Halloween 1978

Halloween is one of the greatest classic horror films of all time. it spawned 8 sequels an awful remake and a sequel to that remake. John Carpenter and Moustapha Akkad are the masterminds behind these great films. This is a spotlight on the original 1978 classic that introduces us to Michael Myers and Dr. Sam Loomis whom we’ll be following throughout the rest of the series as well as Laurie Strode, the main character from these first two.

Title - Halloween

Year - 1978

Country - USA

The film opens up in 1963 with Myers sister, Judith, and her boyfriend messing around on the couch. Quite the horror movie staple now a days, I’m sure it was still somewhat fresh in ’78. Anyway, we see them go upstairs, presumably, to do the nasty. The camera acts as Myers eyes as he picks up a knife and a clown mask, he puts the mask on and proceeds up the stairs. Either Judith’s boyfriend in a minute man or she just likes to brush her hair before sex, when Mike (the camera still acting as his eyes) gets upstairs she’s sitting naked at her vanity brushing her hair. He proceeds to stab the shit out of her. He walks right out the front door and stands on the lawn while his parents pull up. We finally get to see Michael as a little boy dressed in a clown outfit with a bloody knife and some VERY confused parents. Scene zooms out to black, the proper movie starts. That’s it, that’s his origin story and it’s perfect. It’s what makes Michael Myers Michael Myers and its perfect.

Thus, the reason why the remake fails so hard… It tries to give Myers a background story a “more developed” origin story. The problem with that is that he simply doesn’t NEED all that. It completely goes against the concept of the character. Originally the character simply snaps one fateful Halloween and decides to kill his sister. THAT’S IT! His parents are on screen for no more then half a minute and they’re perfectly normal, middle class all American parents nothing abnormal about that. Myers came from a normal suburban family, snaps and kills his sister. This is the basis for the whole character. This is what makes him scary. Rob Zombies version of the back story goes on to piss all over the Myers name. But I’ll go into that some other time.

Anyway, its now current day (aka 1978) and we get to meet Dr. Loomis, who is headed to the nuthouse where Myers has been locked away in for 15 years, When the car gets there all the patients are roaming around outside, Loomis gets out and goes to the gate, leaving the nurse who was driving alone in the car. Myers jumps on top, pulls the nurse out and steals the car. How does he know how to drive? It’s because he’s pure evil and pure evil can get away with that sort of thing. That explanation can be applied to any question you could have about Myers in this film, he’s pure evil, as explained by Loomis, and he’s back to kill on Halloween night. If you don’t like that explanation go watch another movie, perhaps one that requires no imagination. Later we’re introduced to Laurie and her two friends. One is a dumb, bubbly blond chick and the other is a bitchy brunette chick. Later still we meet the blonds boyfriend. Myers comes into town and causes havoc, watch and enjoy =D

Great, great film! An absolute classic and for good reason as it’s one of the first slasher films and an example for all the rest to follow. This film isn’t particularly bloody, it relies more on suspense. Their really isn’t even a huge body count. The plot is great, it may be a bit formulaic but you have to realize that this is one of the first slasher films so it was fresh and new at the time. Not to say this film hasn’t aged well, it’s still a great film. The musical score in great as well, perfect horror film soundtrack! Some nice tits in this film as well, just throwing that in there. Honestly the film is a bit slow, not much really happens till the later middle half but that isn't to bigf of a deal. This movie is sort of a set up for the rest of the series (atleast the next film) so you can forgive it for being a bit slow. If you haven’t seen this, you’ve either lived under a rock since ’78 or don’t like horror movies. If you haven’t seen this I implore you PLEASE watch this, its far better then the awful remake. If you’ve seen it before though, none of this is news to you. Stay tuned because I’m doing the whole (Myers) series this week.