The Reel Review
Three years after a car accident left her a paraplegic, Eva, a former dancer, receives an unusual birthday gift from her best friend – an antique advent calendar from Germany. Eva soon discovers that each door in the mysterious wooden box ushers in a shocking new twist in her life – some good, some really bad. Eugénie Derouand stars in this 2021 French mystery/horror.
While mystery box horror movies (Hellraiser, The Box) are nothing new, The Advent Calendar writer/director Patrick Ridremont’s incorporation of a long standing Christmas tradition into something sinister takes the sub-genre into some interesting and unpredictable paths. The indignities Eva endures as a disabled person are shocking – a sleazy, insulting boss; a rapey acquaintance; a rude co-worker and a wicked stepmother. Just a few days in, Eva realizes that her advent calendar’s mystical ability to improve her life comes at a deadly price.
Derouand (World on Fire, Beatrice) is convincing as the protagonist with an unenviable moral dilemma. The film’s ambiguous ending may frustrate some viewers, but its message, about negotiating what you want with what you can live with, is as thought-provoking as it is timeless.
REEL FACTS
• The Christmas holiday advent calendar, with each day represented by a treat or small gift, originated in the 1800s from Germany’s Lutherans, later spreading to other Christian denominations.
• The Advent Calendar writer/director Patrick Ridremont is a Belgian comedian, actor and director. His first feature film was the 2012 dramedy Dead Man Talking.
• The Advent Calendar, Le Calendrier in French, was filmed in Brussels, Belgium.
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