Movies…with a little bit of obscure culture and sports mixed in
“Fifteen years after murdering his sister on Halloween night 1963, Michael Myers escapes from a mental hospital and returns to the small town of Haddonfield, Illinois to kill again.” Director: […]
“Fifteen years after murdering his sister on Halloween night 1963, Michael Myers escapes from a mental hospital and returns to the small town of Haddonfield, Illinois to kill again.”
Director: John Carpenter
Writers: John Carpenter, Debra Hill
Staring: Donald Pleasence, Jamie Lee Curtis, Nancy Kyes, P.J. Soles, Charles Cyphers, Kyle Richards, Brian Andrews, Nancy Stephens
Where To Watch: Wherever Possible
Release Date: October 27, 1978
If you don’t like Halloween (1978), get the fuck out. Leave.
Halloween is one of my favorite movies of all-time. It is one of the best horror movies of all time. Halloween is iconic, legendary, stoic and perfect. Halloween is the perfect Halloween tradition.
The plot to John Carpenter’s classic is simple. Fifteen years ago Michael Myers murdered his sister. Fast forward to 1978 and Myers has escaped an insane asylum and is on his way back to Haddonfield, IL to haunt its residents on Halloween night.
Going to be brutally honest here. I have no idea how to be objective about this. Halloween is a lot like my love for Highlander (1986); it is undying and unrelenting.
One of the best aspects of Halloween is its pacing. It is slow, suspenseful and uses the lure of slow paces as it each step is a twinge of rope snapping. When Myers is diabolically moving slowly, it feels like the audience is watching an anvil plummet to the earth. The looming shots of Myers’ shoulder that always last half a second too long. The lingering shots on the landscape after someone turns a corner on the sidewalk that make you look closer than you mean too.
What helps the cause of the pacing is the immaculate and timeless score created by John Carpenter himself. This theme song used to be my ringtone and I elated at the chance of scaring people out of their shoes. This theme looms throughout the movie and where it hits are the perfect moments.
Listen here, and preach to everyone across the universe. You do not need copious amounts of blood to make a good horror movie. You do not need to have copious amounts of blood to make a scary horror movie. You need the little things. The little things are what elevate Halloween above so many others.
Halloween is great. It is iconic. This review is short and deal with it; there is nothing better than watching Halloween on Halloween.
STANKO RATING: A (4.5/5 Stars)
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