Halloween (1978) - Will's Review

First let me make it clear that I do not worship at the alter of John Carpenter, I find him to be one of horror's most inconsistent figures; at his best, he's undeniably a genius, but for every The Thing, there's a Ghosts of Mars...

Still, if you're reading a horror blog, there's really no point dragging out any suspense about this one; Halloween is an amazing movie, which cemented the slasher as a sub-genre, and inspired directors for the next 30 some years.

By any objective measure though, it really ought to be a snoozefest;  it has almost no plot... a kid kills sister and is locked away, years later he escapes to stalk random girls, with his less-than-sane psychiatrist in pursuit... That really is all there is too it.

Wait, "random girls"? Yes. The whole "Laurie is Michael's sister" thing was added later, basically so that Halloween II had a plot; even the scene of a young Michael's "Sister" graffiti in the asylum was filmed during the making of the sequel, and added only when the movie aired on TV.

It's riddled with plot holes - forget Myers surviving multiple bullet wounds and vanishing seemingly into thin air; a bigger mystery is how a man who's been in an asylum since he was a child learned to drive! And the bedsheet bit (with hilarious glasses gag) may be fun, but Michael's motivation for turning into a deadly prankster remains unexplained.

The lack of budget (most of the money being spent to secure Donald Pleasance) is mostly well hidden... but when filming in Illinois was impossible, why oh why not just set the film in California (where it was shot) rather than leave us wondering why there are Palm-Trees in the Midwest‽

Even the acting is variable, with one "totally" annoying person in particular dragging the whole thing down.

And yet, it transcends all of this; as I've said, at his best Carpenter is a genius, and the suspense here demonstrates that in spades, as does the iconic score.

There is zero chance you haven't already seen this one, but I think it's time you gave it a rewatch!