Silent Night, Deadly Night 5

When Silent Night, Deadly Night was released in 1984, Mickey Rooney was one of the film's most vocal critics, writing a letter of protest in which he called the makers "scum" for desecrating Christmas.  Ironically enough, seven years later, Rooney went on to star in the franchise's fifth entry, The Toy Maker.

Rooney is Joe Petto, who owns a rather unsuccessful toy store.  He and his son Pino (Brian Bremer) also live in the shop since their house was foreclosed on.  The house is currently occupied by Sarah (Jane Higginson) and her son Derek (William Thorne), which may or may not explain why Pino decides to break in and hide in Sarah's bedroom.  As if that weren't enough to deal with, the two are trying to cope with the loss of man of the house Tom, seen in the film's opening being attacked by a Santa toy that showed up addressed to Derek.  Pino also tries to give Derek a Larry the Larva toy, but it is instead bought by Petto's most frequent customer Noah (Tracy Fraim), who winds up giving it to his landlord, advising him, "It's to die for."

So the film continues, with mysterious presents being left for Derek, the kid refusing to open them, someone else getting hold of them, and killer toy mayhem ensuing.  The film is poorly paced, and it gets very tedious very quickly.  The effects by Screaming Mad George are surprisingly disappointing, consisting of crap like a rubber snake, roller skates with rockets, or a Santa ball that sprouts little arms.  Most of the toys don't actually kill anyone; instead, people just overreact to them and flail around until they're impaled by fire pokers or hit by cars.  More than one character returns from the dead, as well.  A chick is shot by an army of toy soldiers with guns, leaving her a bloody mess, but she shows up alive and well later on.

It all seems like just another bad horror movie with nothing to make it stand out - aside from some truly insane moments, like a bizarre ending involving attempted rape by a robot that lacks genitalia and cries while screaming, "I love you, Mommy!"  And we get the chance to see Mickey Rooney in a Santa suit holding his sack (of toys) while watching two teenagers screwing.  It doesn't get much better than this.

Silent Night, Deadly Night 5 is obviously not scary, and it's too boring to be much fun.  However, those who do decide to watch it will be left with some indelible images.