Director/Screenplay – David Steiman, Producers – Sammy Lee, Matthew Leonetti, Jr., Brett Ratner & Douglas Steeden, Photography – Matthew F. Leonetti, Music – Henning Lohner, Visual Effects Supervisor – Jamison Goei, Visual Effects – Rez-Illusion, Digital Visual Effects – Look! Effects Inc. (Supervisor – Marlo Pabon), Special Effects Supervisor – Leo Weiser, Production Design – Todd Cherniawsky. Production Company – Media 8 Entertainment.
Cast
Bill Goldberg (Santa), Douglas Smith (Nicholas Yuleson), Emilie de Ravin (Mary ‘Mac’ Mackenzie), Robert Culp (Grandpa), Dave Thomas (Pastor Timmons), Saul Rubinek (Mr Green), [uncredited] James Caan (Darren Mason), Fran Drescher (Virginia Mason), Chris Kattan (Jason Mason), Donna Zuk (Mrs Talbot), Michael David Simms (Captain Caulk), Rick Ash (Dick Zucker), Tom ‘Tiny’ Lister (Gas Attendant), Rebecca Gayheart (Gwen Mason)
Plot
It is nearing Christmas in the town of Hell. Nicholas Yuleson lives with his grandfather, an eccentric inventor. Nicolas presses his grandfather on why he avoids Christmas. He is shown an old family book that tells the story of how Satan gave birth to a human son named Santa. An angel came down from Heaven and entered into a bet with Santa over a game of curling. Santa ended up losing to the angel and was forced to do good for a thousand years. As that thousand year period now nears an end, an unleashed Santa arrives in the town and begins slaughtering all in his way.
Santa’s Slay was a directorial debut for David Steiman who has a number of credits as an assistant director to Brett Ratner. Ratner, the director of films like Rush Hour (1998) and sequels, Red Dragon (2002) and X-Men: The Last Stand (2006), also acts as a producer for the film. This appears to be the only film as director that David Steiman has made to date.
David Steiman readily takes to trashing Christmas and its values. This is more than evident from the opening Christmas dinner scene with appearances from Chris Kattan, Rebecca Gayheart, Fran Drescher and an uncredited James Caan as the patriarch, which ends with Drescher’s hair set on fire, another attendee impaled as their chair tips backwards, while Caan’s hands are nailed to the table and his mouth slammed down onto a turkey drumstick.
Bill Goldberg as the demonic Santa Claus
Santa’s Slay mostly consists of Bill Goldberg’s Santa beating people up – stabbing candy canes into the mouth of a mugger; attacking the people at a stripper bar using the stripper pole, before handing the pole to one person where it is attached to the light socket and electrocutes them, and then setting the bar on fire; giving the police captain a taser to the nuts. The latter sections involve Goldberg dementedly driving and flying the sleigh as he pursues Douglas Smith and Emilie de Ravin, while throwing gas and Christmas present bombs, even driving an ice resurfacing vehicle after them.
Elsewhere, Santa’s Slay has a fairly crude level of humour. There is a scene at the police station where Douglas Smith talks to a police officer named Dick Zucker (say it quickly) (Rick Ash) and there is discussion over two police named Caulk and Bush, which devolves into a lot of plays on phrases like “Do you prefer Caulk or bush?”, “Caulk can be a pain in the ass” and so on. The end credits are also interspersed with some ten minutes of blooper footage.
Bill Goldberg came to fame as a wrestler with the WCW and WWE in the 1990s where he went by the mononymic Goldberg, before going onto appear in a handful of film roles. Goldberg is not much of an actor. Certainly, the idea of the demonic character – the Devil’s son who is forced to behave and do good for a millennium because he lost a bet – is a good one. You could see a better written film doing interesting things in exploring such a character. In truth though, all that this means is Bill Goldberg in a Santa suit roaring Freddy Krueger-esque one-liners at victims before despatching them.
