Mike Guratza It's not that this movie is bad... But it certainly doesn't belong in a series called "movies to keep you awake", since I doubt it would even keep a twelve year old awake at night.Although the direction by Paco Plaza (of REC fame), and the general production value is obviously on a very good level, the movie is a combination of Stand By Me, Home Alone and of "The Three Investigators" juvenile mystery books (i.e. having a trailer parked in a backyard as headquarters is a direct link between the latter and this film I think), with none of the aforementioned is what I would consider "spine chilling". The heroes of the movie are conveniently "nerdy" kids that obsess over classic cult movies like Karate Kid, portraying the filmmakers' nostalgic intentions and paying homage to them.Overall though, the movie is what has been described above: a movie about a bunch of kids, that resembles a "Goosebumps" episode, more than a real thriller. I can definitely see why someone can like this one a lot, but it just didn't work for me.

Coventry "Six Films to Keep You Awake" is a Spanish TV initiative created/produced by the most legendary granddaddy of Spanish horror cinema Narciso Ibañez Serrador ("Who Can Kill A Child", "The House that Screamed") and featuring episodes directed by some of the country's most prominent and world-widely respected filmmakers in the genre, like Alex De La Iglesia ("Day of the Beast", Perdita Durango"), Jaume Balagueró ("Darkness", "The Nameless") and Paco Plaza ("Rec", "The Second Name"). If this is Spain's response to the similar American TV-series "Masters of Horror", than I can only be enthusiast and thrilled to notice that the horror genre is still alive and kicking! "The Christmas Tale" was my first personal acquaintance with the series. A vastly enjoyable one, I may add, and definitely one that makes me look forward to the five remaining installments.The plot introduces five 12-year-old but very independent kids (four boys and a girl) who are about to spend a life-altering Christmas vacation. They discover an unconscious woman dressed up as Santa Clause in a pit in the woods who turns out to be a fugitive and dangerous bank robber. Since this woman allegedly stole 2 million pesetas – and since the police don't even bother listening to them – the quintet decides to keep her trapped in the pit and question her about the loot. The situation soon escalates, as some of the kids gradually develop into merciless and sadist abductors. Things get even beyond control when a voodoo-ritual from a silly horror film, which the kids playfully imitated, turns out frighteningly real and the woman rises from the pit as a vengeful and bloodthirsty zombie. "The Christmas Tale" is versatile and chock-full of ideas in spite of his short running time of barely 70 minutes. The film seemingly unfolds as a rather disturbing hostage-thriller, but halfway changes into a more light-headed zombie horror flick. The first half more tension-driven and the second half thrives more on excitement, but the blackly comical elements as well as the energetic atmosphere are maintained throughout the whole movie. The script is also stuffed with small but highly ingenious gimmicks and delightful tributes to older horror and non-horror classics. The events take place in the year 1985, for example. This is mainly a tribute to the kid-gang movies of that period (like "Stand by Me" and "The Goonies"), but perhaps also to justify why the kids spend their school holidays playing outside instead of rotting away behind their computers. The timing and setting also provide the ideal excuses to showcase a handful of terrific 80's set pieces and songs (like the catchy disco hit "Yes Sir, I Can Boogie" used in a masterful scene) and there are also numerous posters and VHS tapes of elderly Spanish horror flicks to spot in the backgrounds (like "Tombs of the Blind Dead", "The Werewolf versus the Vampire Women" and "Horror Express"). The young cast members deliver tremendous performances and Maru Valdivielso is also terrific as the Santa Clause and, by the way, the only adult character whose face can be seen properly.

Paul Andrews Películas Para no Dormir: Cuento de Navidad is set in a small Spanish town during Christmas 1985. Five young friends named Koldo (Christian Casas), Peti (Roge Babia), Tito (Paul Poch), Eugenio (Daniel Casadellà) & Moni (Ivana Baquero) find a woman dressed as Santa Claus stuck in a large hole in the local woods they play in, they quickly discover that her name is Rebeca (Maru Valdivielso) & she is wanted by the police for a bank robbery. The greedy little git's decide to keep her trapped down the hole until she tells them what she did with the money she stole so they can steel it from her. Straving & badly injured Rebeca seemingly has no choice to tell them...Known under the title Films to Keep You Awake: The Christmas Tale to English speaking audiences this Spanish production was directed by Paco Plaza & is part of the six film Films to Keep You Awake series of made-for-Spanish telly horror films. The script by Luis Berdejo starts off as a fairly simple thriller with the twelve year old kids keeping Rebeca down a hole in the woods so they can get the money she stole, this aspect of the film is alright but far from brilliant. Then something right out of the very worst 80's horror film happens, two of the kids who like watching horror films bizarrely conduct a Voodoo ritual for no apparent reason they saw in a film they watched called Zombie Invasion which brings Rebeca back from the dead when she dies down the hole. Right, well isn't that quite the most stupid thing you have ever heard? Why on Earth did they reenact the Voodoo ritual? Why did it even work? Then for the last twenty odd minutes Películas Para no Dormir: Cuento de Navidad becomes a slasher film as a reanimated back from the dead zombie Rebeca stalks the annoying kids with an axe. Unfortunately imagine the very worst teen slasher film from the 80's & then triple it, Películas Para no Dormir: Cuento de Navidad has no nudity, no deaths, no gore, no blood, no mystery surrounding the stalkers identity & it's as lifeless a twenty minutes of predictable slasher film nonsense as I have ever seen. The film also raises the unpalatable notion that watching horror films causes people to turn bad since the two most evil, sadistic & nasty of the kids are the two that watched the zombie film, talk about alienating your audience! Then there are a few plot holes like how did Rebeca get out of the hole at the end? Why was there a big hole in the woods anyway & why did Rebeca fall down it? Couldn't she have just like walked around it? It wasn't exactly inconspicuous...Director Plaza does alright but I never got the feeling it was Christmas, there are no decorations or anything like that & apart from Rebeca being dressed in a Santa Claus outfit nothing relates to it being Christmas at all. Plaza also takes the odd decision to not properly show any of the adults faces, the cops & the kids parents are all framed so as to have their heads either obscured by an object or cut off the top of the frame. Strange & there's no real reason for it as far as I could tell. The only bit of gore is when someone's head is impaled on a metal spike. Apart from some really lame stalk 'n' slash moments at the end there's nothing in Películas Para no Dormir: Cuento de Navidad to indicate that it is even a horror film. There's certainly nothing scary here & there's no sort of atmosphere.Yechnically the film is alright, apparently shot in Barcelona in Spain. It's reasonably well made & put together. Shot in Spanish the film is subtitled, some of the subtitles don't stay on screen for long though so you will have to be quick. The acting seems OK but as someone who doesn't speak Spanish it's hard to tell.Películas Para no Dormir: Cuento de Navidad is another entry in the Films to Keep You Awake series that for me is far more likely to send you to sleep. It really doesn't make any sense, it has lots of holes (besides the one Rebeca falls in) & there's nothing new or original or horrific about it.

Fmartiterron "Stories to keep you awake" was a legendary Spanish TV series that told independent suspense / horror stories every week. As of 2006, some Spanish media have joined resources to produce a follow-up in the shape of six direct-to-DVD films, directed by some of the most popular Spanish film directors. "Cuento de Navidad" is helmed by Paco Plaza, director of "The second name" and "Romasanta".Among the bunch of films that compose this series, this may easily be the best of the lot. Paco Plaza creates a surprisingly cruel negative to teen films, such as "The Goonies" or the Spanish TV series "Verano azul". Set in the early 80s (pop culture references abound in the story), it tells the story of a group of early teenagers that find a wounded woman in the woods, dressed up as Santa. Rather than helping her, they start abusing her, and as soon as they learn she's the suspect of a bank robbery they increase the abuse in order to obtain the robbed money themselves.It's a bleak story, full of cruelty, and Plaza's talent is evident when he uses elements that in other hands would be comedic to increase the cruelty of the tale: when the abused woman manages to turn tables on the kids and pursues them axe in hand, they mistake her for a zombie, and in their efforts to defend themselves of her attacks, the mimic the techniques they've seen in horror movies, much to our horror.It's not a perfect film. I've mentioned how the tale is packed with pop culture references, and some of them feel a bit gratuitous, although they are well integrated within the plot. I was specially amused by a zombie flick that appears recurrently, a parody of Lucio Fulci's movies that strucks more than a chord. Watching local rock and roll star Loquillo as a zombie hunter (with dubbed southamerican accent to boot) is absolutely priceless.