Written by: Ryan Dailey
The scene is a peaceful one. Yellow-orange flames dance around and lick the wood placed in the andiron. The room is filled with the sound of crackling embers. The snow falls on the outside while the flames rise on the television.
The serenity does not last long, however.
About two minutes, to be precise.
Adult Swim’s first full-length live action movie is a terrific experiment in the horror genre, a surprise Christmas gift for horror fans that dare to peel away the gift wrapping.
The Fireplace turns the phenomenon of streaming burning Yule Logs and turns it on its ear, becoming one of those rare gems of a movie where an inanimate object and a setting are just as important of characters as the actors in the scene.
Much like the best gifts being a total revelation on the big day, there will be no spoilers here.
The Fireplace continues the trend of creative and fresh rounds of horror films that 2022 has brought to the community with offerings like Pearl and Barbarian.
The Fireplace is from Chris “Casper” Kelley, whose previous works include Your Pretty Face Is Going To Hell, Stroker and Hoop and CatDog. Chris Kelley is in the same league as Zach Gregger, Barbarian scribe, as they are both hilarious comedic forces that gave birth to some truly golden horror content that has all the potential to become classics.
Kelley’s film legitimately places the audience in the same mind-frame as the characters in the movie by virtue of the fact that neither party knows what to expect next. Much like The Cabin in the Woods, this film combines many of the tropes and topics found in modern and classic horror, but manages to subvert audience expectations each time one is presented.
The Fireplace, despite its mostly restrictive camera work still manages to frighten with the way scenes are structured and even through the use of something as simple as a rack-focus, which provides one of the most gasp-inducing reactions during the film’s run-time. Kelley even manages to reveal much of the backstory of the cabin and its previous residents via uncomplicated wipe transitions.
The dialog in this movie is sharp and well-written and the acting is exceptional, which lends so much credence to a film that is so experiential and dealing with so many outlandish subplots.
The Fireplace manages to sneak in some subtle, and not so subtle, commentary on racism, colonialism and white privilege without being too “woke” about it. This meaning that the social commentary is there to drive the plot forward, as opposed to raising the number of the filmmaker’s Twitter followers.
The kills in The Fireplace are creative and, while most of the kills occur off-camera, the ones that are on-screen are well executed and gory without being too over-the-top.
There are a handful of Christmas horror movies that are actually well done and have earned their place as a tradition. And, with its elements of It’s A Wonderful Life and The Evil Dead, The Fireplace deserves a place in your stocking alongside Krampus, Silent Night, Deadly Night and the original Black Christmas.