World of wanton, senseless murder

Rating: 2/10 (26 September 2019)

Evil swoops out of nowhere and settles into middle America in this granddaddy of American slasher films.
"Halloween" is nothing great, but it has several interesting elements in a terrain in which locks, doors, and windows can't protect.
There is a highly predictable story here -- extending all the way to the movie's sequel-guaranteeing final frame -- and one can see the attacks by mute monster Michael Myers from a mile away.
US slasher films were inspired by Hitchcock's 1960 classic "Psycho," and the Giallo genre of Italy, led by the likes of director Dario Argento ("Suspiria, 1977). "Halloween" starts eerily with a flickering jack-o-lantern and a tinkling of piano keys highly reminiscent of the score from "Suspiria."
The action transpires in white-picket-fenced Haddonfield, Ill., a place you'd never expect the mayhem that plays out. Early on, we zoom in on an English class, where foreshadowing arises from a literary theme: "No matter what course he took, he was destined to his own fate."
Our protagonist is the real-life daughter of actress Janet Leigh of "Psycho," Jamie Lee Curtis, in her first major film role. Dressed as a dowdy schoolgirl, she does well in a very limited role.
Tension does manage to mount as Laurie glimpses a boogeyman in such places as behind a flapping clothesline of wash -- or does she?
I wouldn't have chosen to view this film, but it was presented as part of a course I am taking in the horror film. What IS scary is that "Halloween" spawned so many sequels and imitators. What is it in audiences that prompts them to spend hard-earned dollars on such fare?