Not A slasher film...THE slasher film !!!

Rating: 8/10 (28 July 2003)

As a regular user on this site, I did a survey recently concerning all the true horror fans. All fans were asked to give their top 10 favorite titles in this wonderful genre and with all the films listed, I would make up a new, more representative horror top 50. Well, the results proved that HALLOWEEN is still the best horror film in the opinion of many many fans. A great achievement if you know the runner ups were absolute classics like Psycho and the Exorcist to name only a few. And that's more than right, I think. 25 years after its release this film still is the ultimate thrill. Michael Myers still has the power to scare the hell out of you. The horrible music, by director John Carpenter himself, still makes the hair on the back of your neck rise like nothing else does.
I'm pretty sure everyone knows the story already. And yes, it IS the most simple and predictable story ever written. But so what. It works a whole lot better than many other "intelligent" horror films so what the heck if it's a goofy story. A very disturbed child kills his sister at the age of six and is locked away under strong supervision since then. 15 years later, he escapes and returns to his hometown, Haddonfield. He sets his mind to a local babysitter and he starts to terrorize her and her friends. That's it. But it works on so many levels. If you don't like this film, fine. But at least you've got to admit the status this movie reached is very respectable. It was the inspiration to endless ( and inferior ) sequels, ripoffs etc. In fact the whole sub genre of slashers is based on this one film ! I'm sure it wasn't the first slasher film ever made, but it certainly was the most influential of them all. Now, 25 years later they're still making sequels to the original. I believe they've reached episode number 9 by now. None of them lives up to the original, of course, but Michael Myers has a lot of fans all over the world and because of that...he will never die !
In conclusion, if you want 90 minutes of pure suspense : you can't ever go wrong with watching Halloween. With the right atmosphere ( lights out, the TV loud ) I assure you, you'll be scared as hell. Not only thriller fans enjoy this film. It also has a lot of extra values attached to it. For example when the credits say " introducing Jamie Lee Curtis " This film made her famous and now, 25 years later, she still stars in the sequels. Although, I don't really think she's the star of the series, actually. Michael Myers is in the first place of course. The actor who plays him doesn't have to say a word, but still he is always present. And secondly...Donald Pleasance. This great actor died in 1995, but he'll always live on through the countless amount of memorable roles he played. One of them is his character in Halloween. Dr. Sam Loomis...he'll play this role 4 more times. He appeared for the last time in Halloween 6: The curse of Michael Myers.