Here's what you need to know; after spending most of his life locked away for the murder of his sister, Michael Myers has never lost his taste for death, and on one fateful Halloween night, he gets his opportunity to taste it once again. Meanwhile Laurie Strode, an unassuming high-schooler and her friends have found themselves in the sights of a man with no conscience, no reason, and only a single desire; to kill.
Happy Birthday Halloween, you just turned forty, and I got on your bandwagon late, but I did walk home from work after an hour's overtime in October, so in the dark, listening to your soundtrack because I'm smart like that. Since it's the season, but more so because it turns forty and is getting a sequel, I snagged the one and only Halloween, unleashed onto the screen by John Carpenter all those years ago, so let's get spooky, let's get real spooky.
Halloween's opening titles are quite the showcase all on their own; as John Carpenter's amazing music plods on along and the camera slowly zooms into the soulless eyes of the Jack-O'-lantern. In many ways this short sequence sets the scene of the film perfectly, you know that this film isn't going to be an extravaganza, you know it was made on a tight budget but that the mind behind it had passion and a vision, and most of all, you know it's going to be spooky. The following sequence further establishes the mood as a faceless home invader gruesomely murders a young woman, only for it to be revealed to be her six-year-old brother, Michael. Unlike a certain other film we'll be discussing in this week of spooks, Halloween doesn't go nuts in piling on the characters and story, in fact this film is very straight forward. Our lead is Laurie Strode, who was the final girl before final girls became a thing, and as such she is perfect. You know how this goes, you have a group of friends, most of them are 'bad,' promiscuous and or drug users, then there's the one girl who's just an angel, that's Laurie Strode, and she is indeed an angel. She's the one who keeps up with her studies, who actually babysits the kids while her friends give them to her to look after while they bang, and apparently guys don't want to date her because she's too smart, to each their own. This all serves a purpose however, and it's a purpose we all know; the sweet, innocent, likable girl who confronts and overcomes the baddie, and Laurie might fit that bill a little too well, because she really is likable, she just seems so sweet. Her friends meanwhile aren't quite so sweet, in edition to a hammy delivery, they fit the other end of the bill; the slutty druggies who end up getting slashed. Though that maybe their role in the story, the scenes with them and Laurie are still decently entertaining, and since this film's body count is so incredibly modest, the film uses every moment it can with them to build the tension and dread as the Bogeyman inches his way closer.
Then we have Loomis, Michael's doctor, who injects into the film some more peculiar philosophical and supernatural elements. To him, Michael is not simply a kid who became a killer, he is evil, a literal embodiment of death, devoid of a soul. This does fit in with some of the film's more supernatural elements, but the film wisely never provides concrete answers, all we know is that Loomis, the man who knows Michael better than anyone else, is terrified of him, a detail that is far more important than you might think. Which brings onto the man himself, Michael Myers, who, despite never saying a word, despite effectively not having a face or any kind of personality, still ends up being one of the most memorable horror villains in the genre. Myers is very unremarkable in his appearance, blue work overalls and a cheap mask, but therein lies the brilliance. Michael Myers isn't special, he's a man in a mask, a man who hides or just lacks a voice or a personality or a face, the film even credits him as The Shape. Michael Myers is a monster that hides in plain sight, an evil that can be anywhere at any time and will strike without remorse or hesitation, it is his very lack of discernible features that makes him so nebulous, so ambiguous, to the point that the name doesn't matter, he isn't Michael, he's what the film credits him; The Shape, a Shape that could be hiding behind every door or window, in every pantry and wardrobe, in every dimly lit corner. This further adds to the ambiguity with Michael's seeming ability to literally be anywhere, to go to and from at lightning speed without so much a sound, further adding to the inhuman nature of him, but also making him a far more menacing foe because you can never really escape. Halloween's slasher is also not very imaginative, the kills in Halloween aren't flashy or overly violent, rather they're morbidly utilitarian, which is a very word salady way of saying Halloween isn't very gory, which, oddly, makes it my kind of slasher film.
The horror of Halloween doesn't come from the gore, from the gruesome kills and extravagant amounts of blood, it comes from the anticipation, it's not really what you'd describe as a slasher at all, it's more of a thriller. The film's horror comes from its atmosphere and tension, and if you know this blog in any way whatsoever, you know I go coocoo for tension. Halloween uses jumpscares, but what makes Halloween's jumpscares so effective is that none of them are false. This, among many things, is where the so called one true sequel fails, because it has a load of jumpscares and a lot of them are false scares; things you're not supposed to be scared of jarringly jumping into frame accompanied by an equally jarring audio cue. But when that happens in this film, it's never false, when you get the jarring cue in this film, it means you're supposed to be afraid. But what's more important than that is how the cues aren't relied upon to create the horror, Halloween is very good at building tension, this is one of the benefits of being a slow burner, something the 2018 film isn't, the small cast and seeming omnipresence of the villain creates an atmosphere of dread that the film never shakes, even at the very end when they 'win,' the tension persists through an ending as ambiguous as Michael himself. It's a film that makes you very nervous while you watch, and leaves you nervous when it ends, and while a false scare or, oh I don't know, a joke, would completely kill the dread, Halloween's dread is constant. It's a kind of horror that is underappreciated in my opinion, but of course I'd say that, one of my favourite films is John Carpenter's The Thing, the man knows his craft. And while the two films use their soundtracks very differently, both films have a fantastic grasp on how music can benefit the film beyond simply accompanying the action, and whatever I say about the 2018 film, it does at least have a fantastic soundtrack, which was composed by John Carpenter, he really does know his craft.
It was the Bogeyman
Halloween is awesome, it's one of those films I should have watched years ago, and it'll probably become a Halloween tradition for me going forward. It's a film that, ignoring the hammy acting, I'd be prepared to call perfect, I've been gripped from beginning to end every time I've watched it and nothing really stands out to me as bad. Especially after watching its 2018 sequel, I can honestly say I love this Halloween, and I went into watching this film again after seeing that film with the goal of hopefully finding new appreciation for the sequel, which I didn't, in fact after seeing this again, that sequel's even more in the dust. You already know what I'm going to say; it's an absolute must watch.
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