Sufficiently engrossing is this French monkey’s paw tale of a paraplegic woman and her gifted magical advent calendar. It is slyly shot, looking quite good with the joys of life or the bold agonies of death. The main actress toes the line of sanity and sociopathy well, never letting on quite what her decisions will be or where the film will go. This is buttressed by a vividly wicked German priest meets cenobite “wishmaster”, creepily profiled but never fully investigated. It allows itself to breathe in the darkness and chill of the shadowy holiday spirit.
For those searching the periphery for a new & wild holiday flick, this is a present worth opening.
