Halloween Review: Tales of Halloween

I was amused to find that, in my original review of Tales of Halloween, I noted that I didn’t expect to watch it again.  Well, two years later, I did just because I needed a review for Halloween.  It seems that, in the intervening years, my views have changed somewhat.

Firstly, I found myself less inclined to compare this film to Trick ‘RTreat.  Going in this time I knew what to expect, and it wasn’t Trick ‘R Treat.  I found myself comparing it to the short scary stories that get passed around on the internet every October (and, if you’re a horror nerd, year-round).  By that standard these still aren’t classics, but they are good.

I was somewhat surprised to learn that the tale I found the most memorable this time was one I didn’t even mention my first time reviewing it, Lucky McKee’s “Ding Dong.”  A man (Marc Senter) deals with the literal witch he married (Pollyanna McIntosh) and her craving for children on Halloween.  This story hits hard as both a fantastic story, and a great metaphor for spousal abuse.

I also have to ask myself how I didn’t mention that the killer in “Friday the 31^st” (Nick Principe) was such an obvious Jason homage.  I guess I just figured my readers would assume it, since most horror parodies draw something from Jason, but this example is so blatant I’m not sure why it isn’t lawsuit worthy, right down to the head of his mother on display in his house.

Most of my discussions of the other segments from my first review are still valid.  Most of them are still goofy, with plenty of morality tales sprinkled in.  The tones vary a lot in keeping with the different directors, but I don’t think any of them ever become truly bad.  The different tones actually help us to see many different perspectives of Halloween, and that goes a long way towards giving this film its own identity.

Aside from that, it’s still a fun movie.  If you plan a lineup of movies for the season, this is definitely a worthy edition.  I’m curious to see how it ages.

Halloween Review: Halloween III Season of the Witch

I imagine that anyone who follows my blog, if such people exist, guessed long ago that Halloween III: Season of the Witch would be my review for Halloween 2016 (interesting note: I'm writing it on New Years Day). It's one of the most Halloweeny movies ever made, with witches, masks, decorations everywhere, and that song that you can never get out of your head (“Three more days 'til Halloween!”)

No other film has divided the horror community quite as sharply. There are those who say this movie sucks, and others who feel that it was smeared merely because it didn't had Michael Myers. I think I've developed my own theory on the matter: Anthology series need to, for the most part, maintain a similar tone. Sure there was the occasional comedy episode of The Twilight Zone, but for the most part their episodes were far more serious than, say, Tales from the Crypt.

In the same way, if they wanted to turn Halloween into an anthology series, they needed to at minimum maintain a level of serious horror. Instead, we were given a campy film that, while good in it's own right, really didn't fit with the tone of the series. Imagine Scream Queens presented as a season of American Horror Story. As much as I love both series, they are, on a fundamental level, not the same show.

The premise of the film is that a shop owner, fleeing a town based around a Halloween-mask factory, is attacked by a group of mysterious men. He collapses in a gas station, and is taken to a hospital, where one of the men comes to finish him off. His attacker then burns himself alive.

Naturally, when a death this mysterious occurs, it's only natural for his attending physical from the hospital to team up with his daughter to investigate. Tom Adkins does an admirable job portraying Dr. Challis as a basically good family man, who has drifted away from his children and ex-wife, but who desperately wants to protect the innocent. However, the sheer silliness of the material makes you want to applaud his ability to keep a straight face.

Having watched this movie several times, I still have no idea how the doctor got involved in this story. Why did the daughter team up with him? Why did he feel the need to investigate this case? Why was he even allowed in the factory when he had no business-related reason to be there, and no authority to investigate anything? As far as I can tell the answer is “because he's the hero, and there wouldn't be a movie otherwise.”

Avoiding too many direct spoilers, before the film is over it's involved a plot by druids to sacrifice children in the most impractical way possible. Those druids employ the services of an army of robots that look completely human. Also, any nut with a telephone can get apparently get a television station shut down on the drop of a hat with one phone call.

The ending goes into the territory of the utterly baffling, but I'd say it's supposed to. At a certain point in the last twenty minutes or so things just start happening because...reasons... But, the effect is glorious. In fact a major gag from Austin Powers 2 appears to have been ripped off from this movie, only here it's played straight.

So, the answer is yes, I recommend this movie. Seek it out in the Halloween season. It's fun, it's silly, and it can only be improved by the presence of friends and alcohol.

Wednesday Editorial: Halloween Returns?

When I first started writing this blog, it was always my intention to use Wednesday both for reviews of recent horror movies, and for editorializing. I haven’t, however, had much to say on the editorial front. Today, however, that changes, because I do want to talk about my feelings on a subject: The new Halloween movie. More specifically, I want to talk about the obstacles I see for this movie to overcome.

Now, I’ll be the first to admit I’m excited about this. While I’m not always Jason Blum’s biggest fan, I do know that the guy is a businessman who effectively runs a factory. If he believes there’s a dime to be made with the Halloween name he will make sure that the movie happens. Any quality concerns Blum may bring to the project are washed away by Mike Flanagan in the director’s chair, and John Carpenter himself doing the score.

That said, my question for this production is this: So, what’s the story?

It’s kind of ironic that Halloween has somehow kept its roots firmly planted in the legacy of the first movie, while simultaneously having worse continuity than any other long-running Slasher series. Reviewing the ten films, only Halloween 2 and The Curse of Michael Myers followed up on the previous film without any major retcons. All the others were either alternate continuities, remakes, ignored some or all of the previous sequels, or just outright used an asspull to get out of whatever was established in the last movie (looking at you Halloween 5 and Resurrection). Let’s not even get into how Michael Myers can still see two decades after losing both eyes.

Furthermore, Curse only follows the ending of 5 because the makers of 5 knew that attempting to end the series, and attempting to plan ahead, were both equally pointless. So, 5 gave us a cliffhanger so absurdly vague that the next movie was free to do whatever it damned well pleased, and that’s exactly what Curse did. I’m sure we all remember how that turned out.

Getting off my tangent, however, in spite of all of this wild continuity, one constant has remained that’s almost unheard of in Slasher franchises: Every single film in the series (barring 3, of course) has featured at least one character from the original movie. For Halloween 2 we kept both Dr. Loomis and Laurie, in 4-6 Loomis kept coming back to hunt Michael, and just as Donald Pleasence passed away in real life, Jamie Lee Curtis decided it was time for Laurie Strode to make her return appearance. Then, with the remake and its sequel, both character returned with new actors.

Now, I’m sure lots of people are thinking “Laurie was barely in Resurrection.” That’s exactly right! And that’s why it’s Halloween: Resurrection! That was the one time in the series that the filmmakers tried to cut ties with the original Halloween, and it was an utter disaster.

I’m sure we can all list reasons why Resurrection sucked that are completely independent of Pleasence and Curtis. However, we do have to consider that Halloween is not a fresh franchise open to limitless experimentation. We’ve had decades to learn just what Halloween is, and it’s not a series like Nightmare on Elm Street or Friday the 13^th where you can just place the killer in a new environment and let the blood flow. Michael’s story is tied to that town, that house, and those people, who he killed on that night.

With that in mind, we can begin weeding out what stories can and cannot be told in Halloween at this point. To do so, let’s deal with what’s been done already:

-We’ve dealt with a direct follow-up to the events of the original movie, and seen Michael die (even if it didn’t stick).

-We’ve seen Michael return to attack the offspring of the protagonist of the first movie.

-We’ve explored Michael as a supernatural figure.

-We’ve gotten an explanation for Michael’s origin (and were suitably disappointed).

-We’ve seen the protagonist of the first film return to finish old business.

-We’ve seen Michael attacking people with no connection to the first movie.

-We’ve seen the first movie done again with more emphasis on backstory.

-And most recently, we’ve seen a long, bloody meditation on the significance of family to Michael.

That’s a lot of ideas that have already been used. I’m not going to act as if some of them couldn’t be done better, but if the writers choose to go back down a path they’ve already covered they risk redundancy. We’re currently living in the longest gap between Halloween movies since the series premiered. (The last one came out seven years ago. Previously, the longest gap was six.) Do any of us want to end that drought with a rehash of one of the previous movies, no matter how much better?

Getting (at last) to my point, I think there’s only one story left to be told. Since there’s ample precedent in the series to ignore past movies, they can easily ignore Curse, and bring back Danielle Harris to play Jamie Lloyd as an adult. As a horror geek, this is the best option I can think of. However, it doesn’t seem like the kind of risk Blumhouse is likely to take.

While it’s true Harris is now well-known for her horror roles, and was one of the redeeming features of her two films, Halloween 4 and 5 seem to have a reputation as “the ones that are on cable all October because the rights are cheap, and they’re better than Curse.” (Is that still true? I haven’t really watched television in years.) It seems like it would be too risky for studio execs to go back to a story written out of continuity four films ago.

That said, however, it also seems like the perfect set-up for a great Halloween story that hasn’t really been told yet. While it’s true H20 had Laurie facing her brother after many years, the fact remains that he had terrorized her as a near-adult. To Laurie Michael was a human, if a far from normal one. To Jamie, who faced Michael Myers before she faced puberty, Michael is and always will be the Boogieman.

Furthermore, the family aspect of the story is far more prominent with Jamie than Laurie, giving us ample room to explore the relationship between the two, regardless of whether it’s real or a product of Jamie’s imagination. Laurie found out Michael was her brother well over halfway through his initial rampage. The only film in which Laurie acknowledge a strong fraternal connection with Michael was the Zombie sequel, and even there it’s treated as more a part of her insanity than of her identity. Jamie grew up knowing “my Uncle is the Boogieman,” and in any further sequels would presumably be a functioning adult with many years to incorporate that into her understanding of the world. That’s a very different relationship, and Harris definitely has the chops to pull it off.

Will this happen? Sadly, probably not. However, in the absence of a return by Jamie Lloyd I’m drawing a blank on what new things Michael could get up to. Maybe Mike Flanagan and John Carpenter have better imaginations than me. I certainly hope so.

100 Scariest Movie Moments: #14 Halloween

This is probably the most intimidating analysis I could ever dream of doing. I don’t think there is a single aspect of Halloween that hasn’t been examined, re-examined, ranted on and generally picked apart. I honestly feel like its status as a classic almost compels other people over-analyze what’s fundamental to the story of a small child who went crazy, became catatonic, and years later, escaped from a mental institution and came back to his home to kill anyone in the general vicinity, mostly baby-sitting teenagers.

If I had to offer up my two cents, I would have to say that it popularized ‘The Other’ as the villain; something that was initially perfected by Black Christmas. (In fact, I would argue that Black Christmas did a better job of it.) It’s been said (I believe by John Carpenter himself) that there are only two horror stories: “the evil is out there,” and “the evil is in there.” Either evil is the ‘Other,’ the terrifying force that fights against us, or evil is our own savage human nature.

The slasher film is the epitome of the former, and I feel that is part of why it’s so looked down upon. I can understand why; viewing evil as something that comes purely from without could be seen as an incredibly simplistic way of looking at the world. However, such simplicity is far too often underrated for its ability to elicit terror.

Michael Myers (Nick Castle), before being retconned by the sequels into Laurie Strode’s (Jamie Lee Curtis’) long-lost brother, was pure ‘Other.’ The closest conceivable connection he had to any of the characters was that he happened to have been born in the same town as them. He was human in only the broadest sense of the word.

The movie is very different if its sequels are considered. While I enjoy the sequels, I think the movie is most frightening as a standalone piece. Later films make Laurie out to be some sort of rival for Michael, whereas in this film, her survival is due to a mixture of spunk and luck, and Michael has no interest in any connection or rivalry.

Of course, no review of this film is complete without a discussion of Dr. Sam Loomis (Donald Pleasence), the one person who knew what Michael was before his escape. As with Michael himself, Dr Loomis is a simple character, but effective in his simplicity. He sees Michael as a pure evil that must be destroyed, and is seen by everyone else as a raving madman. So knowing him to be correct, his fear becomes our own.

There’s endless debate about the ending of the movie. Whether Michael’s death at the end of Halloween II was the proper ending to the series, or if it was more horrifying to simply leave the ending open, knowing that he was still out there, and would return. For my money, while I appreciate most of the sequels for what they are, I prefer the ambiguity. Michael is a force of nature, the ending should have been left at that.

Halloween Review: Trick 'R Treat

Well, I couldn't very well allow Halloween to go by without a review. In building up to this I had to ask whether I wanted to treat this like a Wednesday review, or one of my more standard, analytical reviews. On the one hand, this is a film I've seen many times, and know intimately. On the other hand, it's also a film most of my readership is likely to be familiar with. To the outside world Trick 'R Treat is a cult film, but to horror fans it's the holy grail of 21st-century horror.

I came down more on the side of the Wednesday review, mainly for practical reasons. There are so many characters, and so many plot threads in this film, that I hate the thought of trying to deal with them all, especially for a rare movie where I can sincerely find nothing to criticize. I don't claim the movie to be without fault, simply that it's so strongly to my taste that I'm not the person to find those faults. That said, to set a precedent for distinguishing Halloween reviews from Wednesday reviews, I've chosen to also discuss the history of the film.

In any discussion of this film I think it's important to acknowledge the uphill battle it had to notability. It had the bad luck of being completed during the Saw era of horror, when Jigsaw's draw at the Box Office was so powerful that other horror movies were being moved to August to avoid competing, and put on DVD in October. Obviously, for a film set at Halloween, this strategy would make no sense, so the film's release was delayed for two years, and it was eventually dumped on DVD by executives who likely expected to never hear from it again.

Despite such a low profile release, this film has become a hit through grassroots support, and word-of-mouth. This is a movie that has been on DVD shelves every Halloween ever since. This is a film that has mushroomed from an obscure cult phenomenon, to virtually inescapable on any horror fan community on the internet, especially in October. Sam has become an icon.

I think lightning struck with this movie because so many factors came together perfectly, walking so many tightropes. It isn't a remake, but yet it remains timeless without direct references to the year. It doesn't pull punches, but it also doesn't include unnecessary gore or torture porn. It embraces comedy, but without disrespecting or undermining the horror.

The thing that sets this movie apart from most horror anthologies is that the stories all take place on a single Halloween night, in a single town. The stories are presented anachronistically, and often cross-over. They're also all united by the character of Sam, a mysterious trick-or-treater with a burlap sack over his head, implied to be the guardian of Halloween customs, punishing those who disrespect the spirits, or fail to show hospitality.

The film is usually said to have four stories, but I'd likely place the number at six. The four count excludes two short scenes that I count as independent stories. One is the opening sequence, in which a woman is punished for disrespecting the holiday. The second is a short scene involving a “vampire” attacking a woman at a Halloween parade. The vampire eventually shows up in one of the main stories, while tying into another, but his initial attack doesn't really relate to either story, and could stand independently of them.

Of the four main stories, each seems intended to show a moral about the nature of the holiday. All horror is fundamentally about sin and punishment. Either punishment comes to the sinful, or punishment comes to the innocent. In this film, the punishment always inevitably comes to the sinful. Whether their sins are fully deserving of the punishments they receive varies from story to story, and can even come down to audience interpretation. The real horror, however, is simply that there are no innocent characters. Everyone has been cruel, and everyone will face their punishment.

“The Principal” overtly states the traditional Halloween rule of “always check your candy,” while arguably also being about greed. In “The School Bus Massacre Revisited” a group of bullies meet their fates when they fail to accept someone different from them. In “Surprise Party” we learn that stranger-danger isn't just for kids. Finally, in “Meet Sam” an old man learns the importance of generosity...then gets a reminder of School Bus Massacre lesson. All of these stories feel somewhat like a modern mythology, designed to instill morality in the people.

The film also stands out because of it's aesthetics. We live in a day when many horror films shy away from bright colors, while Trick 'R Treat makes heavy use of the reds and oranges of fall. The soundtrack is effective as well, perfectly evoking excited yet nervous feelings of Halloween. The movie makes no apologies, it's about Halloween.

For some time now this has been my favorite movie. Sam is an icon, the stories are both scary and hilarious, and the writing and directing are both excellent. In the off chance anyone hasn't seen it, watch it. If you have watched it, go watch it again.