Main cast: Steven Hubbell (Michael Briskett), Cole Gleason (Andy Robillard), Casey O’Keefe (Cindy Robillard), Ryan Boyd (Bart Robillard), Whitney Nielsen (Katherine), DJ Hale (Eddie), Dakota Shepard (Denise), Gwen Van Dam (Granny), and David Ruprecht (Abe Robillard)
Director: Ryan Nelson
The patriarch of the Robillard family, Abe, looks familiar. It takes me awhile before I go, “Oh, that’s right. He’s played by that host of the Supermarket Sweep show back in the 1990s! The guy with a mouth that seems a little too big for his face!” I used to watch that dumb game show with far too much joy because, deep inside, a secret fantasy of mine is to be allowed to run through a shopping mall and grab whatever I want for free. Oh well, it’s nice to see David Ruprecht again, and he seems to have aged like fine wine. His mouth doesn’t look too big anymore, although I guess he’s still the right person, looks-wise, to play a cannibal.
That’s right, Mercy Christmas is about a family of cannibals, as poor Michael Briskett will discover. A fat, lonely, and pathetic man who only has his work as an accountant to cling to, this fellow only wants someone to love on Christmas. He seems to think that the special day has come early when a new colleague, Cindy, befriends him and he realizes that they have so much in common. Mind you, a sane person will realize that all she does is to ask what he likes and then chimes “Me too!” to have him eating out of her hands. Michael, however, has this pathetic child-like air of desperation mixed with child-like gullibility that I wonder whether I am supposed to think of him as tad special in the head.
At any rate, Cindy invites him to join her family for Christmas. Well, he believes that he has finally achieved his dream of celebrating that day with a perfect family… until they drug him and toss him into the basement with other victims. That’s right, the Robillard family love home-cooked meals for Christmas, made from freshly sourced human meat, and Michael is actually picked out because his bully of a boss, Andy, who also happens to be part of the family, believes that his meaty girth will provide some succulent, tender meat for the family meals.
Now, I like the concept of this movie, but oh my god, every time I think that I am really having fun, Michael will ruin everything. As the lead character, he is absolutely wretched to behold. When other victims of the family are trying to stay alive, he is moping and complaining that they don’t love Christmas like he does. When the others are trying to escape, he wails that he will surely lose his job after this. I think Ryan Nelson, who directs this movie after having co-written the script, is hoping for Michael to be dropping funny and ironic one-liners, but come on. The other victims are badly battered and mangled, and this fat, probably mentally-handicapped, constantly crying lard sack is wailing about inconsequential nonsense.
To add salt and acid on one’s wounds, Michael unlike the other victims is protected by plot armor. Sure, Andy is a psycho that tortures Michael for fun, but the others have their limbs sawed off or their faces viciously savaged. Even towards the end, when Michael manages to escape along with the other obvious designated plus one of the protagonist, he has this poor person agree with him that Christmas is awesome instead of him bringing the badly injured other person to a hospital or something. Am I supposed to root for this character? He’s a useless, blubbering idiot who doesn’t really do anything, and he survives only because the script has appointed him as the obvious survivor. That’s not a spoiler, by the way. The movie opens with Michael alive and all bloodied, before going back a few days to present how that character got to where he is in the opening scene.
At any rate, I like this movie, but I am not going to watch this one again because the irritating main character seriously gets on my nerves.
