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Directed By
John Carpenter
Written By:
John Carpenter, Debra Hill
Cast:
Jamie Lee Curtis, Donald Pleasence, Nancy Loomis, P.J. Soles, Charles Cyphers, Kyle Richards, Nancy Stephens, Arthur Malet, Sandy Johnson, David Kyle, Nick Castle, Mickey Yablans, Brian Andrews, John Michael Graham, Mickey Yablans, Brent Le Page, Adam Hollander, Robert Phalen
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Halloween (1978)
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Movie Review by Ben
December 23rd, 2007
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Now what is there to be said about "Halloween" that has not already been said? It has been discussed ad nauseam in many circles. Even John Carpenter must be sick to death of talking about it all the damn time. On one of the more recent releases of the movie on Anchor Bay DVD, they ended up having to include the original commentary track from the Criterion Laserdisc edition because John felt that everything that needed to be said about the movie was on that track.
We all know the story by now, and it is in large part due to the countless (not to mention endless) imitators who rushed to create their own psychotic killer once they saw how much "Halloween" had made at the box office. At the time it was released, it was the most successful independent movie ever made. Made for about $300,000, the movie ended up grossing over $50 million. Hollywood of course, just had to feed off of that success. "Friday The 13th" would have never existed without "Halloween," and is much more responsible for the numerous clichés we see in slasher movies of this type.
What I love about this movie, and why it still retains much of its power to scare to this very day, is how down to earth it is. All of these characters, the three teenage girls, the little boy Laurie Strode babysat on Halloween, the bullies who destroy Tommy's pumpkin, the sheriff, and even Dr. Loomis come across as very down to earth. The way they are written and directed, we can easily recognize these are people in our own lives. We grew up with the same kind of people, even if we did not do the same things that they did. The only character in the whole movie that is certainly NOT down to earth is Michael Meyers. A killer who seemingly (in the first movie anyway) has no motive for why he does what he does. As the movie goes on, we can barely see him as a person at all. He more than comes across as the pure embodiment of evil.
That's what makes the movie so damn scary. We have all at one time or another lived in a town like Haddonfield. A small town where families can raise their children in peace (or so it would seem), and the problems the town faces are nowhere as bad in any of the big cities in this country. The parents see it as a home away from reality, but for their children, it is reality. It is all they know. So when something like this happens, murders all in one night, it threatens to define the town above everything else it is known for. Was there anything else interesting about Haddonfield before young Michael Meyers took a knife to one of his sisters?
I also love the way this movie was shot. Working with Director of Photography Dean Cundey, Carpenter creates truly unnerving visuals of a killer lurking just behind you in the shadows. One moment, he appears in the frame, and then the next thing you know, he is gone. He could be anywhere, and there is no escape from him. How does one escape from evil in this day and age anyway? One of Carpenter's main themes with this movie is how evil never dies. It is a force that is always with us, whether we like it or not, and it is just around the corner...
The other brilliant thing about the movie is the way it is edited. The movie is edited in such a way that you cannot tell what is going to happen next, or where Michael Meyers will appear or kill next. The best example of editing in the movie is when Laurie Strode is running away from Michael Meyers. At that point, you are in her shoes as she desperately tries to escape the madman who murdered her friends while wearing that William Shatner mask. The editing plays with your emotions beautifully. You want her to escape, and you get the impression that she escapes by the skin of her teeth.
The moment that she is at the front door of Tommy's house, screaming for him to let her in, is one of the scariest scenes I have ever seen in any movie. It intercuts with her banging on the door while we see the Shape approaching her, and we are stuck there with her, and we find even ourselves BEGGING for Tommy to let her in. That's one of many moments in my movie watching experience where I feel like I am right there with the main character, begging for someone to unlock the damn door!
And who can ever forget the music? John Carpenter's score for this movie ranks among the greatest and scariest movie scores ever done. I would put it up there with the work that Bernard Herrmann did on "Psycho." Carpenter's work on film scores has mostly of a minimalist approach, and not that of John Williams who always has the big orchestral score. After all these years, his main title music for "Halloween" is something that I never ever get sick of listening to. It's one of several haunting music scores in this movie that succeeds brilliantly in heightening the ever growing tension the movie escalates in until it reaches the point where Michael Meyers starts hacking away.
This is definitely one of my all time favorite movies, and I really never ever ge
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