Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale (2010) Review – A Gritty Finnish Masterpiece

Welcome to Knockout Horror. Today we are reviewing Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale.

The anti-Christmas movie

A team of researchers have dug something up that really should have stayed buried: Santa’s tomb! A young boy quickly begins to see the truth of Christmas. He realises that the fat jolly man of Western marketing isn’t actually as jolly as legends present him. But the question is, can he convince the adults around him of that fact?

“Rare Exports cares not for your sanitised, commercialised, view of the festive season. In place of happy elves are slaughtered Rudolphs and a Santa that would not look out of place in a depiction of hell.”

Acting as something of an anti-Christmas movie, Rare Exports makes its intentions clear instantly as Pietari’s father hacks up a reindeer for food. This isn’t a movie that is aiming to bring you Xmas cheer. Rare Exports cares not for your sanitised, commercialised, view of the festive season. Gone are the happy elves making toys in the North Pole. In their place are hundreds of slaughtered Rudolphs, a Santa that wouldn’t look out of place in a depiction of hell, and a bunch of elves that run around with their junk out terrorising boys and girls.

Rare Exports presents a version of Santa that couldn’t be further away from what we are used to. Building on stories of legend read by Pietari, Santa is a Krampus-like creature existing only to punish children that have been naughty. This feels like the furthest thing from a Christmas movie. Despite being set in Lapland and featuring plenty of festive tropes, it is the perfect option for people looking for something completely different.

A different perspective

Naturally, like many great Christmas movies, we see the events through the eyes of a young boy. Terrified of Santa, Pietari tapes cardboard to his butt to prevent the inevitable whupping he believes he is due. The hockey gear he dons to protect himself from Santa seems secondary to the rifle he carries. Stolen from his dad, Pietari believes this is wholly necessary to survive. It’s not particularly common to see a movie where a child is afraid of Santa, Silent Night, Deadly Night aside. With that being said, Rare Exports isn’t like other movies.

This sense of childlike curiosity combined with the character’s fear and skepticism lends a fantastic sense of adventure to the movie. I really love this about Rare Exports. It reminds me of films like The Goonies. The interesting thing is, Pietari is completely un-fooled by what is going on around him. Unlike many movies that feature a child protagonist, the adults actually believe him. Well, they do eventually, anyway.

He doesn’t have to spend half of the movie trying to prove them wrong. That’s pretty novel. They completely buy into the potential for what he is saying to be true. He quickly becomes the adults’ go-to resource for all things bad Santa. Whereas some will find this somewhat unrealistic, it brings an element of fun to the movie. Pietari is able to fill in the blanks for the adults and they find what he is saying to be feasible. Perhaps they also grew up on legends of Santa being a complete bastard and can make the link?

Gritty and tense

As mentioned above, this is an incredibly gritty movie. It is the anti-Christmas film. Rare Exports takes the Joulupukki of Finnish legend, turns it up to ten and creates a genuinely creepy version of Santa. On top of that, it also presents us with a somewhat complicated father-son relationship. Pietari’s recent past has been tragic and you genuinely feel quite sorry for him. He makes for a very interesting protagonist and quite atypical in horror.

“An absolutely oppressive, snow-covered landscape plays backdrop to the movie. Stunning in its vast whiteness, it is somewhat strange that such a typical festive landscape can play host to a horror story.”

An absolutely oppressive, snow-covered landscape plays backdrop to the movie, looking every bit as harsh as you can imagine. The cold environment only adds to the gritty presentation. Stunning in its vast whiteness, it’s somewhat strange that such a typical festive landscape can play host to a horror story.

That is what makes Rare Exports such a good anti-Christmas movie, though. Few places on earth can present such a fitting representation of the North Pole. It is incredibly authentic. It also helps matters that Lapland only gets a few hours of light this time of year; rarely do events take place in anything other than darkness. This all serves to add to the tension.

Unexpected shocks

Rare Exports is not a gory movie. It’s not trying to present Santa as a slasher villain who cuts his way through tons of victims. It wants to build tension and a sense of not knowing what will happen next. It aims to shock the viewer in ways you may not expect. Some of which become very apparent a little later in the movie.

Rudolph being on the menu, naked elves and “Santa” in a pit trap are just a few of the methods used. It’s great stuff and feels very different to some of the other Christmas horror movies. Many tend to lean heavily into gore and blood; Rare Exports doesn’t and it feels very different for it.

There is a degree of feasibility to the events of the movie. Everything is presented in a way that seems realistic and, almost, as if it could actually happen. Never once does Rare Exports hint that it is a farcical story deliberately played for laughs. Sure, the ending perhaps trends a little bit towards satire. The rest of the movie, however, is portrayed as deadpan as can be.

Aside from really helping to elevate the moments of fantastic dry Finnish humour, it helps the viewer to buy into the tension and atmosphere that the movie so carefully creates. A story like this could easily slip into silliness. The fact that it never does is commendable. It maintains its grittiness from start to finish.

Fantastic acting and gorgeous cinematography

Acting is fantastic. Onni Tommila is, obviously, the star of the show here. Tasked with carrying the movie from Pietari’s perspective, he does a fantastic job and is very easy to root for. I am sure he went on to even more starring roles. He absolutely deserves them. His actual real-life dad, Jorma Tommila, stars alongside him and does a really good job.

Their complicated relationship is one of the more interesting facets of the film. It goes without saying that their real-life chemistry helps to propel the story along. While Rare Exports never gets too deep on character building, the one developed relationship in the movie is important to the plot and these two do a good job.

“It is one of the best Christmas horror movies of all time. The dry humour, the horrible depiction of Santa, and the anti-Christmas message all work so well together. It is a unique holiday experience.”

Cinematography is stunning. It is quite surprising to see the budget of this movie given how gorgeous it looks. I believe much of it was filmed in Norway and the beautiful scenery is one of the stars of the show. Mika Orasmaa fills every pixel of the 2.35:1 aspect ratio with incredible shots of snow-covered hills. This is a harsh landscape that greatly adds to the grittiness of the film. Despite how oppressive it feels, its hard not to marvel at just how incredibly well filmed it is. A few moments of shoddy CG don’t impact things too much. Some of the close-up shots of the movie’s villains are pure horror gold, as well.

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