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What Happened To
Halloween Movies? |
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When you
think about all the horror movies that
have been made over the past 60 years, there are literally hundreds,
if not thousands, of them. From 50's
horror/sci-fi to recent trash like Hostel and Turistas that borders
way too close to torture porn for my tastes, you can pretty
much have your choice of horror genre. Not all are good and not all are
our cup of tea but there is truly something out there for
everyone.
But
stop and think about good horror movies that are based solely on
the holiday of Halloween. Can't think of many, can you? We
can think of four or five: Halloween, Halloween
2 (the originals), Trick r' Treat and
The Crow. While The Crow isn't
directly about Halloween it does take place in Detroit on
Devil's Night and Halloween and
the main storyline took place on Halloween and that's why
Eric Draven comes back for revenge. And we can't forget that
fav from our childhood, It's the Great Pumpkin,
Charlie Brown. Sure, it's animated and not scary at
all but it's just not Halloween without it!
 Here's
what got this idea started. We
usually start watching a horror movie a night starting on
September 1st but this year we went a day early and watched
2009's
Trick r' Treat.
We think it is one of the best Halloween movies made in a long, long
time, in fact, we can't find one thing wrong with the movie. It was originally made in 2007
but it had trouble finding
a distributor for a planned October 5th, 2007 release into
theaters. How unfortunate that it never made it to the big
screen because I would have loved to see it at a theater. It's four
intertwined stories all centered around an odd little
creature named Sam, who's as cute as he can be unless you
don't like Halloween. Don't give him candy or blow the light
out on your Jack-O-Lantern before the night is over and you
are in for so trouble! And from there the intertwining
stories start. You get to see what he really looks
like under his burlap mask at the end of the film and I
think he's still kinda cute. The whole movie is great, you
should give it a try if you haven't seen it yet. It's a
Canadian made film and you'll see lots of people that you
recognize like Anna Paquin (True Blood), Brian Cox
(Deadwood), Britt McKillip and Christine Willes (Dead Like
Me) and Brett Kelly (Bad Santa). There's a
serial killer, werewolves, a bully who gets hers and so much
more! The DVD
also includes the original animated Halloween greeting that
creator Michael Dougherty used as his inspiration for the
whole movie. It's filmed in a very dark, brooding atmosphere
which fits right in with the theme of the movie. It's just a
great film, 'nuf said!
The original
John Carpenter's Halloween and Halloween 2 can't be beat by
any remake, as far as we are concerned. You just can't beat
the original and it's sequel, which starts right where the
first one leaves off. I've watched the Rob Zombie remake and
saw the original in the theater many, many years ago.
There's just no comparison. The original holds up just as
well today in terms of suspense and scares. It's a staple
around here all October and definitely on Halloween night.
The soundtrack alone is so memorable, once you hear it you
never forget. You hear the first few opening notes and
immediately know what it is.
If you really think
about it, Halloween is a sugar-coated holiday today with a very
old, bloody past. It still holds a sinister feeling today if you let yourself feel it.
Some of us are just more in tune with our inner witches then
others. There's so much to work with on Halloween night so why is it that there
are so few films directly about Halloween in that vast world of
horror films? The Hollywood machine just can't seem to do
anything lately but churn out remake after remake of old
horror films. Take the remake of Halloween, Nightmare on Elm
Street, Straw Dogs, The Wicker Man. Year after year it's
been nothing but some of the most worthless pieces of crap
they dare call horror movies. Hollywood has lost it's edge as far as
coming up with any new ideas
in the horror genre, you have to admit it. Except for a
handful of films like Trick 'r Treat,
Drive Angry and Predators, I can't
think of any that I've seen and enjoyed. I'm sure some
people will think those movies were crap but to each his
own.
There has to
be some creative script writers out there that have some
wonderful ideas or authors that would love to have their
novel made into a movie that is set on Halloween night.
Where are they? Michael Dougherty can't be the only one and
if he is, he needs to start working on a sequel because Sam
has a lot more work he can do on Halloween night.
Indie
writers, directors and film makers used to come up with some
great stuff but even that bunch have dried up it seems. It's
all about the big buck. It cost $50,000,000.00 to make Trick
'r Treat. I chocked when I read that. How can it cost so
damn much to make a movie? They made it back with some to
spare but all in all, that makes it a flop and it's not. It
should be about the box office, it should be about how good
the film was. Great movies gave gone un-noticed because they
didn't make box office and slipped into DVD oblivion. The
world just isn't fair.
So, in
closing, I guess that we are stuck with 4 or 5 great
Halloween holiday based movies to watch for Halloween. If
anyone can think of anymore, just let us know. And, no,
The Nightmare Before Christmas is not a Halloween
holiday movie, it's a Christmas movie but it is enjoyable just the same. I just
can't believe with all of the horror fare that we have to
chose from that there can only be a small handful of
Halloween holiday based horror flix to enjoy and get us in a
Halloween mood. At least what there is, is worth watching
over and over again.
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