Halloween Night is a 2006 American slasher mockbuster film produced by The Asylum .
95-424: The film follows Chris Vale, who was admitted to an asylum at the age of 12 after witnessing his mother's rape and murder by two thugs hired by his father (who subsequently committed suicide). Chris barely survived having his face burned by one of the thugs. Now a 22-year-old grossly disfigured young man, he escapes from the asylum on Halloween after killing two orderlies who mock his wearing of masks that resemble those
190-418: A chef's knife . 15 years later, his psychiatrist Dr. Samuel Loomis drives with nurse Marion Chambers to the sanitarium where Michael is incarcerated to escort him to a court hearing. After Loomis exits their car to unlock the main gate, Michael jumps on the roof and attacks Marion. She runs from the vehicle, allowing Michael to steal the car and drive away. Michael makes his way back to Haddonfield, killing
285-427: A film franchise comprising 13 films which helped construct an extensive backstory for Michael Myers, sometimes narratively diverging entirely from previous installments; a novelization, video game, and comic book series have also been based on the film. On the night of Halloween , 1963, in the suburban Illinois town of Haddonfield, six-year-old Michael Myers brutally stabs his teenage sister Judith to death with
380-438: A "resounding success." Roger Ebert remarks, "It's easy to create violence on the screen, but it's hard to do it well. Carpenter is uncannily skilled, for example, at the use of foregrounds in his compositions, and everyone who likes thrillers knows that foregrounds are crucial . ... " The opening title, featuring a jack-o'-lantern placed against a black backdrop, sets the mood for the entire film. The camera slowly moves toward
475-408: A beer from the kitchen, where Michael pins him to the wall with a chef's knife. Michael then poses as Bob in a ghost costume to taunt Lynda, who teases him to no effect. Annoyed, she calls Laurie to find out what happened to Annie, but Michael strangles her to death with the phone cord while Laurie listens on the other end. Meanwhile, Loomis discovers the stolen car and searches the streets. Worried by
570-465: A blank, "schizophrenic stare." Carpenter's experience inspired the characterization that Loomis gave of Michael to Sheriff Brackett in the film. Debra Hill has stated the scene where Michael kills the Wallaces' German Shepherd was done to illustrate how he is "really evil and deadly". The ending scene of Michael disappearing after being shot six times and falling off the balcony, was meant to terrify
665-466: A call back and was told he had got the part. Moran was paid $ 250 for his appearance. Will Sandin played the unmasked young Michael in the beginning of the film. Carpenter also provided uncredited voice work as Paul, Annie's boyfriend. Akkad agreed to put up $ 300,000 ($ 1.4 million in 2022) for the film's budget, which was considered low at the time (Carpenter's previous film, Assault on Precinct 13 , had an estimated budget of $ 100,000). Akkad worried over
760-400: A collectors' item, with one copy from 1979 selling on eBay for $ 13,220 in 2013. On August 3, 1995, Blockbuster Video issued a commemorative edition of the film on VHS. As stated, the film was first released on VHS in 1979 and again in 1981 by Media Home Entertainment. The synopsis on the back misspelled Myers as Meyers. The film was also released on Betamax around that same time. It
855-438: A costume shop on Hollywood Boulevard . Carpenter recalled how Wallace "widened the eye holes and spray-painted the flesh a bluish white. In the script it said Michael Myers's mask had 'the pale features of a human face' and it truly was spooky looking. I can only imagine the result if they hadn't painted the mask white. Children would be checking their closet for William Shatner after Tommy got through with it." Hill adds that
950-721: A cover of the theme by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross was released. Halloween premiered on October 24, 1978, in downtown Kansas City, Missouri, at the AMC Empire theatre. Regional distribution in the Philadelphia and New York City metropolitan areas was acquired by Aquarius Releasing. It grossed $ 1,270,000 from 198 theatres across the U.S. (including 72 in New York City and 98 in Southern California) in its opening week. The film grossed $ 47 million in
1045-413: A debate among Carpenter, Hill and NBC's Standards and Practices over censoring of certain scenes, Halloween appeared on television for the first time on October 30, 1981; the broadcast coincided with the release of Halloween II . To fill the two-hour time slot, Carpenter filmed twelve minutes of additional material during the production of Halloween II . The newly filmed scenes include Dr. Loomis at
SECTION 10
#17327984705611140-408: A dispute with a friend who kidnaps Vale (still mistaken for Todd) with a gun and another friend disguised as a police officer, who is forced to hand over his car keys. After escaping with the car, the kidnapper is murdered by Vale, who goes back to the party in it. Because someone at the party has called the real police, the angry officer ends the party by telling everyone to go home, leaving only David,
1235-432: A film I would love to have seen as a kid, full of cheap tricks like a haunted house at a fair where you walk down the corridor and things jump out at you." The cast of Halloween included veteran actor Donald Pleasence and then-unknown actress Jamie Lee Curtis . The low budget limited the number of big names that Carpenter could attract, and most of the actors received very little compensation for their roles. Pleasence
1330-631: A hands-on rape in a way that a shooting, even a shooting preceded by a humiliation, does not." Equating sex with violence is important in Halloween and the slasher genre according to film scholar Pat Gill, who made a note of this in her essay "The Monstrous Years: Teens, Slasher Films, and the Family". She remarks that Laurie's friends "think of their babysitting jobs as opportunities to share drinks and beds with their boyfriends. One by one they are killed ... by Michael Myers an asylum escapee who years ago at
1425-426: A hospital board review of Michael Myers and Dr. Loomis talking to a then-6-year-old Michael at Smith's Grove, telling him, "You've fooled them, haven't you, Michael? But not me." Another extra scene features Dr. Loomis at Smith's Grove examining Michael's abandoned cell after his escape and seeing the word "Sister" scratched into the door. Finally, a scene was added in which Lynda comes over to Laurie's house to borrow
1520-518: A mechanic and stealing his coveralls before stealing a white mask from a local hardware store. He begins stalking teenager Laurie Strode , whom he saw drop off a key at his long-abandoned childhood home that her father is attempting to sell. Laurie notices Michael throughout the day, but her friends Annie Brackett and Lynda Van Der Klok dismiss her concerns. Loomis arrives in Haddonfield and discovers that Michael has stolen Judith's tombstone from
1615-405: A neighbor's house to call the police, Michael rises again. Seeing the children running from the house, Loomis investigates and sees Michael strangling Laurie. She breaks free by pulling his mask off, revealing his face. Loomis shoots him six times, knocking him off the balcony. When Loomis goes to check on the body, he is unsurprised to see that Michael has vanished. He stares off into the distance as
1710-500: A new 4K Ultra HD Dolby Vision scan of the film, as well as its first four sequels. Upon its initial release, Halloween performed well with little advertising, relying mostly on word-of-mouth, but many critics seemed uninterested or dismissive of the film. Pauline Kael wrote a scathing review in The New Yorker suggesting that "Carpenter doesn't seem to have had any life outside the movies: one can trace almost every idea on
1805-573: A note." In Halloween ' s end credits, Carpenter bills himself as the "Bowling Green Philharmonic Orchestra", but he also received assistance from composer Dan Wyman , a music professor at San José State University. Some non-score songs can be heard in the film, one an untitled song performed by Carpenter and a group of his friends in a band called The Coupe De Villes. The song can be heard as Laurie steps into Annie's car on her way to babysit Tommy Doyle. Another song, " (Don't Fear) The Reaper " by classic rock band Blue Öyster Cult , also appears in
1900-411: A result of this shift in perspective from a disembodied, narrative camera to an actual character's eye ... we are forced into a deeper sense of participation in the ensuing action." Along with the 1974 Canadian horror film Black Christmas , Halloween made use of seeing events through the killer's eyes. The first scene of the young Michael's voyeurism is followed by the murder of Judith seen through
1995-413: A script, directed the script, did the casting. Halloween is his movie and besides, the script came to him already titled anyway. He liked Black Christmas and may have been influenced by it, but in no way did John Carpenter copy the idea. Fifteen other people at that time had thought to do a movie called Halloween but the script came to John with that title on it. It took approximately 10 days to write
SECTION 20
#17327984705612090-415: A silk blouse before Laurie leaves to babysit, just as Annie telephones asking to borrow the same blouse. The new scene had Laurie's hair hidden by a towel, since Curtis was by then wearing a much shorter hairstyle than she had worn in 1978. In August 2006, Fangoria reported that Synapse Films had discovered boxes of negatives containing footage cut from the film. One was labeled "1981" suggesting that it
2185-439: A traumatized Laurie sobs in terror. Scholar Carol J. Clover has argued that the film, and its genre at large, links sexuality with danger, saying that killers in slasher films are fueled by a "psychosexual fury" and that all the killings are sexual in nature. She reinforces this idea by saying that "guns have no place in slasher films" and when examining the film I Spit on Your Grave she notes that "a hands-on killing answers
2280-400: A two-disc "25th Anniversary edition" with improved DiviMax picture and audio, along with an audio commentary by Carpenter, Curtis and Hill, among other features. On October 2, 2007, the film was released for the first time on Blu-ray by Anchor Bay/ Starz Home Entertainment. The following year, a "30th Anniversary Commemorative Set" was issued, containing DVD and Blu-ray versions of the film,
2375-537: A university sorority house. As also stated in the 2009 documentary Clarkworld (written and directed by Clark's former production designer Deren Abram after Clark's tragic death in 2007), Carpenter directly asked Clark about his thoughts on developing the anonymous slasher in Black Christmas : ... I did a film about three years later, started a film with John Carpenter, it was his first film for Warner Bros. (which picked up Black Christmas ), he asked me if I
2470-422: A young Michael was inspired by John Carpenter's experience with a real life mental patient Hill, who had worked as a babysitter during her teenage years, wrote most of the female characters' dialogue, while Carpenter drafted Loomis' speeches on the soullessness of Michael Myers. Many script details were drawn from Carpenter's and Hill's own backgrounds and early careers: The fictional town of Haddonfield, Illinois
2565-650: Is a 1978 American independent slasher film directed and scored by John Carpenter , who co-wrote it with its producer Debra Hill . It stars Donald Pleasence , Jamie Lee Curtis (in her film debut), P. J. Soles , and Nancy Loomis . Set mostly in the fictional Illinois town of Haddonfield, the film follows mental patient Michael Myers , who was committed to a sanitarium for murdering his teenage sister one Halloween night during his childhood; he escapes 15 years later and returns to Haddonfield, where he stalks teenage babysitter Laurie Strode and her friends while his psychiatrist Dr. Samuel Loomis pursues him. The film
2660-525: Is a soundtrack album composed and performed by John Carpenter , featuring the score to the 1978 film Halloween . It was released in Japan in 1979 by Columbia Records and in the United States in 1983 in 1983 through Varèse Sarabande . An expanded 20th Anniversary Edition was released in 1998 through Varèse Sarabande. In 2018, an LP was released by Mondo Records featuring the mono tracks taken from
2755-415: Is one of its strongest assets." In an interview, Carpenter confessed, "I can play just about any keyboard, but I can't read or write a note." At the end of the credits, Carpenter humorously credits himself as the "Bowling Green Philharmonic Orchestra" for the film's soundtrack but received assistance from composer Dan Wyman, a music professor at San Jose State University . The soundtrack would later play
2850-471: Is paid to Alfred Hitchcock with two characters' names: Tommy Doyle is named after Lt. Det. Thomas J. Doyle ( Wendell Corey ) from Rear Window (1954), and Dr. Loomis' name was derived from Sam Loomis ( John Gavin ) from Psycho , the boyfriend of Marion Crane ( Janet Leigh , who is the real-life mother of Jamie Lee Curtis). Sheriff Leigh Brackett shared the name of a Hollywood screenwriter and frequent collaborator of Howard Hawks . In devising
2945-603: The Spaulding Square neighborhood of Hollywood were used for the film's climax, as the street had few palm trees, and thus closely resembled a Midwestern street. Some palm trees, however, are visible in the film's earlier establishing scenes. The crew had difficulty finding pumpkins in the spring, and artificial fall leaves had to be reused for multiple scenes. Local families dressed their children in Halloween costumes for trick-or-treat scenes. Carpenter worked with
Halloween Night - Misplaced Pages Continue
3040-422: The "false startle" or "the old tap-on-the-shoulder routine" in which the stalkers, murderers, or monsters "lunge into our field of vision or creep up on a person." Critic Susan Stark described the film's opening sequence in her 1978 review: In a single, wonderfully fluid tracking shot, the camera establishes the quiet character of a suburban street, the sexual hanky-panky going on between a teenage couple in one of
3135-463: The "idea was to make him almost humorless, faceless—this sort of pale visage that could resemble a human or not." Many of the actors wore their own clothes, and Curtis' wardrobe was purchased at J.C. Penney for around $ 100. Wallace described the filming process as uniquely collaborative, with cast members often helping move equipment, cameras, and helping facilitate set-ups. The vehicle stolen by Michael Myers from Dr Loomis and Nurse Marion Chambers at
3230-503: The Holy Grail of horror films". He later claimed: "We just learned from Sean Clark, long time Halloween genius, that the footage found is just that: footage. There is no sound in any of the reels so far, since none of it was used in the final edit". Since Halloween ' s premiere, it has been released in several home video formats. Early VHS versions were released by Media Home Entertainment . This release subsequently became
3325-511: The Menace (1993), and Major Payne (1995). Tony Moran plays the unmasked Michael at the end of the film. Moran was a struggling actor before he got the role. At the time, he had a job on Hollywood and Vine dressed up as Frankenstein. Moran had the same agent as his sister, Erin, who played Joanie Cunningham on Happy Days . When Moran went to audition for the role of Michael, he met for an interview with Carpenter and Yablans. He later got
3420-564: The Smith Grove Sanitarium was an Illinois government-owned 1978 Ford LTD station wagon rented for two weeks of filming. When filming was complete, the car was returned to the rental company who put it up for auction. Its next owner left it in a barn for decades until selling it to its new owner who has completely restored both its interior and exterior. Halloween was filmed in 20 days over a four-week period in May 1978. Much of
3515-458: The United States and an additional $ 23 million internationally, making the theatrical total $ 70 million, making it one of the most successful independent films of all time; the film sold approximately 20,153,846 tickets during its initial theatrical release, and remains the most successful release of any Halloween film and the third most successful film in the slasher genre behind Scream (1996) and Scream 2 (1997). On September 7, 2012,
3610-511: The Wallace family dog. Tommy spots Michael from the windows and thinks he is the boogeyman , but Laurie dismisses him. Annie later takes Lindsey to the Doyle house for the night so she can pick up her boyfriend. Michael hides in her car and strangles her before slitting her throat. Lynda and her boyfriend Bob arrive at the Wallace house and find it empty. After having sex, Bob goes downstairs to get
3705-410: The age of six murdered his sister for preferring sex to taking care of him." Carpenter has distanced himself from these interpretations, saying "It has been suggested that I was making some kind of moral statement. Believe me, I'm not. In Halloween , I viewed the characters as simply normal teenagers." In another interview, Carpenter said that readings of the film as a morality play "completely missed
3800-429: The attempts of parents to shield their children from the dangerous influences represented by the city." Halloween and slasher films, generally, represent the underside of suburbia to Gill. Myers was raised in a suburban household and after he escapes the mental hospital he returns to his hometown to kill again; Myers is a product of the suburban environment, writes Gill. Michael is thought by some to represent evil in
3895-410: The backstory for the film's villain, Michael Myers, Carpenter drew on "haunted house" folklore that exists in many small American communities: "Most small towns have a kind of haunted house story of one kind or another," he stated. "At least that's what teenagers believe. There's always a house down the lane that somebody was killed in, or that somebody went crazy in." Carpenter also took inspiration from
Halloween Night - Misplaced Pages Continue
3990-409: The basement. After freeing her, Vale knocks David out from behind, but Shannon manages to grab a gun that Vale has lost, shooting him twice, presuming the killer for dead. As the police and ambulance arrive later, David seems to have disappeared with the police searching for him. Suddenly, a bodybag behind a police officer talking to Shannon sits up. Shannon grabs the officer's gun, shooting and killing
4085-459: The cast to create the desired effect of terror and suspense. According to Curtis, Carpenter created a "fear meter" because the film was shot out-of-sequence and she was not sure what her character's level of terror should be in certain scenes. "Here's about a 7, here's about a 6, and the scene we're going to shoot tonight is about a 9 1 / 2 ", remembered Curtis. She had different facial expressions and scream volumes for each level on
4180-458: The character of The Gunslinger from Westworld (1973) for Michael Myers. Carpenter's inspiration for the "evil" that Michael embodied came from a visit he had taken during college to a psychiatric institution in Kentucky. There, he visited a ward with his psychology classmates where "the most serious, mentally ill patients" were held. Among those patients was an adolescent boy, who possessed
4275-408: The corpse as if it "were a butterfly collection." Carpenter did the score as he was told that the film "wasn't scary" after doing a test screening . Instead of utilizing a more traditional symphonic soundtrack, the film's score consists primarily of a piano melody played in a 10/8 or "complex 5/4" time signature , composed and performed by Carpenter. It took him three days to compose and record
4370-493: The daughter of June Lockhart from Lassie , as Laurie Strode. However, Lockhart had commitments to several other film and television projects. Hill says of learning that Jamie Lee was the daughter of Psycho actress Janet Leigh: "I knew casting Jamie Lee would be great publicity for the film because her mother was in Psycho ." Curtis was cast in the part, though she initially had reservations as she felt she identified more with
4465-457: The entire score for the film. Following the film's critical and commercial success, the "Halloween Theme" became recognizable apart from the film. Carpenter said it was also done in an hour. Critic James Berardinelli calls the score "relatively simple and unsophisticated", but admits that " Halloween ' s music is one of its strongest assets". Carpenter once stated in an interview, "I can play just about any keyboard, but I can't read or write
4560-425: The eye holes of Michael's clown costume mask. According to scholar Nicholas Rogers, Carpenter's "frequent use of the unmounted first-person camera to represent the killer's point of view ... invited [viewers] to adopt the murderer's assaultive gaze and to hear his heavy breathing and plodding footsteps as he stalked his prey." Film analysts have noted its delayed or withheld representations of violence, characterized as
4655-428: The fact that Loomis saves Strode, Clover asserts that Halloween initiates the role of the " final girl " who ultimately triumphs. Strode fights back against Myers and severely wounds him. Had Myers been a normal man, Strode's attacks would have killed him; even Loomis, the male hero of the story, who shoots Michael repeatedly with a revolver, cannot kill him. Aviva Briefel argued that moments such as when Michael's face
4750-583: The film as part of a Blu-ray boxed set featuring every film in the series (up to 2009's Halloween II ), made available in a standard and limited edition. The film was released by Lionsgate Home Entertainment (Anchor Bay's successor) in an Ultra HD Blu-ray and Blu-ray edition for the film's 40th anniversary. It is also available online for computer and other devices viewing ( streaming rentals) and downloadable files through Amazon .com, Apple 's iTunes Store download application and Vudu .com computer servers . In September 2021, Scream Factory released
4845-654: The film as the first in a long line of slasher films inspired by Psycho (1960), The Texas Chain Saw Massacre and Black Christmas (both 1974). It is considered one of the greatest and most influential horror films ever made . In 2006, it was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". Halloween spawned
SECTION 50
#17327984705614940-606: The film but also wrote "You get what you signed up for and therefore should be satisfied with that fact alone. Production is slick, score is eerie and the acting makes sense." Dread Central also heavily criticized the film, stating " Halloween Night is stupid slasher flick that’s sporadically amusing but mostly dull due to pacing issues, the predictable nature of the “seen it a million times before” storyline, and its insistence on taking itself far too seriously even when it's being outright dumb." Halloween (1978 film) Halloween (advertised as John Carpenter's Halloween )
5035-598: The film for dialogue peppered with the word "totally." Soles was an actress known for her supporting role in Carrie (1976) and her minor part in The Boy in the Plastic Bubble (1976) and would subsequently play Riff Randall in the 1979 film Rock 'n Roll High School . According to Soles, she was told after being cast that Carpenter had written the role with her in mind. Soles's then-husband, actor Dennis Quaid ,
5130-418: The film on DVD in various other editions; among these were an "extended edition," which features the original theatrical release with the scenes that were shot for the broadcast TV version edited in at their proper places. In 1999, Anchor Bay issued a two-disc limited edition, which featured both the theatrical and "extended editions," as well as lenticular cover art and lobby cards. In 2003, Anchor Bay released
5225-415: The film's slightly surreal color scheme) and William Friedkin 's The Exorcist . Carpenter composed the entire soundtrack in just three days. Beyond the film's critical and commercial success, Carpenter's Halloween Theme became recognizable far beyond the movie itself. Critic James Berardinelli described the soundtrack as "relatively simple and unsophisticated" but acknowledged that "Halloween's music
5320-446: The film, noting that when Laurie is attacked by Michael while babysitting, "No parents, either of the teenagers or of the children left in their charge, call to check on their children or arrive to keen over them." According to Gill, the dangers of suburbia is another major theme that runs throughout the film and the slasher genre at large: Gill states that slasher films "seem to mock white flight to gated communities , in particular
5415-460: The film. It plays on the car radio as Annie drives Laurie through Haddonfield with Myers in silent pursuit. The soundtrack was first released in the United States in October 1983, by Varèse Sarabande/MCA. It was subsequently released on CD in 1985, re-released in 1990, and reissued again in 2000. On the film's 40th anniversary, coinciding with the release of Anthology: Movie Themes 1974–1998 ,
5510-481: The film. This is based on the common belief that evil never dies, nor does evil show remorse. This idea is demonstrated in the film when Dr. Loomis discusses Michael's history with the sheriff. Loomis states, "I spent eight years trying to reach him [Michael Myers], and then another seven trying to keep him locked up because I realized that what was living behind that boy's eyes was purely and simply ... evil." Loomis also refers to Michael as "evil" when he steals his car at
5605-596: The filming was completed using a Panaglide, a clone of the Steadicam , the then-new camera that allowed the filmmakers to move around spaces smoothly. Filming locations included South Pasadena, California; Garfield Elementary School in Alhambra, California; and the cemetery at Sierra Madre, California. An abandoned house owned by a church stood in as the Myers house. Two homes on Orange Grove Avenue (near Sunset Boulevard) in
5700-512: The imagination of the audience. Using a montage of the houses as Michael's breathing is heard, Carpenter tried to keep the audience guessing as to who Michael Myers really is—he is gone, and everywhere at the same time; he is more than human; he may be supernatural, and no one knows how he got that way. To Carpenter, keeping the audience guessing was better than explaining away the character with "he's cursed by some..." Carpenter has described Halloween as: "True crass exploitation. I decided to make
5795-481: The jack-o'-lantern's left eye as the main title theme plays. After the camera fully closes in, the jack-o'-lantern's light dims and goes out. Film historian J.P. Telotte says that this scene "clearly announces that [the film's] primary concern will be with the way in which we see ourselves and others and the consequences that often attend our usual manner of perception." Carpenter's first-person point-of-view compositions were employed with steadicam ; Telotte argues, "As
SECTION 60
#17327984705615890-421: The killer several times, in the end, Strode is rescued in Halloween and Halloween II only when Dr. Loomis arrives to shoot Myers. However, Clover has argued that despite the violence against women, Halloween and other slasher films turned women into heroines. In many pre- Halloween horror films, women are depicted as helpless victims and are not safe until they are rescued by a strong masculine hero. Despite
5985-420: The local cemetery. He meets up with the town sheriff, Annie's father Leigh Brackett, and they begin searching for Michael. While they investigate the old Myers house, Loomis describes how he realized that Michael is pure evil. That night, Michael follows Annie and Laurie to their babysitting jobs. Laurie watches Tommy Doyle, while Annie stays with Lindsey Wallace across the street. Michael spies on Annie and kills
6080-407: The meter. Carpenter's direction for Castle in his role as Myers was minimal. For example, when Castle asked what Myers' motivation was for a particular scene, Carpenter replied that his motivation was to walk from one set marker to another and "not act." By Carpenter's account the only direction he gave Castle was during the murder sequence of Bob, in which he told Castle to tilt his head and examine
6175-480: The music, retaining rights to 10 percent of the film's profits. Because of the low budget, wardrobe and props were often crafted from items on hand or that could be purchased inexpensively. Carpenter hired Tommy Lee Wallace as production designer, art director, location scout and co-editor. Wallace created the trademark mask worn by Michael Myers throughout the film from a Captain Kirk mask purchased for $ 1.98 from
6270-430: The now disappointed Shannon, and some friends. Vale enters the house again, kills several of the remaining people, and ties up Shannon, who is wearing his mother's collar found in the house earlier. He breaks up a hole in the wall covered with boards where his father hid his mother's corpse before committing suicide. As one girl escapes from the house in a panic, David begins to search for Shannon, finding her captured in
6365-594: The official Halloween Movies Facebook page announced that the original Halloween would be re-released starting October 25, 2013, in celebration of the film's 35th anniversary in 2013. A new documentary was screened before the film at all locations, titled You Can't Kill the Boogeyman: 35 Years of Halloween , written and directed by HalloweenMovies.com webmaster Justin Beahm. In 1980, the television rights to Halloween were sold to NBC for approximately $ 3 million. After
6460-428: The original 35mm stem of the film and for the first time features the music as originally heard in theaters and on the earliest VHS releases of the film. Lacking a symphonic soundtrack, the film's score consists of a piano melody played in a 10/8 or "complex 5/4" time signature , composed and performed by director Carpenter. He admitted that the music was inspired by Dario Argento 's Suspiria (which also influenced
6555-795: The other female characters: "I was very much a smart alec, and was a cheerleader in high school, so [I] felt very concerned that I was being considered for the quiet, repressed young woman when in fact I was very much like the other two girls." Another relatively unknown actress, Nancy Kyes (credited in the film as Nancy Loomis), was cast as Laurie's outspoken friend Annie Brackett, daughter of Haddonfield sheriff Leigh Brackett ( Charles Cyphers ). Kyes had previously starred in Assault on Precinct 13 (as had Cyphers) and happened to be dating Halloween' s art director Tommy Lee Wallace when filming began. Carpenter chose P. J. Soles to play Lynda Van Der Klok, another loquacious friend of Laurie's, best remembered in
6650-442: The person. After unzipping the bag, she is shocked to see that she killed David. In the final scene, Vale is seen hitch-hiking and picked up by a car driver, who presumes him to be having a long Halloween party night. The film ends while the car leaves. Cinema Crazed panned the movie, writing "as a " Halloween " wannabe, it's horrible, but as a slasher film on its own merits it's horrible". HorrorNews.net criticized some aspects of
6745-477: The phone call, Laurie goes to the Wallace house and finds her friends' bodies and Judith's tombstone in the upstairs bedroom. She runs to the hallway where Michael slashes her arm, causing her to fall over the banister. Dazed and injured, she narrowly escapes the house with him in pursuit. She makes it back to the Doyle house, but realizes she has lost the keys to the front door. Tommy lets her in and she orders him and Lindsey to hide. Laurie calls for help, only to find
6840-452: The phone is dead. Michael sneaks in through the window and attacks her again, but she stabs him in the neck with a knitting needle. Thinking Michael is dead, Laurie staggers upstairs to check on the children, where Michael appears again. While Tommy and Lindsey hide in the bathroom, Laurie hides in the bedroom closet. Laurie stabs Michael in the eye with a coat hanger and then in the chest with his own knife. After she sends Tommy and Lindsey to
6935-414: The plot came from Celtic traditions of Halloween such as the festival of Samhain . Although Samhain is not mentioned in the plot of the first film, Hill asserts that: ... the idea was that you couldn't kill evil, and that was how we came about the story. We went back to the old idea of Samhain, that Halloween was the night where all the souls are let out to wreak havoc on the living, and then came up with
7030-414: The point," adding, "The one girl who is the most sexually uptight just keeps stabbing this guy with a long knife. She's the most sexually frustrated. She's the one that's killed him. Not because she's a virgin but because all that sexually repressed energy starts coming out. She uses all those phallic symbols on the guy." Debra Hill , who co-wrote and produced the film, also dismissed the idea saying, "There
7125-443: The role was the biggest mistake he made during his career. Yablans then suggested Pleasence, who agreed to star because his daughter Lucy, a guitarist, had enjoyed Assault on Precinct 13 for Carpenter's score. In an interview, Carpenter admits that "Jamie Lee wasn't the first choice for Laurie. I had no idea who she was. She was 19 and in a TV show at the time, but I didn't watch TV." He originally wanted to cast Anne Lockhart ,
7220-449: The sanitarium. This further emphasizes why Michael wears the mask as he " Wears his villainy plainly on his face." Yet we still question how evil Michael is without knowing his true motivation throughout the first film. We come to the end of the film, and Michael once again roams the streets of Haddonfield as evil never dies. Historian Nicholas Rogers notes that film critics contend that Carpenter's direction and camera work made Halloween
7315-481: The screen to directors such as Hitchcock and Brian De Palma and to the Val Lewton productions" and musing that "Maybe when a horror film is stripped of everything but dumb scariness—when it isn't ashamed to revive the stalest device of the genre (the escaped lunatic)—it satisfies part of the audience in a more basic, childish way than sophisticated horror pictures do." Halloween (soundtrack) Halloween
7410-410: The screenplay. Yablans and Akkad ceded most of the creative control to writers Carpenter and Hill (whom Carpenter wanted as producer), but Yablans did offer several suggestions. According to a Fangoria interview with Hill, "Yablans wanted the script written like a radio show, with 'boos' every 10 minutes." By Hill's recollection, the script took three weeks to write, and much of the inspiration behind
7505-421: The sequels Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers and Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers , and a replica Michael Myers mask. A 35th-anniversary Blu-ray was released in October 2013, featuring a new transfer supervised by cinematographer Dean Cundey. This release earned a Saturn Award for Best Classic Film Release . In September 2014, Scream Factory teamed with Anchor Bay Entertainment to release
7600-558: The spectacle means. After viewing Carpenter's film Assault on Precinct 13 (1976) at the Milan Film Festival, independent film producer Irwin Yablans and financier Moustapha Akkad sought out Carpenter to direct a film for them about a psychotic killer that stalked babysitters. In an interview with Fangoria magazine, Yablans stated: "I was thinking what would make sense in the horror genre, and what I wanted to do
7695-476: The staid-looking homes, the departure of the boyfriend, a hand in the kitchen drawer removing a butcher's knife, the view on the way upstairs from behind the eye-slits of a Halloween mask, the murder of a half-nude young girl seated at her dressing table, the descent downstairs and whammo! The killer stands speechless on the lawn, holding the bloody knife, a small boy in a satin clown suit with a newly-returned parent on each side shrieking in an attempt to find out what
7790-446: The story about the most evil kid who ever lived. And when John came up with this fable of a town with a dark secret of someone who once lived there, and now that evil has come back, that's what made Halloween work. I met this six-year-old child with this blank, pale, emotionless face, and the blackest eyes; the devil's eyes ... I realized what was living behind that boy's eyes was purely and simply ... evil. —Loomis' description of
7885-399: The thugs were wearing. His old home is now inhabited by David Bexter's family; Bexter hosts a Halloween party there with his girlfriend Shannon, his friends, and his schoolmates. Vale kills a party-goer named Todd at a gas station, steals his costume and car, and drives to the party. At the party, Vale is taken for Todd by everyone and starts a killing spree unnoticed. Meanwhile, David fakes
7980-402: The tight, four-week schedule, low budget, and Carpenter's limited experience as a filmmaker, but told Fangoria : "Two things made me decide. One, Carpenter told me the story verbally and in a suspenseful way, almost frame for frame. Second, he told me he didn't want to take any fees, and that showed he had confidence in the project". Carpenter received $ 10,000 for directing, writing, and composing
8075-578: Was absolutely no intent for that to be the underlying reason. I was raised a Catholic schoolgirl and what leaked into the script is my Catholic sensibility. It was totally unintentional." Some feminist critics, according to historian Nicholas Rogers, "have seen the slasher movies since Halloween as debasing women in as decisive a manner as hard-core pornography." Critics such as John Kenneth Muir state that female characters such as Laurie Strode survive not because of "any good planning" or their own resourcefulness, but sheer luck. Although she manages to repel
8170-463: Was additional footage for the television version of the film. Synapse owner Don May Jr. said, "What we've got is pretty much all the unused original camera negative from Carpenter's original Halloween . Luckily, Billy [Kirkus] was able to find this material before it was destroyed. The story on how we got the negative is a long one, but we'll save it for when we're able to showcase the materials in some way. Kirkus should be commended for pretty much saving
8265-468: Was always intended to be called (and take place on) Halloween . Carpenter said of the basic concept: "Halloween night. It has never been the theme in a film. My idea was to do an old haunted house film." Film director Bob Clark suggested in an interview released in 2005 that Carpenter had asked him for his own ideas for a sequel to his 1974 film Black Christmas (written by Roy Moore) that featured an unseen and motiveless killer murdering students in
8360-548: Was considered for the role of Bob Simms, Lynda's boyfriend, but was unable to perform the role due to prior work commitments. The role of "The Shape"—as the masked Michael Myers character was billed in the end credits—was played by Nick Castle , who befriended Carpenter while they attended the University of Southern California. After Halloween , Castle became a director, taking the helm of films such as The Last Starfighter (1984), The Boy Who Could Fly (1986), Dennis
8455-409: Was derived from Haddonfield, New Jersey, where Hill was raised, while several of the street names were taken from Carpenter's hometown of Bowling Green, Kentucky. Laurie Strode was allegedly the name of one of Carpenter's old girlfriends, while Michael Myers was the name of an English producer who had previously entered, with Yablans, Assault on Precinct 13 in various European film festivals. Homage
8550-438: Was ever gonna do a sequel and I said no. I was through with horror, I didn't come into the business to do just horror. He said, 'Well what would you do if you did do a sequel?' I said it would be the next year and the guy would have actually been caught, escape from a mental institution, go back to the house and they would start all over again. And I would call it Halloween . The truth is John didn't copy Black Christmas , he wrote
8645-493: Was make a picture that had the same impact as The Exorcist ." Carpenter agreed to direct the film contingent on his having full creative control, and was paid $ 10,000 for his work, which included writing, directing, and scoring the film. He and his then-girlfriend Debra Hill began drafting the story of Halloween . There were claims as early as 1980 that the film at one point was supposed to be called The Babysitter Murders but Yablans has since debunked this stating that it
8740-508: Was not released in CED format (capacitance electronic disc), unlike Halloween II and Halloween III , but it was released on Laser Disc . The film was released for the first time on DVD in the United States by Anchor Bay Entertainment on October 28, 1997. To date, that DVD release is the only one to feature the original mono audio track as heard in theaters in 1978 and on most home video releases that preceded it. Anchor Bay re-released
8835-498: Was paid the highest amount at $ 20,000, Curtis received $ 8,000, and Nick Castle earned $ 25 a day. The role of Dr. Loomis was originally intended for Peter Cushing , who had recently appeared as Grand Moff Tarkin in Star Wars (1977); Cushing's agent rejected Carpenter's offer due to the low salary. Christopher Lee was approached for the role; he too turned it down, although the actor later told Carpenter and Hill that declining
8930-493: Was shot in Southern California throughout May 1978, produced by Compass International Pictures and Falcon International Productions. The film was released by Compass International and Aquarius Releasing in October and grossed $ 70 million on a budget of $ 300,000, becoming one of the most profitable independent films of all time. Primarily praised for Carpenter's direction and score , many critics credit
9025-496: Was temporarily revealed are meant to give pleasure to the male viewer. Briefel further argues that these moments are masochistic in nature and give pleasure to men because they are willingly submitting themselves to the women of the film; they submit themselves temporarily because it will make their return to authority even more powerful. Critics, such as Gill, see Halloween as a critique of American social values. She remarks that parental figures are almost entirely absent throughout
#560439