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Among the Sisters present are Jess (Olivia Hussey), a polite and principled Brit who practically wears a halo over her spectacularly conditioned head of hair. Phyllis (Andrea Martin) is Jess’ best friend, a brainy, big hearted nerd with wavy hair and coke bottle glasses. Holding court over things is Barb (Margot Kidder), who absolutely steals the first act of the film. She is a loud, brash, hard drinking, sexually charged battle-axe. She fears nobody, including cops, and Phyllis seems to be the only person who can control her. Barb is Chris Farley to Phyllis’ David Spade, is what I’m saying.

Clare (Lynne Griffin) has but one character trait, which is to be Barb’s verbal punching bag. And supposedly in charge of all this is Mrs. MacHenry (Marian Waldman), the Housemother. She drinks and curses less than Barb, but not by much. Because of this, the girls more or less do what they want, but still somehow manage to stay out of trouble. Sadly, trouble comes looking for them in the form of the shambling mouth-breather who scales the trellis outside the house and enters the attic during the party.

The killer is in first person shooter mode all throughout the film, allowing us to see through his eyes. All we see of him are shadows, and the odd partial reflection - although his incessant muttering and wheezing become pretty unsettling over time. Which reminds me - as the party comes to a close, someone makes a prank call to the house, and Jess answers. It’s clear he’s called before, because Barb takes the phone and lays into him in the way she lays into everyone - which makes me want to travel back in time and propose to Margot Kidder.

Maybe I can warn her about all that stuff that happens in the ‘90s.

Shortly after this, Barb does the same thing to Clare, who runs upstairs with her mouth poked out. She heads into the attic to pack for her trip home, and is promptly murdered. If you want to know how, it’s on the movie poster. From this point on, the calls continue, and the person calling is a raving, babbling lunatic. This too, kind of gets to you as the film goes on, and everyone is trying to figure out whether the Killer and “The Moaner” are related, or whether the Pi Delta-Somethings are just the un-fucking-luckiest Greeks on campus.

Unfortunately, because Black Christmas is based on a well-known urban legend - one you will probably suddenly recall about 15 minutes into the story - very little of the tension in this movie comes from the actual plot. Odds are that even if you don’t know what I’m talking about, you’ll still have everything figured out well before the final reveal. But what makes the film so much fun is that it’s well paced, it has a (bleak) sense of humor, and while the killings are few in number, they’re all uniquely terrifying. Not because of out and out gore, and more because of what you don’t see than what you do.

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