Halloween

Halloween title

Tag Line : The Night HE Came Home.

Halloween Without doubt THE greatest horror film of all time, which also happens to be my personal favourite, is this low budget classic from director John Carpenter. In this, psychiatrist Dr Loomis (as played by notable British actor Donald Pleasance) is attempting to get his patient of 15 years, Michael Myers, permanently locked up. When he breaks out of the mental institution he's in and escapes.

Michael has been incarcerated since age 12 after brutally murdering his Sister one Halloween night. With Halloween approaching again, Doctor Loomis suspects where he may have gone and heads over to Michael's home town of Haddonfield to try and find him.

As night falls, the unsuspecting townsfolk start falling prey to the unseen killer who's lurking in the shadows, whilst Dr Loomis and the local police frantically search the town for him. Meanwhile, young Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis in one of her first starring roles) has made a shocking discovery in the house opposite, and finds herself as Myers next potential victim.

Expertly directed by John Carpenter, this is an excellent horror film, that's still unbeaten by the many modern day horrors that have come out since. The film manages to shock, scare and make you jump, without resorting to blood and gore. The chilling music and the clever camera work, showing Michael appearing, then disappearing in the background of each shot, whilst his next victim carries on unawares, makes for an air of tension unlike any other horror film I have seen since.

An excellent film, with a great cast and a chilling score.

Overall marks : 10/10

Other Information.

The original title for the film was " The Baby Sitter Murders" until John Carpenter was brought in to direct, and suggested the change.
The name of Donald Pleasance's character, Sam Loomis, was taken from the name of Marion Crane's boyfriend in the film "Psycho".
The original mask that Myers wore was actually a "Captain Kirk" mask sprayed white. Apparently, the reason for this was the crew were having extreme difficulty finding a suitable Halloween mask, as the movie was actually being filmed during the Spring.
The part of Myers was played by Nick Castle, an acquaintance of Carpenters, and was listed in the credits as "The Shape". The actor listed in the credits as Myers, Tony Moran, just doubled for the unmasking scene.
Sam Loomis's car was actually John Carpenter's and the Phelps Garage truck belonged to the catering company.
Nick Castle went on to direct several children's movies, most notably "The Last Starfighter" which starred Lance Guest from part 2 and Dan O'Herily from part 3. weird or what?
When the film was shown on the US TV networks they insisted on cutting some of the murder scenes, John Carpenter was asked to film some additional scenes to help pad out the running time which he did using the film crew from Halloween 2. These included several scenes of Loomis confronting the young Myers in his cell, and of Loomis having a meeting with the institute case review board. In addition the US TV version had a slightly different ending, in which you don't actually see Loomis shoot Myers, instead all the gunshots are heard from outside the house. This was also used for the flashback intro to "Halloween 2".
The "TV version" released on DVD in the US and UK contained the additional scenes filmed for the US networks, but didn't cut the murder scenes. However, this release is currently out of print.