I already reviewed Christmas Cruelty, a Norwegian horror Christmas movie. Now, I’m going to review a Dutch Christmas horror movie from the Netherlands. I’ve never seen or heard of any Netherland movies, but I am going to assume that they can get some good movies. And this movie must be one of them… Right? Well, this movie was to mark the return of horror movie director, Dick Maas. So, this guy must have had some sort of experience in making horror movies. Well, let’s look into his return to the horror industry, and take a look at the movie Sint, or Saint in Europe, or Saint Nick in the U.S… They couldn’t just pick one?



So the movie takes the story of Sinterklaas, or Santa Claus, and distorts it into a dark fantasy world. Instead of Sinterklaas being a good natured soul who delivers gifts to people on Christmas, he is the murderous ghost of Niklas who, with his evil ghost gang, goes around murdering hundreds (Literally hundreds) of people when his holiday is celebrated on a full moon… Well… It’s an original take on the story. So, the story centers around a police officer named Goert whose family was killed by Sinterklaas on one fateful Christmas night. Now, not celebrating the Sinterklaas tradition, he is trying to stop people from celebrating it before Sinterklaas strikes again, but of course, no one believes Goert when he says that the evil ghost of Niklas and his evil horse gang are going to murder people on the streets, and must now do what he can to prevent Sinterklaas from attacking. Now, for some reason, that plot doesn’t happen much in this movie. It’s mostly thrown to the side. Most of the movie is mostly about Sinterklaas and how he goes around doing his killings around the holiday season. Kinda ironic, considering that the poor bastard is barely in the movie at all.



What I find to be the most disappointing part of this entire movie is Sinterklaas himself. Not that he’s a bad monster. In fact, he’s a great monster. Showing him in a modern time, in that old centuries old uniform on a white horse, just standing in the snowfall at night, without revealing his face is just really creepy. He really shows himself as being a very creepy character. He’s even able to travel across roof tops and through walls, really showing how he really is a ghost. This is the best depiction of a ghost I’ve seen in awhile. And when his face is revealed, it’s pretty damn good. The makeup on him looks very professional and well done. Sure, I like subtlety and this does kinda ruin it by revealing his face, but I can’t deny that the makeup looks really damn good on him. Unfortunately, it’s easy to appreciate something that you rarely see. And that is exactly what Sinterklaas is. We rarely see this guy in the movie at all. We see the fear he brings in people and we see just how scared people are of him, but not much of him, really. But, this does kinda make him more scary, as seeing what effects he causes on people can be just as good as seeing the monster himself. I guess I both love and hate that I don’t get to see Sinterklaas much. I love seeing the fear people are in in this movie, but I hate that we don’t get more Sinterklaas.



Well, let’s talk about something else here. I love the acting in this movie. It never feels like the actors are trying too hard, but it never feels like they don’t care either. They always feel genuine. Especially the cop Goert. Sure, his backstories cliched, “the villain killed my family and I want revenge” and all that, but at least he has some talent in acting. The violence in this movie is also really top notch. The gore looks just like what you’d expect from a movie about a murderous gang of ghosts lead by the Dutch version of Santa…. What? But, unfortunately, the movie feels very limited. It feels like the director was limited on what he wanted to do, and the story feels very unfinished in most places. You can just tell that this movie had hundreds of restrictions put on it. That’s probably because parents hated this movie because of its depiction of Sinterklaas. Yep, it’s Silent Night, Deadly Night all over again, with director Dick Maas argument being that if parents could convince their kids that Sinterklaas exists, they can convince them that the man in the movie wasn’t Sinterklaas. Well damn, Dick Maas didn’t fuck around. Sadly, the movie studio didn’t seem to agree, and just seemed to limit his creative work. And I thought American movies were restricted.



Sint is a movie that I had a lot of fun watching. Is it the best movie out there, no, but I had a lot of fun with it. I love the stupid action scenes, and the effects on the monsters and with the violence. It really makes me want to look into Dick Maas other movies like De Lift or Amsterdamned. He definitely seems to have peaked my interest. I’d say, if you like horror movies that don’t take themselves seriously, than this is the movie for you. I recommend watching it. Barely anyone watches it, since it is a very obscure movie, and the only people who seem to have watched are from the country of Netherlands. Maybe one day, we can get this movie to be recognized by an English audience… Or not, I don’t know. Take care.