, this one that we’re doing today. Well, you know, we put it out to our patrons. What would you guys, do you guys have suggestions for us?
We have a running list that we have going all the time. I think this one came up from several people this year and you seemed very keen on doing it. And it only came out last year as well. It’s a 2023 Norwegian horror comedy. called There’s Something in the Barn, directed by Magnus Martens, and, uh, man, I was getting serious Rare Export vibes from this one, which was one of the, one of the first movies we ever did, also a Norwegian horror film.
And several of the Christmas horror movies that we’ve done over the years have been Norwegian for some reason. I don’t know why that is. I really have no idea, but it’s been fun. Just the fact that this was a Norwegian movie was exciting me because I just love the quirky humor And I was looking forward to potentially really beautiful like scenery and stuff like that Maybe some cultural stuff and in those ways it didn’t disappoint me at all.
Craig: No. Not at all, it was Super cute. Yeah. I didn’t know anything about this except for any image you see of it kind of shows like an elf peeking out of the barn. So you know what the something in the barn is.
Todd: There’s something in the barn, probably an elf, maybe more, but definitely an elf.
Craig: I didn’t want to read too much about it because I thought if there are going to be any surprises, I don’t want them to be spoiled for me.
So I didn’t know much about it. When it comes right down to it, I really enjoyed it. I read a review after I read it that said it’s like Gremlins meets National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation. Yes. And I had definitely thought about both of those movies while I was watching this. In fact, I think there are at least one or two direct homages.
At one point, somebody climbs up on a ladder and it gets pushed back and he falls flat back on his back and it shows an aerial shot of his face. It’s the exact same shot from Christmas Vacation, basically. And I feel like there were a couple of others. Definitely thought of Gremlins 2.
Todd: There was a point where I think the dad made a big show of plugging in the Christmas lights, even though it doesn’t have the same result.
Yes, yes! It’s like the same shot, it’s so cute. Yes,
Craig: yes, exactly. But then also, Krampus, just because they’re similar, not because it necessarily reminded me of it. Actually, if I have any critique of this, and I don’t have a lot, I thought it was Good. I would say it’s kind of like Krampus light. It’s going for the same things.
This is one of those movies that you and I love that don’t shy away from the violence and gore, but also have like the heartwarming element, you know, like, like, love your family because it’s Christmas. And I thought that it delivered on that. Uh, level two, maybe not to the, you know, Krampus is one of my now favorite Christmas movies of all time.
Yeah. This is not one of my favorites of all time, but I feel like that’s what it’s going for. Yeah. And it, it does a good job.
Todd: Well, Krampus surprises you at how dark it gets and that’s something that’s so charming about it. This movie, I, I was on edge thinking that it could get that dark and it never does.
That’s not a criticism, but you’re right. It was approaching that, you know, what’s going to happen here to this family? What’s going to happen to everybody here? Are they going to survive? You know, it seemed to be willing to kill people off at one point. I wasn’t sure
Craig: right
Todd: at one point I thought that was going to kind of avoid killing people or avoid overtly gore even with the first kill I thought this might be one of a few because The first kill happens to a guy in a mask and so it’s not even that good I mean, it’s gruesome, but, you know, they’re clearly avoiding, like, anything, like, really in your face disgusting when you see the body there.
I thought, okay, well, maybe this means the movie’s gonna try to keep it a little light. Eh, not really.
Craig: Oh, yeah, that wasn’t the first kill. There’s the cold open or whatever.
Todd: Oh, that’s right.
Craig: There’s this older Norwegian man, and he’s like bustling about the barn at night.
Todd: Cause there’s something in there.
Yeah.
Craig: He says he’s going to tear it down once and for all. And, and weird things happen. Like a baby carriage rolls out into the open and he uncovers it and there’s a huge bear trap in there. And it was so funny. Which he puts his hand in, what the, what the heck, you moron? I
Clip: don’t, I
Craig: guess he triggers it on purpose, I don’t know.
And then there’s, there’s like a red killer POV, so you know somebody’s in there. Something swings out of the rafters on fire and hits him and knocks him out the window.
Todd: Like a burning tire.
Craig: Yeah,
Todd: it’s so bizarre that you’re like, okay, what, where, where is this going? You know, what is this? So, uh, I really liked the cold open actually.
Craig: I did too. I mean, cause obviously there’s something in the barn, just so you know, and it might set you on fire, who knows, but then it becomes. Every holiday movie, where the family is driving to their new home, and we get the aerial shot of the car. You know, they’re in the car, and they’re talking about, you know, a fresh start.
Clip: Did you guys know the happiest country on earth? Yeah, doesn’t surprise me. It’s like Disneyland for Europe. Now we move to Disneyland. Hell luck. I just wish global warming would hurry up already. Don’t worry, in a couple of years when California is just a scorching desert, I’ll be back. Norway will be just like Santa Monica.
Craig: It’s very cliched in many ways. I don’t care about that. That’s fine. Yeah. horror movies are cliched all the time. It doesn’t bother me. It’s cliched in that way. It’s also cliched in that the mom is actually this. She’s been around for a couple of years, but she really hasn’t connected with the teenage daughter who’s like rebelling, and she’s so mad that she has to leave her friends and move to Norway.
Todd: It’s so typical. It’s so typical. But that’s what’s charming about it. I mean, I was in this all the way. Plus, it has this sense of humor. It’s got humor. Like you said, it’s following the National Lampoon kind of strategy of the family’s a little dysfunctional, but not really like dad’s a goofball kind of out to lunch in a way like he’s just overtly positive, but a nice guy just trying to, you know, keep everyone together and do the best and hijinks ensue, you know, I mean, it’s it just has so much of that flavor that I thought this is a movie I’ll probably come back to.
Oh, yeah, because it’s so full of Christmas warmth.
Craig: Oh, my God. God, I was, I was, I was 10 minutes into it and I texted Alan cause obviously he wasn’t watching with me. He was in the other room and I texted him. This movie is so f ing Christmassy. There’s so much like upbeat Christmas music in it. Jam packed.
Yeah.
Todd: It’s like every minute of this, there’s some Christmas tune playing in the background and it’s great and it’s widescreen. I mean, we’re talking, I don’t know what the aspect ratio is, but it’s super widescreen. And they made every bit of use of that. Like the, every frame is just filled with beautiful stuff.
Whether it’s a landscape, whether it’s inside the barn, whether it’s inside the house. These people are like my parents decorating at Christmas. They go to the nines. There are candles everywhere. Everything’s kind of has a glow to it. Mm hmm. It just felt so warm and cozy. Oh God. It was just so nice. I just loved it.
And what a great way to kick off this month. You know? Oh, I was so
Craig: glad we did
Todd: it first. It’s like
Craig: beautiful, snowy mountains with pine trees, you know, covered in snow. Like it’s just. It’s gorgeous. It’s, I know nothing about this director or cinematographer, so I have no information to share, but based on this beautiful work, loved it.
Yeah. And, and you’re right. It is funny. Okay. So Bill is the dad and he’s played by Martin Starr, who I think I’ve seen in a bunch of stuff, but he’s never like the leading guy. I do remember him from a movie called like, this is the end or something with a lot of really funny, famous. Yes. Bro comedians. He
Todd: was also in a movie we did, uh, he and Amrita Acharya.
Who plays the mom. Who plays the mom. Yeah. They were both in Dead Snow 2, Red vs. Dead, which is another Norwegian horror movie, the zombie one that we just loved. Yeah. They were both the two stars in that, so I’m sure they were plucked from that, but that was like God, what, 10 years before this, at least?
Craig: Martin Star, to me, just kind of has a, uh, kind of awkward, I don’t know, almost uncomfortable air about him, and, but it’s, it’s funny to watch. And he’s kind of like, he doesn’t know what to do. Like, he doesn’t know how to make this relationship between his wife and his kids work. He’s just trying to figure things out.
And it just so happened that he inherited this big, beautiful house. It’s literally in the middle of nowhere, that’s the only, I kind of get it, the teenage daughter, like it literally is in the middle of nowhere. He’s trying to give them a new start, and that’s admirable, and he is, like you said, like he’s ridiculously optimistic, like everything’s gonna be fine.
It is so Christmas Vacation because they pull up. Like they’re driving through the mountains in the snow and he stops the car and he’s like Is that a moose on a sign? Oh, so
Clip: cute. Have you ever seen a moose on a sign before? Come on Let’s take a photo with it. Yeah. Yeah Oh, this is gonna make the most amazing family christmas photo for this year.
Oh,
Craig: yeah. Great idea And so they all get out of the car to take A picture with the sign. And as they’re taking the selfie, an actual moose walks into frame behind them, and then they turn around and they notice, but the dad it’s so Clark Griswold, like he starts like walking up to it, but then the mom moose shows up and like chases them to the car.
It’s very Christmas vacation. Oh,
Todd: a hundred percent.
Craig: But, but that’s before they even get to the house and then they get to the house and it’s gorgeous and there’s a barn. And there’s something in the barn.
Todd: There’s a lot of shit in the barn, for one thing. The barn is as big as the house. Maybe even bigger than the house.
Craig: Well, barns are big. I mean, it is a barn.
Todd: Of course, they have to be big. We find out later that Bill and Carol, as you said, she’s the stepmoms. They’ve been together for a couple years, I guess they said. I don’t remember exactly how long. But Carol apparently is a life coach who has this system that she calls Happy Vision.
Where you just envision things happy. I was actually kind of sad that they didn’t do more with that. I thought we’d, I thought that would be kind of more of a running gag. It’s a bit of a running gag, but, but we don’t hear too much about her whole system, except that it just involves envisioning things happy.
So it’s, it’s simple and dumb. I don’t know how people feel about life coaching out there, but you know, I do kind of, I’m a little skeptical about the whole concept myself, so it’s ripe for parody and that’s her. And it turns out that Bill was one of her. Clients I guess or whatever and she completely turned his life around he
Craig: went to one of her seminars Yeah, they met at one of her seminars.
Todd: That’s so funny I just thought that itself was hilarious and I just cannot help but like this guy
Craig: Well, you know, look he lost his wife and he’s, uh, single guy with two kids now. Like I can totally see like going to an aspirational speaker or whatever. Falling in love. He’s trying Todd. Give
Todd: the guy a break.
Yeah, I get it. I get it. But he’s just so enthusiastic. And that’s the other thing. Like, you know, this may be me as an expat. I’ve been there before where you come to a place and you just want to love it so much because you have no choice. You know, it’s new and it’s fresh and everything’s exciting. This guy’s going over the top.
I love that. They all have hats that say norway on them.
Craig: Oh my gosh. Yes stocking caps
Todd: And just as you expect like you said, you know, they walk through town in the carol older sister is just bitching the whole time And lucas just seems kind of okay Like he’s exploring things and they wander into town the next morning and lucas wanders into this little park It’s called a museum later, but it looks just like a little setup with all these like garden gnomes and elves and these little huts and homes that are, you know, like a display.
Yeah, outdoor.
Craig: Yeah, almost like a little Christmas village or something like that.
Todd: Yeah, it’s a cute little thing, and he’s looking at that. Meanwhile, the rest of the family just wanders right into a coffee shop next door, and they see, they’re talking to each other. Kind of openly trying to make friends with the locals.
Craig: It’s that great moment. It’s the shady locals, you know, like the new, the new folks walk in and silence, like everybody stops what they’re doing and just stares at them. I love that. I do too.
Todd: And there’s a lot of You know, again, this is Norwegian, the director’s Norwegian, the, one of the, the main writer, at least, is Norwegian, and so, like, there’s a lot of poking fun at Norwegian culture in here as well.
I’m not an expert on Norway, I’ve never been there, I’d love to go sometimes. I’ve known a couple Norwegians, we’ve talked about Scandinavian culture in general, and just how people aren’t as overtly friendly. Initially, as Americans, they can come off as kind of cold, just because they’re rather reserved, and they don’t, you know, just smile at you the minute you walk in, like, you kind of have to earn it, in a way, you know, like, Why would I smile at you?
I don’t know you. But, once I do know you, you know, we can become really close and really good friends. So, I just feel like there’s a lot of, there’s a lot of jokes about Norwegian culture kind of poking through in here. Yeah, the locals, it’s so funny because these locals, we know that there’s something in the barn.
Craig: Right.
Todd: And we know that as soon as they say where they are staying, they’re, one of the, one of the guys comes up to him. I think his name is Raymond, right? This bearded guy?
Craig: Yeah, I think so.
Todd: We don’t hear it till later, but he comes up to them. Are
Clip: you the family that’s taking over the Newtown farm? Yeah, that’s us.
Eric was my uncle. I inherited the farm after he passed away.
Yeah, and now we’re moving here.
So these are the happiest people on earth.
Todd: Everybody knows that there’s some problem there. You know, it’s like the family that moved into the haunted house. Right. But nobody is willing to just say something to them about it. Like, they’re just like, kind of oblivious. But like, little things are dropped and it slowly dawns on them that, wait a minute, what’s going on here?
That the house has a reputation for being haunted.
Craig: Yeah, which I actually thought was kind of interesting because I just, I assumed That they knew the truth. I assumed that they knew there was an elf in there.
Todd: Oh, the town you mean?
Craig: Yeah, the town. Yeah, not the family. Yeah, me too. But as it turns out, they don’t.
All they know is that weird things have happened up there, and so they think it’s haunted. Before they went into town, they also met this cop who shows up several times. And I didn’t, I didn’t write down the actress’s name, but she’s really funny. She’s comic relief. And I loved, well, the first thing she speaks to them in Norwegian.
People typically speak to them in Norwegian first, but when they say they’re American, everybody can speak English, so they don’t have any. problems at all, which is my experience too. I visited the Netherlands for a weekend. So it’s not
Todd: like
Craig: I have extensive experience, but my experience was that everybody spoke English.
Clip: Oh, you’re Americans. Yeah. I just got to tell you, I love the Kardashians.
Craig: And, and she’s dropping jokes all over the place. It’s hilarious. There’s later, something happens. We’ll get there, but the cop comes. She’s like, yeah, it looks like something bad happened. And the mom’s like, well, what are you going to do?
She’s like, well, I’ll dust for fingerprints and then I’ll get there. Forensics.
Todd: Forensics out
Craig: here.
She cracked me up. I thought she was hilarious, but you were talking about the, the boy Lucas is just wandering around town and he ends up at that little Christmas village looking kind of place. And a guy comes up behind him. I didn’t figure that guy’s name out until way later either. It’s
Todd: a Tor, Tor. You really don’t hear his name until the last 15 minutes of the movie, I think.
Yeah.
Craig: He tells the kid about. Elves? Does the kid tell him he saw something in the barn because he did see something in the barn?
Todd: The kid sees his display and the guy walks up behind him and says, oh, that’s a barn elf.
Clip: Oh, okay. Are they good or bad? Uh, if you treat the barn elf nice, he will be good to you and help look after the farm.
But if you make him angry, he will do what?
Todd: But he has had, you’re right, like an experience in the barn where he’s been wandering in there and he’s seen things move or shift around or he’s seen the door creak open and close when he was up in his room looking out the window. So he’s kind of prepped to be interested at this point. He
Craig: saw glowing eyes from, yeah, from his window.
But this is where it gets even more gremlins y because there are rules. Three of them. The elf hates changes to the farm and that’s going to be a problem because they’re planning on turning that barn into a hotel, which we should talk about.
Clip: Secondly, he doesn’t like bright artificial light, you know, and he hates loud noises.
So don’t take him to a rave party to put it that way.
Craig: So then they all go home up to this point. And we’re like a half hour in at this point.
Todd: Yeah.
Craig: This feels like a sweet family Christmas movie. I didn’t know at this point what I was getting into and I actually went back to IMDB to check. I thought, I thought this was rated R and I went back to check and I’m like, yes, it is rated R.
I’m like, what is happening? Is it just because they say f every once in a while? No, I mean, it earns its R rating later, but up to this point, it just seems like a sweet family Christmas movie.
Todd: Even with the next scene, it kind of feels that way too. Because, what I didn’t expect, is that, you know, it’s nighttime, and Lucas goes into the barn, intending to see this elf, and he sure enough does.
Like, this elf literally walks out. And he looks great, by the way. Yeah. All the elves. in this movie are fantastic. They’re all played by little people, I think. The main elf, the main barn elf, is played by an actor named Kiran Shah. This guy, ugh, is
Craig: He works all the time.
Todd: veteran of the movies, like, he was, um, Abu in Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark.
Ended up doing the Star Wars movies with Ewok. Legend. You know, we did Gothic. He was the Fuseli monster in Gothic and just, he’s been working nonstop in every movie you’ve seen that, that needs a little person in it. So, uh, he’s pretty old actually.
Craig: But you were saying like, yes, this scene too, when he meets the elf, this feels like ET or something.
And yes, the score behind it feels like those old, like Amblin. Movies, or those old Touchstone movies where this is, this is Mac and me, this is E. T., this is, you know, like, Oh, look, they’re gonna have a nice little friendship. And they do, for a second. For a
Todd: little while, they do! I’m thinking, this isn’t gonna be horrible.
Except, the family has other Airbnb or something.
Craig: That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever, like It’s so
Todd: stupid.
Craig: Heh heh. That barn, it looks sturdier from the outside than it looks from the inside. Like, it is nothing. They, there’s nothing there. Like, it’s just a frame.
Todd: You’re gonna have to basically build a new building in here.
Yes,
Craig: absolutely. At one point, she shows somebody pictures on her phone of the mock up and they had, like, it’s like this luxurious, Condominium kind of thing like much nicer than their house. Yes. Anyway, it’s silly But obviously that’s gonna change some things. Yep barn elves not gonna like that. That’s rule number
Todd: one screwed up
Craig: They’re going to throw a party in the barn.
But first the dad goes to Clear snow, but it’s already done. And not only is it done, it’s just beautiful. Like it’s just perfectly, perfectly cleared.
Todd: He just thinks the town did it for him. I love this library comes in. He’s like, and now you see how social democracy works. Lucas, pay your taxes and they fix stuff for you.
Craig: Oh, the elf then visits Lucas’s room. Cause they’re buddies and there are a lot of fun Christmas songs. And then there’s a whole montage. To Holly Jolly Christmas, where tons of work is getting done. Like, they’re working, but then also the elf, I think, is doing a lot of work, too. But, then, that’s when dad, Clark Griswold’s And so now things are changing, and Lucas tries to tell them about the elf, but nobody will listen.
Todd: Yeah, he even posts the rules on the fridge. It’s so like Gremlins, it’s so cute. You know, obviously this is going badly. So Dad has put Christmas lights up everywhere, Clark Griswold fashion, like you said, and the next morning they get destroyed. Lucas is telling them about the barn elf.
Craig: I like that the cop, because they called the cop, and the cop was like, It could have been the moose coming back for revenge.
Todd: And she cackles as she takes off again in her little snowmobile. It’s so funny. At one point, dad and mom are inside the barn talking and, uh, there’s, I think that’s when they’re setting up for the party and he turns to her and goes, you’re in Norway now, nothing bad ever happens here. And shortly thereafter, he gets whacked by a barrel.
Craig: Yeah. The elf rolls a barrel onto their heads. And Lucas is like, how could you do that? I thought we were friends. They’re not
Todd: then the party
Craig: and then they, they have their party. Yeah. He’s been trying to learn. Norwegian, like with Duolingo or something. Every time he tries, he’s totally off it. Like, he tries to give a toast, but what he says is, My wife and I have made a concoction with my nuts.
Todd: It’s such an old gag, but it just, it works really well.
Craig: It’s, it’s Clark Griswold. It is. So obvious, but the party’s super boring and like super awkward. Like nobody’s talking to each other until they all start drinking and then they all get wasted and the party, they have a great party.
Todd: Carol turns to Bill and says, Norwegians are so friendly.
They just needed alcohol. Lots of it. Who knew? Who knew? So, a woman mentions the Haunted Farm rumors to Carol, so that kind of like clues her in about that. And then Nora, who is still not happy with being here, kind of makes a little friend who cajoles her into drinking some alcohol, and she’s drinking this like, Moonshine?
Moonshine, yeah. That that guy made that says like 96 percent on it, and she ends up puking. On the elf because the elf is underneath the floorboards just like bristling and angry staring up at this party happening And then she pukes on his face
Craig: Yeah, and I guess lucas is worried like he keeps trying to turn the music down and he eventually he shuts the music off And he says party’s over and I don’t remember if everybody leaves at that point or not But the museum guy talks to him.
He’s like, hey, what’s wrong? And he’s like, it’s He’s gonna be mad and like the guy doesn’t believe him, but he can tell that the kid is really upset. So he’s like, well, look, all you have to do is on Christmas Eve put a bowl of porridge with like cinnamon and sugar on the top in the barn as a peace offering and everything will be fine with the elf.
And then they all go to bed for the night and the elf destroys the kitchen. I mean, I guess this guy. Like, even though he doesn’t believe, because he’s the curator, I guess, of that museum, he knows the lore. He doesn’t believe it, but he knows it, so that’s handy. Yeah,
Todd: all of that really surprised me, you know?
Like you said, I just thought everybody knew there was an elf there. It wasn’t like that town was hiding this big secret. And even this guy, I thought, well, he’s the one guy who, like, knows, you know, or at least believes. I mean, he’s got the museum for God’s sake, but no, he doesn’t either. He’s just like, no, these are just, uh, stories.
So, um, that surprised me that even he took a long time to come around to believing that there were elves there. This is where we kind of get our first bit of violence. You know, Bill comes downstairs, sees smashing plates and the kitchen trashed, uh, wanders around with a knife and finds the elf’s hat by the door to the basement.
And when he bends down to pick it up, the elf runs up behind him and kicks him down the basement staircase. And I thought, is Bill dead? No. No, he’s not dead. He’s not dead at all. No, he’s actually fine. Carol picks up a giant leg of lamb from their dinner, I guess, to use as a club, and the elf follows her.
Lucas comes in the room and turns on the lights, and suddenly he’s gone. The elf is gone. And the policewoman comes. And she blames a fox, which, which Bill is only too happy to believe. Like, he’s like, Oh, well, that’s a relief. Thank goodness. Oh, it’s a fox. Aren’t you happy to hear that?
Craig: And it was at that point that I was like, okay, that’s stupid.
Like something forcibly pushed him down the stairs. A fox doesn’t push you down the stairs and close and lock the door. Like foxes don’t do that. But I think that that scene was to establish that. This elf will hurt and or kill them. Like, let’s just make that very clear. The cop also, again, I can’t do her justice.
You re If you, if you haven’t seen this movie, folks, you should watch it. Yeah. You’ll find this cop very funny. She’s like, oh yeah, I guess the party got a little out of control. That can happen when you have a little too much to drink. And she just talks to them like they are Alcoholics. And like, she’s like, yeah, maybe lay off the booze a little bit.
You know, the kids as she’s walking out, she’s walking out. She’s like, don’t drive drunk.
Todd: I halfway expected a Minnesota accent coming out of her mouth. You know, she just has that look and that feel what other movies. You know, is there a character like this? I mean, there’s there’s several like this is a very stereotypical Fargo, maybe that’s the one she was really channeling there.
But anyway, lucas is doing as is instructed. He’s made the porridge He’s put it in the fridge He’s prepared it for for later in the evening when he’s going to bring it out and dad because he’s been Looking up this on the internet is so happy to make lutefisk which You get your Ludovic gag because everybody, if there’s anything anybody knows about Norway, it’s that Ludovic is awful, but they eat it up there.
And Carol freaks out, Bill eats the porridge. And
Craig: the kid’s like, God, it’s just funny as I’m remembering it. It strikes me as funny when the kid says, that was all the porridge we had. What? You
Todd: couldn’t make
Craig: more? What? Make some more. Like, did you use, like the last couple of days? Half a cup of rice? Like?
Todd: As concerned as he is that they follow the rules, ultimately, when he doesn’t or when he can’t, he just kind of is like, eh, about it, you know?
Yeah. It’s not like he storms in to try to stop the party, he puts up with it for a while before he shuts it down. And this thing with the porridge, he went through all this effort, he’s not going to stay up late if necessary just to do that to appease the elf.
Craig: The line suggests something. to me like, oh no, I can’t make more.
But that was, that just seemed ridiculous to me. Yeah, it’s silly. And so instead he gives the elf the lutefisk. Again, I get it. It’s a joke. It’s a gag. I get it. But kind of dumb. It is dumb. Give him a Twinkie or something.
Todd: Just give him a pile of cookies. He loves those cookies. He
Craig: loves those cookies.
Exactly. A
Todd: huge pile with a bow around it or something. But. Of course, the elf doesn’t like Ludafisk, and that’s the joke. He’s enraged. And so the elf turns evil, looks up at the sky, and his teeth are now pointy, and his eyes are black, and he grabs a hammer, and a storm’s outside. And that’s when we get our second kill, basically.
Mm hmm. It’s kind of clunky here. I think this setup is kind of clunky, because the Come on. Okay, so Bill enlisted Raymond to come and play Santa for his, like, teenage kids?
Craig: Well, not on purpose. He was gonna ask Raymond for some other favor, but I don’t remember what that other favor was. That was Raymond was I don’t think that was it.
Raymond was drunk, and Bill said, Can I ask you a favor? And Raymond said, You want me to play Santa on Christmas Eve? I’ll do it. I love playing Santa on Christmas Eve and I, I, I felt like Bill was like, uh,
Todd: Oh, I felt like Bill.
Craig: Yeah.
Todd: I felt like Bill, he nailed it. What Bill was asking for. I, I don’t know. Well,
Craig: maybe you were right.
Maybe you’re right. I don’t know. But yes, I mean, it, Bill is expecting him. So yes, they have this arrangement, but he shows up and he sees the elf standing there, you know, by the barn with the hammer, but he thinks it’s the kid. I mean, he’s really drunk. So whatever. Yeah. But he follows the elf around the side of the barn.
The house, actually. Isn’t it the house? No, it’s the barn. It’s the barn.
Todd: Oh, okay.
Craig: They’re just standing there, facing each other, standing next to the barn, and the elf starts banging his hammer against the barn, which I don’t understand why the family wouldn’t have heard that, but whatever. And he bangs it like two or three times, and the guy’s like, what are you doing?
And I guess eventually he looks up, so the camera looks up too, and there’s a bunch of icicles up there, and It falls right through his head, doesn’t it?
Todd: Yeah.
Craig: I thought it was, I don’t know, I mean, I like a good icicle kill, that’s fun. I thought that he was trying to make the snow fall off the roof. I was like, oh, he’s gonna bury him in the snow.
But, I was wrong.
Todd: And then Bill comes outside and sees Raymond and he’s hanging by the Christmas light. The elf has strung
Craig: him up. Yeah, strung him up outside the barn. So he’s like dangling from Christmas light.
Todd: And this is when pandemonium starts.
Craig: Yeah, exactly. Well, I’m glad that Bill runs inside and is like, we have to get out of here right now.
Like, it’s, it’s so rare that people do that.
Todd: Right.
Craig: But they try to leave. And of course the car won’t start because cars never start in horror movies. And the elf attacks in it. They Somehow get him in front of the car and the kid says turn on the lights and it they turn on the lights and that Like knocks it out.
Yeah, it falls over backwards. This is an unconscious.
Todd: They really don’t like bright lights
Craig: That I don’t know that rule kind of comes and goes It does.
Todd: They’re an awful lot of light, a lot of the movie. They’re in an awful lot of light, and they don’t care. But you shine a flashlight in their face and suddenly it’s like kryptonite.
Craig: It burns them. Yeah, right. I don’t know. But it knocks them out, but the kids run inside because the parents tell them to, and the parents walk over and stand over its body like dummies, and eventually its eyes open up and it screams, and it’s like, It’s projected to us because the parents cover their ears and they show it radiating across the land That this is like a super super loud scream and within seconds an army of elves arrives They just come they just come flooding out of the barn.
Todd: It’s so great.
Craig: I don’t really understand this
Todd: No, I don’t either. Oh, do they have underground tunnels?
Craig: They have underground tunnels. They have Like an elf village, not very far away. So, and it appears to be out in the open. Do those tunnels go to a mystical land? Like, I, I really don’t understand that. And also like.
Are these Woods Elves? And are Woods Elves and Barn Elves friends? I know, right? There’s a lot we don’t know. Yeah, when they showed the call, radiating like, you know, through the wilderness, I thought, oh, well, he’s calling all the other Barn Elves and the Barn Elves will get there somehow. But that doesn’t seem to be the case.
Todd: Yeah.
Craig: This seems to be like a village of a huge village of like what roughly 20 or more
Todd: At least yeah, because at first it looked like a small group, but then they just keep coming at first I thought oh, it’s like it’s like, uh, maybe eight or nine six. Yeah, but then It becomes a home invasion movie where they retreat to their house and the elves are coming in like zombies, breaking through the windows, running, you know, in, and they just keep coming, and it’s like they seem to dispatch them, but more are still there.
I never really got a good handle on how many elves there actually were. I don’t know if it was just like, we were supposed to believe there were just dozens of them, or if they just kept getting up. You know, because it seems really hard to kill these things. You think they’re killing them, but they’re not.
Craig: Yeah, right. Like, it seems like Mom kills one with, like, the star from the top of the Christmas tree. Like, she throws it at its face or something. And then Nora, who it’s been established was a softball player back in the States, sees a bat and picks it up. And it’s, you know, that scene from Signs. And, like, it’s, like, Nora swings away and she just starts, she just starts like nailing them with her bat and the mom protects the kids.
Like, look, the mom, she really loves them and they’re going to see, and they’re, they’re going to bond through this.
Todd: Yeah. There’s definitely that vibe throughout.
Craig: The cop shows up. And it’s, they’re like, Oh my God, you have to help. Blah, blah. And she doesn’t believe them. She thinks they’re drunk again. And they’re like, where’s your gun?
And she’s like, I don’t have a gun. This isn’t America. We don’t just go around shooting people in the face.
Todd: This was a running gag that got a little old, I think. But I mean, I thought it was funny.
Craig: I thought it was hilarious.
Todd: Yeah.
Craig: I, I, I fully, fully believe that that’s how much of the world views us. Oh, yes.
And they’re not far from wrong. So Dude,
Todd: I was literally talking about this at brunch today with a German person. So yeah. That is how they view
Craig: us. Anyway, but she doesn’t believe them until they hear her snowmobile fire up outside and they go outside and one of the elves is just joyriding on the thing.
Like that’s why this is also, it’s so much like Gremlins because I don’t know. When it happens, like, the cop, like, runs out there and, like, tells the elf to get off the snowmobile, but it doesn’t, and then it runs her over, and, like, the snowmobile, like, spews blood all out the back, all over the family, like, just, right in their faces.
Todd: That was hilarious. It was also shocking. I did not expect the cop to go.
Craig: Uh, I kinda did.
Todd: You’re thinking gremlins, yeah, I guess so. But She was so charming.
Craig: She was. I liked her. It’s not like I wanted her to die. I just figured she was disposable, you know? She’s just comic relief. Because I thought they are not going to kill anybody in this family.
They’re just not. True. If they had, I would have been shocked, and I think I wouldn’t have been happy about it.
Todd: Yeah.
Craig: There was a moment when I was scared for the stepmom. But we’re not there yet. Anyway, the elf cra crashes the uh, snowmobile into the barn and we see that gas is leaking out which, remember that for later.
But then the elf gets the gun off the snowmobile, shoots another elf, and then himself, I think more gun. Commentary there. That was so dark. Yeah, cuz he doesn’t know what he’s doing with it He’s not to get too dark, but he’s just like a kid with a gun like he doesn’t get it
Todd: Yeah
Craig: and then there seems to kind of be like an elder elf that is in charge of the Tribe and they’re speaking gibberish language But they’re clearly making a plan and and we kind of get the sense that our main elf like the barn elf isn’t Totally down with the plan.
But at this point, I don’t know All the elves get drunk, which again, it’s totally gremlins. Like it’s the scene in the bar where they’re all just being goofy and drinking and having a great time. But this was also the part where it bothered me because they’re in the house and all the lights are on now, to be fair, or, or were those candles, they were fairly damn, I guess.
Todd: Even they did not have candles that many candles in their house. Plus they crowd around a big, bright TV
Craig: and they’re playing loud music.
Todd: Yeah.
Craig: Maybe woods elves have different rules. Well it could
Todd: be. That could be. Maybe we just say that. The bright still hurts them though. So like
Craig: Maybe barn elves are barn elves because they’re like introverts and they just like to be by themselves and they’re so they’re just like grouchy old people and they don’t like noise and they don’t like change.
So they’re so so basically me.
Todd: You’re a barn elf.
Craig: And the woods elves are cool. They’re like partying, they’re having a good time. Yeah. That must be what it
Todd: is. I mean, they are kind of like isolated from the rest of the tribe, right? I mean, they’re off in somebody’s barn instead of in that little village.
Craig: Right. They’re just the grouchy old men of the elves. I get it. I get it. I feel that.
Todd: You
Craig: feel
Todd: for her. Yeah.
Craig: I do. I mean, they’re not bothering anybody. They’re helpful. I could have a, like, I would love to have a barn elf, like, we’ll just keep to ourselves.
Todd: That guy chopped up so much wood for this dude, and just for a couple cookies.
I could keep it down. I could keep a barn elf happy if that’s the result. Not this result, though. This is, this is shit. This is horrible. They’re, they’re all trashing the place downstairs.
Craig: Yeah. But while they’re downstairs trashing the place, the family is just up there. Hold up in the daughter’s bedroom, and I also thought like what are you doing?
Like you can tell they’re obviously preoccupied downstairs like get out of it out Now is the time. What are you waiting for?
Todd: Yeah, no, nobody’s coming. This is the moment the family comes together This is their big come to Jesus moment. Dad has his big apology speech, but
Craig: somebody says Well, we’ve had worse Christmases.
That was hilarious. Oh my
Todd: god, that was hilarious. And then they’re just describing like some Christmas where they all had to take shits in the bathroom and like one Christmas where they were walking around On the airplane,
Craig: it was even worse.
Todd: I’m like, that was worse than these people being murdered around you?
I don’t know about that. The
Craig: younger than 12 year old son walked in on his grandmother and her lover, Stefan, more than once.
Todd: That would be pretty traumatic, though. I mean, I have to admit.
Craig: Yeah. Anyway, but the elves are destroying the house and the main elf doesn’t like it. So Dad and Lucas go for help on the sled.
Finally. The mom and the daughter, yeah, the mom and the daughter stay behind because the mom got stabbed in the leg. She’s okay, apparently, but she can’t walk.
Todd: They jump out the window onto a conveniently placed pile of snow. That’s helpful.
Craig: I thought that was a funny joke, though, too, because It almost seemed like they expected the same thing I expected.
Oh, we’ll jump onto this pile of snow that will cushion our landing. No, it’s rock hard. Yeah,
Todd: they hit it and slide down. But, but this next bit is just total comedy. Like, they start skiing down the hill. So there’s like, it’s like one of these sleds, kind of a, I guess, like an adult sled or whatever, with a proper seat on it that the kids sitting on and the dad standing behind it.
And as they’re, as they’re, careening down the mountain on this sled. There are two elves behind them in a similar sled and he has a stack of saw blades, like circular saw blades that he is chucking an
Craig: endless stack of them, apparently, but
Todd: you know, it just creates this moment, this action scene.
Craig: Well, and it’s, I know I keep bringing it up.
I apologize if it’s annoying listener, but it, to me, it was the sled scene from national Lampoon.
Todd: Oh yeah. Right
Craig: with a, with a little bit more. You know, higher stakes.
Todd: Right. You’re right. You’re right.
Craig: Meanwhile, the mom and the sister are back at the house and having their
Todd: moment
Craig: and They’re like we’re gonna have to fight or something.
The mom’s like, well, they seem to be afraid of fire Do you have anything flammable in here? And the daughter’s like, well, I Might have some moonshine and the mom says we’re gonna talk about that later. But great get it. It’s perfect And so then they start making, this is, this is so funny. I mean, it’s, the movie jumped the shark a long time ago and again, I don’t care.
Todd: That’s funny. Um,
Craig: but they, they start making Molotov cocktails out of Christmas tree ornament,
Todd: moonshine and sparklers. Yep.
Craig: Yeah. Is that what those were? Were they sparklers? I couldn’t figure it out. I was like, okay, alright, I’ll buy Molotov cocktails and these Christmas ornaments, but where did they get wicks?
But okay, sparklers, alright, fine. And they start throwing them down. Well, I don’t know, I feel like the elves get in there at some point, but
Todd: Eventually they do. Yeah, what happens is they toss them down, they seem to scare the elves off, some of them explode, and you know, all that stuff, so then they’re really happy with themselves, so they just sit down again.
Like, like, okay, and have a heart to heart. What was your purpose here? You know, you’re throwing those Molotov cocktails down there, presumably to destroy the elves or distract them so you could get away, right? But, no, they just, like, okay, well we did that, and they sit down again. I mean, I’d be worried that the elves are gonna try to come up now.
You know, like they do and they do. So it’s kind of silly, but they got to have their moment, their mother and daughter moment, but they hear a noise in the chimney because in the daughter’s room is a fireplace that they haven’t really paid attention to. I guess it’s got doors on it. So, so yeah. So another action scene ensues where these elves try to burst through and they try to shut the door.
And then the mom yells to her daughter, go get help. And she’s like, okay, so she leaves her mom in this room that is about to be besieged by elves to just go, do what? Go after the other two? Like, I didn’t get that at all. It was kind of dumb. But, mom
Craig: I don’t know. I mean, again, it’s the mom, you know, she’s She’s making, she’s sacrificing, like, I mean, you get out of here.
I’ll hold them off. I’ll sacrifice myself for you. And, and the elves get in there, but we don’t see what happens. And then Nora’s in the woods and she’s surrounded by glowing eyes. And then it cuts away from her and we don’t know what happens. And the whole reason that the dad and the son left was because the son knows that the museum guy lives just down the road.
So the elves that were chasing them get hit by a semi and they make it to, uh, The guy’s house and they are like, yeah, it’s true. There’s barn elves and he still doesn’t believe, but he agrees to go with them and take them back home and they get there and immediately see the elves. And he’s like, Oh, they’re real.
And the dad’s like, uh, yeah, we told you. And he’s like,
Todd: what did you do to make them mad? And the kid’s like, we broke all the rules. He’s like, all of them? I’m thinking, yeah, he did. They broke every single rule. They didn’t even get the porridge to the poor little kid. The poor little guy. Oh my God.
Craig: Yeah. So they, they follow, they’re very obvious about it.
They follow the elves into the barn. It’s almost as though.
Todd: They’re being led. They’re not
Craig: scared of them anymore. It’s weird.
Todd: Or the elves don’t care anymore. It’s, or, yeah.
Craig: It’s hard to believe that the elves don’t notice, but whatever, who cares? They see two elves go down into this hatch in the barn that we’ve never seen before, and so they follow them down there into these tunnels that you mentioned before.
And they go through these tunnels and come out, back into the forest, seemingly, and there’s this weird, like, village of these little huts. I mean, they’re tiny, tiny. They almost look like Big eggs or pods or
Todd: something
Craig: But nora and the mom are tied up to a stake in the middle And so they go they run up and they start trying to untie them, but that leader elf shows up with the gun The museum guy tries to negotiate peace.
He’s been talking about this He makes the same joke about not shooting people in the face
Todd: And then he’s talking about the oslo accords. Actually. I thought what what he was saying was quite funny but god the It doesn’t play well now,
Craig: you know? It’s not well timed right now, but yeah, I mean, I understand, I get the concept.
I think they’re making a joke of how, Whatever. I get it. You get it. We all get it. It’s like, here’s, you know,
Todd: you dumb Americans, you think we should rush in and just like destroy everything. It’s kill or be killed. And then, you know, everybody dies. Us Norwegians, we believe in making peace and negotiating.
And so he’s going to do that. But of course, yeah, the gag is going to be that the negotiations don’t work or do they, right? So he starts his negotiations. And the elf shoots him. And the old elf
Craig: shoots him.
Todd: That’s it. Yeah, I wish I saw something.
Craig: I did too, and I thought it was a funny joke. I mean, that elf is kind of like the spike of gremlins, you know?
Yes. You’re not, you’re not going to negotiate with them. I thought it was funny, but I, I also don’t understand this because, again, I’ve only watched it once on my laptop, but I’m pretty sure I saw blood fly. And then here in about three minutes. He’s fine. Even, his arm’s even fine,
Todd: you know, it’s just like, come on.
Craig: Yeah. He was
Todd: shot in the shoulder. The
Craig: L’s, yeah. Yeah. I know, but, people act like that’s not a big deal, like, oh, I’m fine. No, you are
Todd: down. I really thought he was dead at this point, yeah.
Craig: But Lucas sees the, the barn elf and he, when they were friends, he like, made like a sign of peace, like he touches his chest and that means like we’re friends or peace or something, I don’t know.
So he makes that to the main elf. And so the main elf comes and helps cut mom and Nora free, but all of them now are surrounded in the barn. The barn elf argues with the gun elf, and the gun elf goes to shoot him, but the gun is empty.
Todd: Yeah.
Craig: So I guess they run, and they run up into the loft.
Todd: Yeah.
Craig: The, the, the women are like, yeah, we got this.
And so the, the guys jump out. The barn again,
Todd: and the girls blow up the barn because the daughter had been making these little paper airplanes because she was bored in her room pouting earlier. So she makes a paper airplane, lights it on fire and tosses it down. So, you know, it spins in a spiral circle that everybody watches and then hits the, the gasoline that’s on the ground, which, you know, she could have just dropped a piece of paper down there.
It would have been the same. I mean, it was just kind of a dramatic moment. It wouldn’t have looked as good though. Yeah, it wouldn’t have looked as good. It wouldn’t have been as dramatic.
Craig: I thought it was a great shot. And I also kind of liked, I liked the slow shot and it’s over some beautiful slow Christmas carol.
Like, um, I don’t remember which one it was, but you know, the, the, it goes to slow mode to follow this plane, this flaming paper airplane and some beautiful Christmas carols playing in the background
Todd: and
Craig: the elves are all watching it like in awe and wonder.
Todd: Um,
Craig: and then it hits. And we’ve also seen that there’s like tanks or bags of something that’s explosive.
I don’t know what that was, but we’ve seen it a bunch of times.
Todd: Blows up the bomb.
Craig: And so, yeah. It, yeah, it starts to explode. The girls jump out and get there jumping out of a building explosion, which is great. But now, the main elf is sad. Cause he lost his home. Cause he lost his home. And I love that.
Todd: One of the kids says, I think, can he live with us?
And mom says, honey, he can’t stay here. We just piss him off again.
Craig: I, I thought that was funny. I thought that it was going to return to. The cute like fun family thing like we’ll build him a new barn and we won’t break the rules And we’ll all live happy and the ending will be over a montage of family goofy family vacation shots with us in the barn elf and But she’s like my and I thought you know, it’s the it’s the chunk and sloth moment like oh you can live with us now But he’s like can he live with us?
Oh, no No, no, no. That ain’t happening. That’s out of the question. And the kid’s like, but where will he go? And the museum guy is like, I’ve got an idea. So they take him to live in the Elf Museum in town. Now, I don’t understand this either. Uh huh. I guess he just has to be really good at hiding? Cause he’s literally like, in the town square.
Yeah,
Todd: also it’s not a barn. There’s nothing barny about that. I mean there’s a tiny little barn. Well he could, he could help keep it up. I suppose. Yeah, but he’s a new kind of elf now. Now he’s a museum elf. He’s not a barn elf. That’s true.
Craig: Yeah. Yeah. I don’t know. I don’t think he’s going to like it there.
Todd: He’s probably pissed off his fellow elves as well. So like, uh, I don’t, I don’t think screaming and getting it. I mean, he’s probably going to have to take what he can get is what I’m trying to say.
Craig: Yeah. I don’t think it turns out so great for him in the end, but they all stand and look at the Northern Lights and it’s beautiful.
And the dad says, when all said and done. This was a pretty good Christmas. And again, it’s almost that exact shot where the Griswolds are standing outdoors all together, looking up at the sky and all said and done. It was a pretty good Christmas. And then Darlene Love starts singing.
Todd: No little zinger or anything like that.
Craig: I liked it.
Todd: I liked it too. You know, I just, I went online and I saw the reviews are just kind of middling about this and I don’t understand that. I know. We’ve seen a lot of other, you know, Christmas movies that try to be this cute. And they fail. They’re just like, awkward, or a little uneven, or maybe a little too cliche.
I mean, this had it, this was cliche in many ways, but I don’t know, there was just, there was just enough about it that was interesting and different that I, that I really enjoyed it. Plus, you know, we said it a million times in the beginning, it’s just very heartwarming. It’s just Christmassy through in and throughout, and I enjoyed it a lot.
Craig: Yeah, it’s really fun. Like, it’s not a 10, you know, like, it’s not, We’ve, we’ve reviewed better Christmas movies, but I still think it’s good. I had a lot of fun watching it. It certainly wasn’t boring. It was very funny in places. There were lots of fun gags. There was a funny gag where two of the elves were after they were drunk, they were standing in the yard peeing and one obviously looks over at the other one’s dick and starts laughing.
Just goofy stuff like that. Yeah. The family stuff was cliche, but. Typical, but whatever. I still enjoyed it. It’s still, you know, it landed. I totally thought it landed. I didn’t think, you know, there were parts that were goofy. It certainly jumped the shark in places, but movies like this do all the time. Was it entirely unique and creative?
No, we’ve seen elf movies before. We’ve seen these kind of home invasion Christmas movies before. But I like them and this is a good one. So yeah, I will recommend this to people. I think it’s a lot of fun and I think it’s got a lot of appeal. Again, Christmas, family stuff,
Clip: Christmas
Craig: music, comedy. Some people might be turned off by the gore.
And if you’re not big into gore, then you probably, you know, it’s probably not going to be for you. Cause it does get gory in that second half. It does. There’s lots of blood.
Todd: There’s a lot of blood, but even then it’s not too bad. It’s just
Craig: CGI blood splatters.
Todd: Yeah, it’s some blood splatters here and there, like, when we talked about, for example, the two elves, like, the one shooting himself in the face and the other one, it’s an off screen thing.
So, like, they do actually restrain themselves considerably on, on making things too graphic. They could have gone further and they didn’t. I felt like they were trying to keep it light, you know, that’s what made it a little different from Krampus. Krampus felt kind of deep. Krampus had this, like, serious message, more or less, by the end of it.
Whereas this, you know, it doesn’t, it doesn’t really have the serious message. It’s just, uh,
Craig: well, appreciate your family.
Todd: Yeah. Appreciate your family. You come together at Christmas time to solve your problems and your challenges and, and don’t piss off the barn elves.
Craig: Right. Keep it down.
Todd: Yeah. Keep it down and keep the lights dim.
Well, thank you guys so much for listening. Really, we’re so excited about this holiday season coming up. If you have ideas for movies that are coming to your mind as you hear this, that we haven’t done yet, send us a message anywhere you can find us online. You just Google two guys in a chainsaw podcast.
You’ll find our website at ChainsawHorror. com. There’s even a speak to us button at the top where you can just record a one minute message, actually, and send that straight to us. Or you can just shoot us an email, leave us a review as well on your favorite podcast channel. So there are a lot of ways to get through to us and let us know what you think of the show and what you’d like to see us do this holiday season and beyond.
We hope you’re going to have a good, safe, and happy one. And we will be with you every step of the way these next three weeks. Until next time, I’m Todd. And I’m Craig. With Two Guys and a Chainsaw.
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