Like the best Christmas movies, Candy Cane Lane goes full-throttle on the weirdness
There is a moment near the end of Prime Video’s new Christmas movie Candy Cane Lane that will now be seared into my brain every time I look at Christmas tree decorations. Evil elf Pepper (Jillian Bell) pulls a spherical glass ornament out of her pocket and takes a big chomp out of it like it’s an apple. There’s this chilling crunch noise as she continues to chew, the exact opposite of a soothing ASMR effect.
It’s a small detail in the hullabaloo of the movie’s chaotic finale, but it’s so visceral, I will never be able to forget it.
This weirdly horrific take on a common piece of Christmas decor basically illustrates the entire premise of Candy Cane Lane, and exactly what the movie does best. Director Reginald Hudlin and screenwriter Kelly Younger dare ask the question, “How terrifying can we make Christmas without actually making it scary?” And man oh man, Candy Cane Lane’s Christmas gets pretty darn terrifying.
The story kicks off when, in an effort to win his neighborhood’s holiday decorating competition, Chris Carver (Eddie Murphy) makes a strange deal with the owner of a Christmas store. However, that owner turns out to be Pepper, who defected from the North Pole after deciding that Santa’s gotten too lax with his Nice list. She’s on a mission to huntdown wrongdoers and lure them into Faustian bargains. When they fail to uphold their end of the deals, she turns them into tiny porcelain figurines for her little Christmas village, dooming them to live out eternity in Yuletide cheer.
In Chris’ case, his deal with Pepper grants him some magical decorations for a “12 Days of Christmas”-themed display that stuns the neighborhood. But then it comes to life and begins to terrorize him and his family. As the animals and
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