The movie opens on December 22, 1971, 3 days before Christmas,
and we see some people observing a young couple’s house in a small town in Canada.
These 4 people then walk toward the house, and as soon as the husband opens the door…
One of them brutally stabs the husband to death.
Then, they restrain the scared wife, remove her clothes, and stab her as well.
Some markings on her stomach indicate that the killings are ritualistic.
In the next scene, we are taken to Blackvale Academy, an all-girls boarding school.
A teenager named Clara suddenly wakes up from her sleep, as if she’s seen a nightmare.
She looks out of the window and spots one of her classmates, Samantha,
preparing for a jog.
Samantha is the quiet girl at school, and she is often ridiculed by her friends.
Even today, as she is taking a shower, they abruptly turn off the lights and leave.
The scene then cuts to history class where Miss Rose is talking about witches.
She reveals that a dearly fire broke out several decades back and burnt this town;
there were only 4 survivors, and they blamed the incident on a witch.
During this, Samantha’s attention is caught by Clara’s disfigured hands.
Later, during lunch break, the girls talk about the murders that have terrorized the town as of late.
One of them has brought a newspaper headline; it is revealed that the Christmas Killers
have already killed 3 families this week.
The popular girl explains that they follow the same pattern every time;
they pick a house with a nice couple, slaughter them with knives and peele parts of their body.
Samantha then asks about the symbols that the killers leave behind,
and the popular girl assumes that they are related to some satanic shit.
The winter holidays are about to start from tomorrow; most of the girls are relieved that
they can go home, and stay away from all this madness here.
However, it is revealed that Clara has never been home during the holidays;
she doesn’t even have any friends, and spends most of her time drawing alone.
Most girls think she’s an orphan, but no one has ever confirmed it.
Meanwhile, Rose goes to see her boyfriend, Jimmy, who works as a chef at the same school.
They talk about their future plans, and Rose reveals that her students know about their relationship.
That night, Samantha is seen packing her belongings;
she can’t wait to go home and be with her family after months of separation.
Unfortunately, she receives a call from her stepfather, who has some bad news;
he can’t come to pick her up tomorrow.
This means that poor Samantha will have to spend the holidays alone at school.
After the call ends, Samantha cries, and she heads to the bathroom to have some alone time.
But then, she comes across a distressing sight; Clara is cutting her hands with a knife
and leaving without any explanation.
2 nights until Christmas; the same four killers enter a local church and apprehend the priest.
The leader of the group, Jude, lifts up the priest’s shirt, which reveals a mark on his stomach.
This confirms that they have found the target they were after.
Jude uses a knife to carve the man’s stomach, and extract a piece of skin.
Once their work is done, the machoman of the group, Grant, finishes the priest off by twisting his neck.
Back at the school, Clara wakes up from yet another nightmare,
and she sees her friends departing for the holidays.
Jimmy has been assigned to drive them to the local train station, and he puts a beautiful
ring in his pocket, which means he is planning to propose to Rose.
He bids goodbye to everyone and leaves with the kids.
Now, only Rose, Samantha, and Clara remain at the school.
The kids certainly seem disappointed, but Rose promises that they will have a good time.
Samantha is still upset by her stepdad's betrayal, so Rose tries to talk to her,
but she is in no mood to listen.
The girl then reveals that her stepdad told her to try this place out for one semester,
but now she realizes her stepdad just doesn’t want to deal with her as he doesn’t let
her come home this Christmas.
Hearing this, the caring teacher lifts Samantha’s mood by assuring her that she will have an
independent life in the future.
The teacher then sends her to the basement to get some vodka.
Samantha slowly heads downstairs, and she appears a bit scared as this is her first time here.
She looks around for a couple of minutes, and finally finds the vodka.
But just as she takes a few sips, Clara startles her from behind.
Here Clara reveals that she usually comes here to read books from the library.
According to her, the books found here are forbidden, and the teachers don’t allow
anyone to read them.
Samantha then apologizes for barging into Clara last night, saying she didn’t see anything,
but the creepy girl says there was nothing to see.
After drinking a few sips of vodka, Clara asks Samantha how her mother died.
This shocks the latter, as her mother’s death was a secret, but despite the strange feeling,
Samantha explains that her mom died in a car accident several years ago.
On the other hand, we see the Christmas killers heading somewhere in their car.
Jude and the only female member of the gang, Maisie, are having a romantic time at the back.
The fourth member, Doug, is driving, but he is clearly distracted by what’s going on in the back.
But then suddenly…
A deer arrives out of nowhere, resulting in an accident.
They move it to the side of the road, and prepare to leave.
But just then, an officer arrives at the scene.
As he interrogates the group about the accident,
he spots the eerie piece of human skin on the road…
Before the officer can do anything, Grant knocks him from behind,
while Doug is shot in the arm as well.
Jude shoots the officer to death, and simultaneously, Clara awakens from another nightmare.
She seems to be connected to the killings in some manner.
Later in the evening, Samantha and Clara join Miss Rose, who has prepared a wonderful set of dinner;
she’s doing everything to make the girls feel right at home.
But all of a sudden, someone arrives at the door.
It is none other than the notorious killer group, who have come here to treat wound on Doug’s arm.
Rose is clearly uncomfortable to let them inside, but the group insists.
Maisie even mentions that she studied at the same school and graduated in 1964,
and her picture’s on the wall.
It’s the night before Christmas; Rose allows them in, and begins to stitch up Doug’s
wound so that they can leave right away.
During this time, Maisie notices that Clara looks familiar and asks if she has a sister
went to school here, but she doesn’t even respond.
Unfortunately, after the treatment is done, the group refuses to depart.
Jude grows unruly by the second, and mentions that they are here to have dinner.
When Rose realizes that they are in danger, she grabs a pair of scissors and points it at them.
Rose tells the kids to flee, but instead of escaping through the front door,
Clara weirdly goes further inside the building.
As a result, Samantha also follows her to the church room.
Seeing Doug approaching outside, the two hide under the chairs, hoping they can remain undetected.
Doug tries to give them a jumpscare, but ends up getting the jumpscare himself.
Unfortunately, he easily catches Samantha and holds her.
Clara, who has a knife in hand, approaches him, as if she’s about to attack him.
But the man threatens to snap Samantha’s neck, so she hands him the knife,
allowing him to apprehend both of them.
Elsewhere, Rose manages to lock herself in a room.
She tries using the telephone to call for help, but as usual, the line appears to be dead.
Just then, her boyfriend Jimmy arrives outside the house,
and notices the strange vehicle parked nearby.
Rose also manages to contact him through the window,
but Grant appears from behind and knocks him out.
Soon after, Jude also breaks through the door and takes Rose away.
In the next scene, we see that the intruders are tying everyone in the dining room.
It is Christmas Eve, and Jude and his group are excited about the dinner.
They begin eating voraciously, while the poor captives watch in horror.
Upon learning that Rose can't eat like a dog, Jude helps her do it.
Moments later, Jude asks Rose if she loves Jimmy.
When she replies with a ‘yes,’ he reveals that Jimmy has something for her.
He proceeds to untie the man so that he can propose to her,
but as soon as Jimmy breaks free, he tries to attack the leader.
Jude counters by slashing his throat, killing him agonizingly.
This leaves everyone in complete shock, but Clara seems to be weirdly unphased.
Jude then ends the dinner by giving Rose the ring her boyfriend had bought for her.
Afterwards, the kidnappers bring the girls to the main hall,
and Jude starts playing mind games.
He opens the presents that Rose had brought for them.
Samantha has received a lovely dress, and she is forced to wear it in front of everyone,
while Clara just smiles at her.
As for Clara, she has received a travel book, as she has never been out of the school in ages.
Following this, they proceed to place all the pieces of skin they took from their victims
inside a circle, carefully drawn with blood.
Jude starts revealing their plan; he first mentions that Gods or Devils are not pleased
through prayers, but by sacrifice.
According to Jude, they can become immortal if they summon the demon here.
Maisie then reveals that when she was studying at Blackvale school,
she used to regularly go to the forbidden library.
That’s where she came across the book which included the instructions to summon the demon.
The authorities found out about her activities and kicked her out, but she managed to grab
a page which had all the information she required.
Over the years, she met with the men who had similar agendas and minds;
every life they have taken, every drop of blood they have spilled, is according to the plan.
Now, they have to kill only one innocent soul to complete the ritual.
Meanwhile, Rose is busy cutting open her bondage with the earlier ring.
She finally manages to break free, but before she can reach a weapon, Jude knocks her out.
He takes her to the ritual circle, and brutally stabs the poor caring teacher.
Electricity surges through the room, indicating the presence of the demon.
However, after Rose passes away, nothing appears.
The group is left astounded as they thought the demon would be summoned.
Doug starts questioning if they went on a murder spree for no reason,
but Maisie is certain that they have missed an important step.
Hence, Jude and Maisie head down to the basement to check the magic book.
Once they leave, the ever so creepy Clara inquires about what Doug wants if the demon is summoned.
Doug is still skeptical that killing a bunch of religious people who have the same mark
on their stomachs could summon a demon.
Lastly, he confesses that he wants ‘Maisie.’
However, the handsome guy is frustrated that Jude is the one who gets to be with her all the time.
Stressed out by Clara’s question, he demands to know where the booze is,
so Samantha directs him towards the basement, leaving the girls in the care of Grant.
Suddenly, Clara says Grant only joined this psychotic group because he is a soldier,
who needs orders and enjoys a mission, as if she knows that he’s an ex-soldier.
She unexpectedly goes near him and whispers...
Strangely enough, the phrase is echoed throughout the hall, and all the kidnappers hear it loud and clear.
Clara then removes her clothes, revealing several satanic marks on her body.
She orders Grant to let Samantha go, and for some reason, he complies.
It is evident that he has been hypnotized by Clara, and Clara tells Samantha that Samantha
has to leave right now or she’ll die.
Clara then takes the blood of one of the group’s victims, and puts it all over Grant’s face,
promising him immortality if he follows her commands.
Downstairs, Maisie continues her research, and eventually learns that they made a big mistake;
it wasn’t a summoning ritual.
She thought they had come here to summon the demon, but in reality,
the demon was already here all along.
It lured them here to set it free.
We also see Clara, who is performing a menacing dance routine in the middle of the room.
Back to Maisie; she checks her old year book in the library,
which surprisingly has Clara's picture in it.
When she checks all the pictures on the wall,
it is revealed that Clara is none other than the demon.
She has stayed in this school for several generations,
because she cannot escape her body, and that’s why she looks familiar.
But now that the killers have offered several sacrifices, she is on the verge of escaping.
Now only one sacrifice remains; the blood of the guilty.
At this point, Jude has gone crazy and proudly thinks that he is the demon.
He also starts fighting with Doug to assert his dominance,
but then, a completely possessed Grant arrives and separates them.
Maisie runs for her life and bumps into Clara, but she is eventually captured and apprehended.
Finally, we return to Samantha, who reaches a payphone,
and immediately alerts the authorities about the situation.
But she also doesn’t want to wait for too long so she grabs a weapon,
and heads inside the house to save her friend.
Back inside the dining room, Clara has turned the tables,
and now she’s the one initiating the ritual.
At first, she reveals her backstory; a very long time ago, the people of this town tried
to summon her by setting fire everywhere.
However, they soon changed their mind, as they were not sure what they were getting themselves into.
This caused Clara to be trapped in this house; she could neither die, nor go out of the premises.
But as the years passed, she took the form of a student and started manipulating others.
She even put the ritual book in the library, which was found by Maisie.
Now, she needs one last sacrifice to finally be free, which is the blood of the guilty.
But the tricky part is that four of them have to hurt themselves or each other.
She then orders Grant to torture the tied up killers.
At first, the macho man Grant cuts Jude’s ear for the sacrifice,
and then he chops off Doug’s fingers.
Grant even tortures himself as part of the rules, and as the three of them scream in
pain and fear, he finally stabs Doug and Jude through the chest, killing them instantly.
Now, it’s Maisie’s turn to be sacrificed, but when Grant proceeds to finish her off,
she starts manipulating him, saying they can run away together and live a happy life.
This seems to have an effect on Grant, but since he cannot disobey Clara as well,
he decides to end his life instead.
Suddenly, Samantha barges through the door, saying she is here to save her friend,
and Maisie manages to escape Clara’s ritual.
Samantha then reads the ritual book, and finally gets to know that her friend is the demon.
Currently, Clara is trying to mess with Maisie’s mind so that she goes crazy and kills herself.
Overwhelmed by everything that is happening, Samantha keeps on insisting her friend to stop.
She disrupts her concentration numerous times, allowing Maisie to reach the front door,
but Clara manages to lock it.
Here Clara gets enraged because Samantha ruined her ritual by returning here,
but Samantha just wanted to save her.
Clara then starts ranting about how lonely she feels due to years of confinement;
she wishes the group could kill her.
Hearing this, Samantha finally understands her situation and decides to help,
while the building starts shaking.
Clara asks that Samantha free her by killing Maisie, as she’s unable to do it.
When the front door has opened, Samantha stabs Maisie in the back with an ax,
killing her on the spot.
This completes the ritual, and Clara is now finally allowed to leave the school after decades.
The movie ends as the cops arrive at the scene, and inspect the bodies,
while Samantha and Clara are leaving to travel the world together.