I never saw John Carpenter’s Halloween (1978) at a young,
impressionable age so it never imprinted on my psyche like The Birds (1963), Night of
the Living Dead (1968), and Jaws
(1975), which continue to this day to creep me out because they make me regress
instantly to the little kid who saw them through fingers barely covering my
eyes. That being said, Halloween is
still an unsettling experience because Carpenter created such a well-crafted
scare machine.
And he gets us right from the
start as we see the world literally from the point-of-view of a young Michael Myers (Will Sandin) as he spies on older teenage sister Judith (Sandy Johnson).
Dean Cundey’s flawless steadicam work creates a sense of unease as it glides
smoothly through the Myers house. In a nice bit we even see Michael put on a
mask before he brutally kills his sister. The real punch to the gut comes when
Carpenter cuts from Michael’s P.O.V. to an omniscient angle as we see his
parents arrive outside the house just as the boy emerges with a bloody knife.
The mask is pulled off to see the slightly blank, slightly surprised expression
on the child’s face. I don’t know how Carpenter got that expression from the
boy, but it is a fantastically complex mix of emotions (or lack thereof) that
plays across his face.
The film jumps from 1963 to
1978 and it’s a dark and stormy night as Dr. Samuel Loomis (Donald Pleasence) drives
to a psychiatric hospital in Smith’s Grove, Illinois to take Michael to another
facility. There’s this great shot of several patients wandering the grounds in
the middle of the night. What are they doing there? We’re barely able to ponder
this when Michael suddenly appears, commandeers the car and like that he is on
his way back home to Haddonfield.
I love how Carpenter is
confident enough of a filmmaker, even this early on in his career, to show
Michael (Nick Castle) in broad daylight, like the initial, over-the-shoulder
shot of him observing Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) as she walks down the
street. Every time he pops up, it is unsettling in the way he almost casually
appears, like when Laurie spots him across the street from the school standing
behind the station wagon he stole, almost defiantly as if daring her to call
attention to his presence. And then, after a few looks, he disappears. Michael
prowls the neighborhood in that car, driving by Laurie and her friends who seem
blissfully unaware except for her who senses that something isn’t right. The
creepiest shot of these daytime sequences is when Laurie and Annie (Nancy Kyes)
see Michael down the street, standing by a hedge. There is something disconcerting
about a killer like Michael being so brazenly visible during the day despite
Loomis and the police looking for him.
The contributions of producer
and co-writer Debra Hill can’t be underestimated enough as evident in the scene
where Laurie and her friends, Annie and Lynda (P.J. Soles), walk and talk about
boys and babysitting – mundane things that pretty much anyone can relate to and
this humanizes these characters. We start to get to know them as their distinct
personalities surface. They’re not just cardboard stereotypes to be senselessly
killed off later on in the film. When it does happen their deaths have more of
an impact because we’ve come to identify with these characters, even care about
them. This is certainly the case with Laurie whom we spend the most time with
and who comes across as the most sympathetic.
Jamie Lee Curtis plays Laurie
just right. She’s not naïve or entirely innocent (we see her smoking a joint
with Annie), but there is definitely something good about her. She lacks
experience because of her youth and this fateful night is a coming-of-age of
sorts for her, which Curtis conveys so well. There’s a nice exchange between
Laurie and Annie as they drive around town. They talk about the upcoming school
dance and Laurie admits that she doesn’t have the courage to ask someone even
though she admits to liking a specific boy. This is a telling scene that sheds
light on her character. Laurie may be something of a bookish wallflower (in
these early scenes she always seems to be carrying around her school books),
but she has aspirations to be more assertive. It is this wish fulfillment that
gets us to empathize with her.
Donald Pleasence hits all the
right notes as the obsessed Dr. Loomis. He is Ahab and Michael is his great
white whale that he is compelled to pursue come hell or high water. Having
spent years with Michael he knows just how evil the man is as he lays it out
for Sheriff Leigh Brackett (Charles Cyphers): “No reason, no conscience, no
understanding. Even the most rudimentary sense of life or death, of good or
evil, right or wrong.” And this is from Michael at six years of age! Loomis
tried to help the boy for eight years and then realizing it was no use, spent
another seven making sure Michael never left the institution because, as he
puts it so well, “I realized that what was living behind that boy’s eyes was
purely and simply evil.” Pleasence delivers this beautifully written monologue
brilliantly; transforming what could have so easily been perfunctory exposition
dialogue into a chilling account of just what is stalking the tree-lined
neighborhoods of Haddonfield. The veteran actor doesn’t oversell it, resisting
the urge to go over the top with the role. When Loomis loses his cool it’s with
good reason. This speech conveys all we need to know about Michael in the
intervening years from ‘63 to ‘78, which was needlessly fleshed out in Rob
Zombie’s remake. I also like how Pleasence shows that Loomis is scared of
Michael because he knows how evil the man is and what he’s capable of. This
helps humanize the good doctor. He’s not some stereotypical infallible hero,
but someone trying to do the best he can under trying circumstances.
Carpenter and Hill tell us
just enough to let our imagination run with it, allowing us to fill in the gaps
ourselves and in doing so be active participants in the narrative – something
that countless imitators, wannabes, and even subsequent sequels often failed to
do, instead of spelling things out and upping the gory body count. In
comparison, Carpenter’s Halloween is
downright subtle, like when Michael kills a neighborhood dog. All we hear is
the poor animal whine and then a shot of Michael gently dropping its limp body
to the ground. There’s no need to rub our noses in it as Carpenter conveys all
we need to know through an economy of style. Another haunting shot (one of
many) is when a little boy named Tommy Doyle (Brian Andrews), whom Laurie is
babysitting, spots Michael across the street carrying Annie’s dead body around
the front of a house at night. Perhaps it is the voyeuristic aspect that makes
it so spooky or it’s the matter-of-fact way Michael goes about his business.
There are many reasons why Halloween still holds up after all these
years. It’s more than being an expertly crafted, efficient scare machine. I
think it also taps into some pretty primal fears that most of us can relate to
– it took a ruthless serial killer and set him loose in an average,
all-American suburb – symbols of safe haven in the 1970s and 1980s. Suddenly,
with this film they weren’t so safe anymore. As a result, Halloween helped spawn a whole slew of suburban slasher movies, but
few, if any, have stood the test of time like Carpenter’s film.
Nice work on a classic.Happy Halloween!
ReplyDeleteNicely observed account of this film and its wonderful characters, JD. I don't think Carpenter's classic will ever lose its appeal. We have a new release due in the UK on 21st October, with a new transfer supervised by Dean Cundey, and a new documentary, too.
ReplyDeleteAgreed on all counts! Halloween is not just my favorite horror movie, it is my favorite movie, period. It is done so well, so perfectly, that even being over 40 years old and having seen it multiple times, I am still left with a sense of fear and dread about what could be right outside. Just love it. And yes, Rob Zombie's film does what this film showed you don't have to do. You DON'T have to explain it all. In fact, when you do, it takes so much away from it all.
ReplyDeleteYou are so right about this film. It is really a streamlined, but carefully crafted film that manages to push all the right buttons without going over the top or under the bar. It is one of the reason it is so rewatchable and so unnerving each time. I really think that it is the brazen casual nature of Michael that makes him so frightening. He doesn't obey the rules of scary things only coming from shadows and darkness. In that way he's like the ghosts in "The Shining", they have no problem appearing in broad daylight and it makes much much scarier.
ReplyDeleteAnd I agree Pleasance is pitch perfect in this role. He really comes across as a scared man in a bad situation, but still feeling responsible and willing to do what it takes to resolve it. Great casting all the way around.
Very well done– you nailed just about everything that I love about this movie– daylight Michael Myers, Pleasence's vulnerability, Laurie's goodness, the humanity of the teens, Cundey's cinematography– it's a perfect storm of indie horror, and one of my favorite jewels in Carpy's crown.
ReplyDeleteRichard Kirkman:
ReplyDeleteThanks!
Steve Langton:
Yes! I got the new Blu-Ray. Cundey's approved transfer looks fantastic. A little skimpy on the DVD extras, but I will just hold on to my other DVD editions. Love this film and never tire of watching it.
Caffeinated Joe:
I couldn't agree more! I do love this film and it still captivates me every time I watch it even though I know what's going to happen. It has a mood and an atmosphere that I just love.
Roman J. Martel:
Well said! I totally agree with you about Michael. There is a real presence to him that unfortunately has gotten watered down with every subsequent sequel, but still stays strong with Carpenter's film!
Sean Gill:
Thanks! It is right up there among my fave Carpenter films for sure.