Rating: R | Runtime: 87 minutes
Release Date: November 10th, 2023 (USA)
Studio: RLJE Films / Shudder
Director(s): Tyler MacIntyre
Writer(s): Michael Kennedy

Will you be my Clarence?

I was sold by the text “From the writer of Freaky and the director of Tragedy Girls” since I’m a big fan of both. Add the promise of an It’s a Wonderful Life pivot a la the title It’s a Wonderful Knife and I really didn’t think there was a world where I wouldn’t end up being a fan. Yet here I sit trying to wrap my head around the tonal choices Michael Kennedy and Tyler MacIntyre made. Because this doesn’t feel like an homage of Frank Capra’s masterpiece. It feels like a parody of itself.

I’m talking the corniest of corny line deliveries. The cringiest of cringey “we’re pro-LGBTQ+” gags and out-of-nowhere results. And a narratively intriguing twist on the conceit that ultimately leads to a completely unexplained final reality that may have been easier to gloss over if two characters made separate wishes rather than just one. The film is trying so hard to be so many things that it ends up becoming something akin to the musicals we used to put on in middle school: those off-brand, cheaply licensed IP-knockoffs that proved as cute as they were forgettable.

Jane Widdop and Jess McLeod as Winnie and Bernie (the self-labeled George Bailey and Clarence of this escapade) are endearing as our potential heroines learning that it took less than a year for Angel Falls to become Demon Falls without the former being born. Winnie makes the wish on a rare night with a visible aurora borealis because she’s realized that everyone is pretending last year’s tragic murders never occurred. She can’t follow suit considering her best friend died and she killed her murderer. There’s an intriguing PTSD commentary here that never forms in lieu of easy, gendered jokes.

I enjoyed Justin Long’s budget Henry F. Potter, though. He’s embraced his recent horror period and never shies away from looking the fool—something his Henry Waters can’t avoid with a thinly-veiled cutthroat agenda beneath a hokey smile of blindingly white fake teeth. And both Joel McHale and Erin Boyes provide a funny duality as Winnie’s parents with a Hallmark Card sheen in “reality” and fully broken souls in the alternative. All the characters (besides Bernie and Katharine Isabelle’s Aunt Gale) possess this stark contrast since the filmmakers skew more towards Biff Tanner’s Pleasure Paradise than Capra’s Pottersville.

Maybe it was the high expectations, but everything unfortunately felt TOO. MUCH. I guess the ironic thing is that a lot of people felt that way about Freaky and Tragedy Girls while I certainly did not. So, definitely check this one out for yourself if it seems worthwhile. It might turn out being just right for you.

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Justin Long as “Henry Waters” in the horror film, IT’S A WONDERFUL KNIFE, an RLJE Films and Shudder release. Photo courtesy of RLJE Films and Shudder.