An unsolved murder is like a burr in the side of the town with clues being dropped like breadcrumbs for Sheriff Rodney Arnold (Ryan Robbins), often called Chief, to follow on Halloween while the killer, who is dressed like a Halloween decoration, a skeleton clothed in black, has another babysitter, criminology college student Deena (Jessica Clement), in their viewfinder. Can the killer get stopped before they kill their next victim? “Night of the Reaper” (2025) proves that you can’t have it all, but you can try.
Clement is fine as someone a bit disconnected from her family and community, but still a solid babysitter who mostly sticks to her job except for the occasional swig of whisky. She manages to seem like a credible babysitter even though her actions at home and in the Arnold house seem furtive. Deena screams final girl. Deena’s best friend, Haddie McAllister (Savannah Miller), presents as a typical, bubbly teen girl and is the opposite of Deena. Chad Bolton (Ben Cockell) seems to know Deena and likes jumping out behind vans to record people on his video camera. Willis (Bryn Samuel) jumps out of vans but Deena seems not to mind his attention since startling is not on the agenda.
Robbins as the Chief is likable and the kind of person that instills confidence though by the end of “Night of the Reaper,” you may reconsider that unfounded confidence given that he is not the one who solves the murder without someone leading him around by the nose. The Chief’s right hand man, Officer Butch Cassidy (Matty Finochio), is all business though unlike his boss, whatever cloud is hovering over their town does not seem to weigh him down since he still takes time out to flirt with the receptionist, Dottie (Sofie Kane), who is reciprocating his interest. While inspecting a dead dog in the road, US Forest Service Law Enforcement Officer Elizabeth Talbot (Keegan Connor Tracy) crosses the two men’s path as they follow the clues.
Exterior signifiers such as vocation or a closely associated object define the characters more than anything else. It is like a slasher version of “Clue” (1985). “Night of the Reaper” hides key demographic facts about the characters that later is pivotal to understanding various characters’ motives and actions. It is a narrative technique that “Fall is a Good Time to Die” (2025) used judiciously so it worked. Overlooking one blip where information should be is acceptable, but because more than one may keep people off kilter and second guessing their instincts. When the revelations start coming, it retroactively feels more like cheating than clever craftmanship. It is a bit of a shell game that could work depending on how good you are at noticing the con. At least, you should notice that there is a puzzle and some of the pieces even if you do not know how they fit. If you occasionally guess the killer’s identity, then change your mind, there is a reason for it.
The strangest omission in the story is never showing the widowed Chief with his son, Max (Max Christensen), the director’s real life son, even though Rod is initially shown at home before he goes to work. If the kid went to school, how come they did not notice the package earlier? If Max did not need a babysitter until the evening, where was he while his dad was at work? Hattie babysits Max, but when she can’t, she gets Deena to sub without checking in with the Chief to see if he is copacetic with the swap. It becomes clear in a later scene showing Deena and the Chief chatting that they appear to be on good terms and clearly know each other. Deena and her family are quiet, withdrawn and ashen, but the reason is not given until the eleventh hour of the film. Lots of references are made to various tragedies but not detailed. The problem with hiding basic facts is that it is less obvious to director and cowriter Brandon Christensen and his brother and cowriter Ryan Christensen which ones need to be included so they can ground the story.
Taking its inspiration from “Halloween” (1978), “Night of the Reaper” really leans on VHS horror and the nostalgia of Eighties atmosphere (MTV, Classic Coca-Cola) without providing the required connective tissue to make this movie work. Like “It” (2017), is it an effort to exploit the popularity of “Stranger Things?” The killer is not just killing for fun but is shown recording their kills on a video camera. This concept has been around since “Peeping Tom” (1960) when a killer sought to capture the moment that the victim died and was revisited with the “Scream” franchise, “The Poughkeepsie Tapes” (2007), “The Den” (2013) and many others. It feels like the Christensen brothers had a lot of good ideas that they envisioned, including a cool twist that horror afficionados may see coming; however, if a viewer thinks about the characters, the dynamics and how everything gels, it does not quite feel like a cohesive story.
The found footage parts of “Night of the Reaper” is more interesting than the overall movie and are where most of the kills occur. The opening sequence is the tightest one as the tension builds up with every strange moment, especially since children are involved. It is more “When a Stranger Calls” (1979) than anything from the legend John Carpenter though the deliberate pacing with a frenzied finale does begin to match the beats of Carpenter’s aforementioned classic, but with none of the evocative resonance that creeps into your bones annually as fall approaches. It kind of drags once babysitting duties begin in the second half when it could have been as tight as the opening sequence.
“Night of the Reaper” visually embraces analog horror, but the static gets annoying when the scares are not being televised or recorded on a camera. It is nice that it is a love letter to all the movies that the Christensen brothers likely admired as kids, but it is not a substitute for substance. One sequence borrowed from “The Silence of the Lambs” (1991).
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Like every movie lately, the killer is actually two people, but there are no credible reasons why those two people would meet and collaborate though perhaps they were in a romantic relationship. The best and biggest surprise in “Night of the Reaper” is that it is actually a vengeance, turn-the-tables film, and if the story made sense overall, then it would land better and make this movie one of the greats. The idea of the vengeful figure disrupting the killer’s creative vision with their own is great but then making that person do stupid things gets annoying. There is one perfect kill, but because it is the second to last kill, it makes the last one feel comparatively anticlimactic. One killer growls, “You don’t know anything about me,” which is true and kind of the problem. It is rare to get a Michael Myers level killer that needs little explanation except pure evil.
Who is the first victim? If it was the car accident victim, that would make sense because then it would distract law enforcement from investigating the crime effectively, but the brothers do not provide the chronology. While I am glad that all the victims are not connected to the Chief, and it is not a weird crush situation, it makes the victim choice feel puzzling and underdeveloped. Why are all the kills diverse then repeated at the eleventh hour? The idea that the killer is making a movie with different types of kills would have made for a better movie for the killer and filmmaker brothers.
