I've actually never seen Silent Night, Deadly Night 84 (SNDN). I see you liked it. I heard it's pretty unique.
I remember seeing ads on TV. I was just reading some of wiki on it,
"Television advertisements, which aired between episodes of family-friendly series such as Three's Company and Little House on the Prairie, led to parents complaining that their children were terrified of Santa Claus." During Little House on
the Prairie? That's really funny. I wonder why they chose that slot? Makes you wonder if they were trying to get a reaction that would lead to some free publicity? If so, it worked.
I suppose
the execs who ran
the ad during Little House probably should have considered if it was appropriate for
the children who'd be watching
the TV show.
LOL! Oh, did they just refer to Three's Company as "family-friendly"? What kid would watch 3 Co with their parents? Who wrote this?
There were some street protests and
the producers pulled
the ads and pulled
the film from theatres after about a couple weeks, despite good sales.
During
the 'At
the Movies' film review Siskel and Ebert read
the names of
the companies, writers and producers and said they should be ashamed of themselves. Wow.
I guess
the general idea was, "An editorial published in Variety stated: "Most protests were generated by
the feeling that
the depiction of a killer in a Santa Claus suit would traumatize children and
undermine their traditional trust in Santa Claus." "Undermine their traditional trust in Santa Claus"? What does that mean? Trust Santa about what, not to kill them? "Trust in Santa"? What an odd thought.
My folks never told us there was a Santa Claus. They let us know
the gifts were from them!

I'm certain I never asked if he was real; but if I had they wouldve told me he wasnt. Personally, I dont think you should lie to your kids. I never found it offensive for depicting Santa as
the 80s Santa is mythical, though there was a real St Nick.
There was a short window where I might have wanted to see SNDN. Cause of my age I wouldnt have been able to see it in
the theatres (R), as I wouldnt have asked my folks to see this.
The local theatre did allow my friends and I see some Restricted films, but my friends wouldnt haven gone for SNDN. By
the time I could rent it, I think I had soured a bit on some of
the 80s horror 'crudeness for crudeness sake' stuff, just wasnt my personal taste anymore. Course, I'm just making some assumptions about SNDN... I noticed every film is different.