Synopsis
Halloween, Haddonfield, 1963. Six year old Michael murders his older sister. Fifteen years later he escapes from the hospital he's been locked in since that night and steals a car. There's only one place he's going. Home.
Review
I'm not one for horror films, but classic movies at the cinema are something to behold so I snapped up a ticket for what turned out to be a packed screening. It was a nice surprise to be treated to a little documentary before the film too.
I had always assumed that Halloween was going to be scary, and it was, sort of. It was scary in a very different way to modern horrors though. The reason I tend to ignore the genre is that the story lines don't make up for the amount of "jump out of your skin" moments they put in. Something can be scary without having to make you jump.
On the modern scale of films Halloween isn't very good on several levels. That being said though, it's still an excellent film and the fact that it's so simple and plays on the basic human feeling of unease is great.
It's good to see that the horror movie staples were at their peak in the 70s: not turning the lights on when searching a dark house; only stabbing your attacker once, even though you thought he was dead when you stabbed him once the first time... AND the second time; and my personal favourite... I've stabbed my attacker and he's down, he looks dead so I won't bother checking, instead I'll just turn my back and take a breather for a moment.
One things that I couldn't help doing while watching this film was laughing. Come on, it's funny. But it's only that way to me because I've seen so many films now that I know what's going to happen. The bad guy is always going to have vanished when you try and point him out to someone, there will always be a creaking window or door, and 4 times out of 5 there will be a body behind/inside whatever you open. I still got those chilling feelings while watching it but I was also drawn in by the fact I was sitting there willing things to happen that I knew were coming.
What should you do?
It's definitely a classic and well worth seeing. Just remember it isn't the big budget movies you're used to seeing if you only watch modern things.
Movie thing you wish you could take home
Normally I would say it's difficult to want something from a horror film, but in this instance I'd quite like some of the immense luck that's going around. Michael and Laurie both have an amazing ability to survive life threatening situations. That's something I would definitely want.
Comments
Post a Comment