Classic Movie Review: Halloween (1978)

 

You can't be a true movie critic until you've reviewed John Carpenter's iconic horror classic "Halloween" during Halloween season, right? If so, then I officially submit my name as a movie critic because it's finally time for me to talk about "Halloween." When I made the decision to write these Halloween movie reviews, this is obviously one of the first ones that jumped into my head. In fact, I was going to make this the first review of the season as it seemed like the most fitting one to kick things off with. That ended up not happening for various reasons, but that's OK. I'm content with releasing this review closer to Halloween. Now that we're less than a week away, if you need to get yourself into the Halloween spirit by watching a movie that will scare the tar out of you, this just might be the perfect choice. Michael Myers has certainly done a great job of scaring me for many years. Because, yes, unlike with my recent review of "Friday the 13th," "Halloween" is a movie that I've had a lot of experience with. Accordingly, I have a lot of thoughts about this movie that I've had bottled up for years that I'm really excited to finally get out as I think there are a lot of discussion points with this movie pertaining to what makes a good horror film as well as a good villain.

As far as the plot goes, this is a very simple movie. It's Halloween in 1978 and Laurie has the obligation of babysitting Tommy. Meanwhile, her and her two friends, Annie and Lynda, are trying to come up with a plan to hang out together on Halloween night despite these babysitting obligations. But it's safe to say that plans are interrupted by one Michael Myers, a 21-year-old serial killer who has just escaped from a mental institution that he's been in since he killed his older sister when he was just six years old. For reasons known only to Michael Myers, and possibly not even the director or screenwriter, he's decided to stalk these girls all day before he attempts to kill them at night. Perhaps he just has a thing against teenage girls or babysitters for some reason and Laurie is the first, or one of the first girls he comes across after his return to his hometown, and he has decided that she is going to die along with her friends. I don't know. That's my best guess. Michael Myers is not one that is given a specific motive. He just does things. His character is written as a purposely mysterious human being who ultimately is the embodiment of pure evil and is referred to frequently during the film as the boogeyman. And the boogeyman is coming to get you!

When I think of the boogeyman, I think of an unknown evil that is lurking in the shadows waiting to jump at me when I least expect it. I don't know who or what the boogeyman is, but I know that he's not a pleasant individual. That fear of the unknown is a very powerful fear that this movie preys on, specifically the fear of an unknown entity that you won't be able to escape or overcome once you have been captured. Once you put a name and a face to the boogeyman, he becomes less scary, thus the less you know about him, the more terrifying he is. Thus when it comes to horror villains, Michael Myers is the one that has gotten under my skin the most. Surprisingly, much of this movie isn't a gratuitous gore fest of murder. It's Michael Myers sitting in the shadows, waiting for the right opportunity to strike. Sure, we get a murder right of the bat in the introduction, but that's done to show us what this evil person is capable of, thus putting us on the edge of our seats in pure fear as he just sits there watching everyone. As a young kid, I legitimately hated walking home at night and that was partially due to the fact that I envisioned Michael Myers hiding behind every corner. Yeah, probably not a movie to watch when you're younger. But oh well.

As I carefully think about what exactly makes this movie so creepy, there are three major things that stand out in my mind. The first is that music. Most of it is that simple three note piano medley that is so creepy. Every time I go to re-watch this movie, I tell myself that I am going to be a brave soul and not get scared. Because I don't get scared easily, especially now that I am a grown man. But then the music starts right during the opening credits and I immediately cower in my chair every time like a little dog. Then throughout the movie when the danger is near, the music starts again and I cower again. We combine that with some very clever camerawork that kicks in when Michael Myers is near. We often go to his first person POV with handheld shaky cam. Putting yourself in the shoes of the killer as he silently approaches our protagonists is a fantastic way of instilling a sense of dread. Finally, we combine that POV with the third thing that makes this creepy. The breathing. Because Michael Myers is wearing a full-headed mask. If you've ever worn one of those, you'll know that it's hard to breathe in, so when we go to the first person POV, we also get to experience Michael Myers' heavy breathing, with the music in the background.

I think there's a good lesson here on how to make an effective horror film. There's not a lot of jump scares in this movie and there isn't a ton of gore, either. I think some horror directors or studios have this false impression that if they cram a bunch of jump scares into their movie, that it will make it a scary movie. False. There's also other directors that think gore fests are scary. Also false. I prefer creepy. When you have a deadly combination of music, camerawork and sound effects, that's a lot more terrifying than throwing a bunch of jump scares at me or bathing the sets in blood and gory images. Even when we're not in the Michael Myers POV, we often see him placed in various locations in the shot that subtly catch our eye and creep us out. The times where he is hidden in the background are extremely effective at making us uneasy as we progress through the plot. Then of course there are times where he suddenly shows up right in front of us, making us want to get up and run away so that we aren't massacred right along with the characters. Regardless of what's going on in the story, John Carpenter does an absolutely perfect job with this movie in providing fear to the audience. If that's the type of film you are going for, then look no further.

It's funny, though. I've seen quite a few YouTube reviews of this movie over the last few years during Halloween and there's several of them that get all confident and happy that they are going to be bold and actually criticize this movie. Then they tell me about how awful the side characters in the movie are. Yeah that's cute. Now hold my BYU-approved caffeinated soda for a second while I dive into some ACTUAL critiques of this movie. Because, while I still hold strong to the idea that this is one of the creepiest movies I've seen due to the aforementioned horror techniques courtesy of John Carpenter, there's a few aspects of this movie that have always nagged at me. But sure. Let's humor the crowd for a second and talk about those side characters. They're really annoying. I'm specifically talking about Annie and Lynda. Annie gets killed off first and I was kind of sad, but not really. Then we have the sequence where Lynda and her boyfriend Bob are alone making love and acting so annoying that when Michael Myers walks in, instead of being scared, I found myself saying, "Get 'em Michael!" Then I pause and laugh because that's not how I'm supposed to be reacting to this film. But so be it. Laurie is a strong lead character, so she makes up for it.

But now seriously. Are you really that surprised that side characters in a late 70's horror film don't give Academy Award winning performances? While it's nice to have good characters all around, having annoying side characters in a horror film is almost to be expected and thus not a real critique of the movie. The biggest question for me has always been the underlying question of "Why?" This is something that I've done quite a bit of debating over on the internet and with various friends. Why is Michael Myers the way he is? What is it that caused six-year-old Michael to grab a knife out of the kitchen drawer, walk up the stairs and stab his sister to death? Why did he then not say a single word during the 15 years that he was in the mental institution? Why did he choose that specific moment to break out of prison? Why was it so easy for him to do so and how in the fetch did he know how to drive a car so perfectly when he's been locked up since he was six? And why did he decide to hunt down these three girls when it seems they have no connection to him? Why is everything so easy for him? Why is he so strong and powerful? And why is he an immortal being incapable of dying, despite the fact that he should've died three times in the movie? 

I get it. I really do. John Carpenter visited a mental institution and saw a young kid with what looked like the darkest eyes and that inspired him to want to make a movie with a kid so evil that he would be an embodiment of pure evil. In John Carpenter's eyes, the definition of pure evil is someone who has no soul and never had a soul. Thus was born Michael Myers. The kid without a soul. He has zero conscience and zero moral compass, so he goes around killing people because he doesn't know any better. For some people that is all they need when it comes to a villain. He's pure evil. No explanation needed. For me, though, that feels a bit empty. Mostly because I have a slightly different definition of pure evil. I don't think there exists a person on earth who was born with no soul. I much prefer the falling from grace philosophy. For someone who seemingly lost their soul, has no moral compass or has no respect for human life, I believe there was a reason behind it. If you dive deep into the lives of serial killers or evil dictators, there was always a breaking point. Reasons that led them to do the awful things that they did. I honestly don't think any of them were simply born without a soul. I think they lost it somewhere along the way, very early on for some of them.

Perhaps I'm looking too far into this and being too philosophical with a simple movie that's just designed to scare people. But when Michael Myers has been inducted by many into the super villain hall of fame as one of the greatest cinematic villains ever created, I look at that designation and shudder a bit. So how about we take a look at some of the other villains and see how he compares. Darth Vader. Why is he so evil? It's not because he has a scary looking outfit and James Earl Jones' epic voice. It's because he was once a powerful Jedi that was supposed to bring balance to the force before he fell from grace and turned to the dark side. Norman Bates. He is honestly a charismatic, troubled human being trying his best, but his dark psychological history with Dissociative Identity Disorder has ruined him. We can also look at Walter White on the small screen, who, throughout "Breaking Bad," experiences a harsh, depressing fall from grace. If we jump away from cinema and look to the Bible, it doesn't get much more pure evil than Lucifer. Yet in Isaiah he is described as someone who was the son of the morning who then fell from grace. In my mind these are much stronger examples of pure evil, thus I don't think Michael Myers himself compares well.

Long story short, I like my villains to have solid motive. A reason behind who they are. Implementing that in a smart way gives them more depth and makes them more terrifying. Note the words "smart." Because Rob Zombie obviously had similar thoughts with Michael Myers, so when he remade "Halloween" in 2007, he gave him a backstory and a motive. While I appreciate the effort, Rob Zombie completely missed the boat with his remake as he turned "Halloween" into an unscary, raunchy, gore fest with zero characters worth caring about and nearly an hour spent on this added backstory. I take a hard pass on that. So what's the real way to fix "Halloween"? I don't know. I'm going to tread lightly on that because you need to find a way to make it equally as scary while adding the necessary depth to make Michael Myers an interesting character. A thought I had was perhaps ditching the whole backstory altogether? As in get rid of scenes when he was a child as well as the prison escape and start the movie with this mysterious serial killer stalking them? That would make it so we formulate this after the Zodiac Killer. He would have a history and a motive. We just know nothing about it. Thus he becomes a true boogeyman.

The other nagging thing that bothers me about this movie is the fact that Michael Myers is immortal. This is definitely a product of the times as the 70's and 80's loved their horror villains to be these unstoppable, immortal super villains incapable of being killed. Thus you can't defeat them or stop them. You just have to hope you are lucky enough to survive. When I was younger that was definitely terrifying. Now that I'm older, that makes him less interesting. I think the more realistic you can make your horror villains, the more uncomfortable it is as it makes you feel this could actually happen. But when he gets shot six times and falls off a second-story balcony, yet walks away seemingly unscathed, I immediately log this away to something that is completely fake and fairly cheesy when the movie is trying to be serious. I'm fine with him escaping to set up the sequel, but not dying when he should've been killed is something I don't like. One of the reasons people gravitate towards horror films, especially in times of tragedy, is to witness the battle of good vs. evil where good overcomes evil. If evil can't be overcome and can only be survived if one is simply lucky, then that removes that element of the film and makes it harder for someone to appreciate. 

In summary, I believe the goal that John Carpenter had when he made this film was to create a slasher horror that would scare people silly for years to come and he absolutely succeeded in a huge way. This is one of the most iconic horror films whose influence is still felt today in modern-day horror. People are still trying to replicate what John Carpenter pulled off and many of them have failed, partially because they seem to forget what makes horror films scary. While this movie is a product of its times as it isn't without its moments of gore, language and sexuality, those elements aren't the focus of the terror. The music, the camerawork, the sound effects, and the thought of someone always watching you is what makes this movie scary and I have all the respect in the world for that. Not just that, I do genuinely love this movie because I think it is one of the scariest horror films out there. If terror is all you want or need this Halloween, then this is a perfect movie for that scenario. I just personally hesitate to call this a masterpiece. There's no depth to it when you analyze the characters and the story, specifically Michael Myers himself. There are better horror villains out there. Thus I won't give this a perfect score, but I still am comfortable with a 9/10.