Halloween (1978) 35th anniversary Blu-ray review

It can be argued that Bob Clark kicked off the slasher sub-genre with his 1974 Christmas classic, Black Christmas - and you’d be right - but the real success story to utilize the stalk-and-slash formula was John Carpenter’s Halloween (1978). The film cost a mere $325,000 to produce, yet the record grosses it took in made it the most successful independent film of all-time until The Blair Witch Project (1999) became a hit some 20 years later. To this day it stands as one of the greatest films the genre has to offer, with a legion of fans to back up that assertion. Carpenter utilized all of his finely-tuned skills as a director to create an atmosphere that is palpable, oozing off the screen with ominous presence and the promise of bad things to come. He employs the “less is more” method, preferring to let his characters carry the bulk of the film so that we can become accustomed to them, grow to like them as individuals, and all the while a faceless, blank Shape appears intermittently to remind us danger can be around any corner. Halloween also benefits from receiving one of the most widely-remembered themes in all of cinema, let alone horror. Carpenter, who also composed the film (in addition to producing and writing), laid down a moody, simplistic score that eschews complex arrangements and orchestration, relying entirely on the tones created using piano melodies. This basic approach also worked wonders for Jaws (1975) a few years earlier, a fitting fact considering Michael Myers is the “shark” of this film, methodically staking his prey until striking at the precise moment.

On the extremely-off chance that someone reading this isn’t familiar with the film, a brief summary. It’s Halloween night, 1978, and Michael Myers has escaped from the mental hospital he was committed to fifteen years earlier for murdering his sister. Hot on his trail is Dr. Loomis (Donald Pleasence), his psychiatrist and the only man who knows what evil lurks behind those eyes. He’s returning to Haddonfield, back to his home, and a young group of girls are about to be reminded that on Halloween night, everyone is entitled to one good scare.

A film can only be as good as its leading characters, and few female trios are as memorable as Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis), Lynda (P.J. Soles), and Annie (Nancy Loomis). Carpenter had the good sense to write these high school girls like real people. Horror films are often guilty of exaggerating personalities to make them more distinct, but Halloween gives these girls an authentic voice. Their friendships feel genuine, not like a forced group of friends cobbled together for easy pickings later on. On-screen deaths don’t mean anything if there isn’t a connection with the audience to these characters. Laurie feels like a relatable person. She isn’t the most popular girl in school, nor is she the prettiest. She’s just an average teenager who wants to get good grades and have fun with her friends. Even dating isn’t seen as a high priority to her, although part of that reasoning fits into the “morality play” aspects of most horror films. Laurie is certainly the most “virginal” of her friends, and that’s exactly why she makes it to the end.

I’d be remiss not to mention the late Donald Pleasence, whose role as the Myers-obsessed Dr. Loomis remains one of the great protagonists in horror. The role was originally offered to both Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee (who later said turning it down was a big regret) before going to Pleasence, who at that time was best known as Ernst Stavro Blofeld in You Only Live Twice (1967). His relationship with Myers is almost like that of a father, and he’s desperately trying to retrieve him before more blood is spilled. Loomis manages to remain collected and professional, but there is an aura of frenzied desperation bubbling just under the surface because he knows what Myers is capable of doing. The role came to define his career, for better or worse, and his presence in the sequels injected them with gravitas.

Producer Irwin Yablans told it best to Carpenter that the audience shouldn’t be graphically scared, but rather “it should be what they thought they saw that frightens them.” Taking this ethos quite literally, the film features virtually no bloodshed, and most deaths don’t even involve Myers’ trademark knife. The film took a then little-used technique of assuming the killer’s POV, an effect that greatly amplifies the tension because now the audience can tell where the boogeyman is going to strike from but the actors on the screen are none the wiser. It’s a bit like the “bomb under the table” technique filmmakers like Alfred Hitchcock would employ. It all comes down to setting a mood, and Carpenter’s long, languid shots lull viewers into a false sense of tranquility before snapping them back to reality with Myers appearing at the sound of a stinger in the score. There’s virtually nothing Carpenter can be faulted for here, delivering what is for all intents and purposes a perfect horror film in every regard.

It’s so great, in fact, that fans will gladly (grudgingly?) line up to purchase any and every new edition that is released – leading us to Anchor Bay’s brand-new 35th Anniversary Edition. This time around, we’re treated to a few new supplements, but the real meat in the bag is the new transfer, approved by cinematographer Dean Cundey.

The previous blu-ray edition of Halloween had unauthorized color timing changes made, giving the film a heavily-saturated appearance which essentially negated the intended effect of looking like fall weather. Now, I realize that it can only look so much like fall since it was shot in the spring of 1978 in Pasadena, CA, but this new transfer claims to be more in line with the aesthetic Carpenter and Cundey were aiming for. Everything looks cooler and crisper this time around, with a steely/grey tone given to the picture. It feels more like the Halloween season. This change has also benefited the film’s fine details, which now look more apparent than ever. Faces and lines are more sharply defined, resulting in an image that should win over anyone on the fence about buying the film again. The prior blu-ray looked like a film shot during spring. The grass was so green it was practically bleeding off the soil. And skin tones looked much hotter there than this new edition, where faces have a softer, more neutral balance. I can’t say I minded the blue push given to some of the night scenes, as it did give the film a more ghostly atmosphere. But it’s hard to argue when Dean Cundey himself is behind the controls, and this is by far the best presentation we’ve seen yet. I did a direct A-B comparison, switching back and forth between the two discs, and the results here are startlingly impressive. If you’re a purist who wants the most accurate presentation possible for films you love, this is a no-brainer for the image alone.

On the audio side of things, this disc gets a major boost by receiving a lossless English Dolby TrueHD 7.1 surround sound track that, quite simply, murders the previous disc’s PCM track. As soon as the film begins, there is an immediately noticeable difference in the range allotted to the score, with Carpenter’s deep synth tones reverberating through your system. Dialogue levels register at a higher level, giving them a fullness that was lost in previous editions. The expanded dynamics provide more impact to musical stingers. Music is of major importance to this film, inexorably so, and the richness provided by this track provides an immersive experience fans could have only gotten in a theater before. Rear supports carry a lot of ambiance with them, filling out the sound field with elements of rain storms, trick-or-treaters, and screams that were previously lessened in their effectiveness. The original mono track is also included, though it shows clear limitations when stacked up against this new multi-channel affair. Simply put, it’s the best the film has ever sounded.

The supplemental department is a mixed bag on this new release, with a two new features hosted alongside some re-purposed extras. First up is a new audio commentary with writer/director John Carpenter and actress Jamie Lee Curtis. I’ll admit I’m not the biggest fan of re-recorded commentaries since, especially for a film like Halloween, it’s been dissected a million times already. But I really liked this track. Not only because I could listen to Carpenter - now a little older, wiser, and slightly weary – talk about his days of yore endlessly, but because Curtis seems to have this new-found exuberance for her days as a scream queen. These two converse like a couple of close, old friends, holding nothing back and speaking candidly about working together, the ensuing years that have passed since, and much more. It’s great to hear Curtis show some real excitement. She controls most of the track, while Carpenter sort of sits back and gives her the reins while offering up his own thoughts on the picture all these years later. The Night She Came Home is an all-new documentary on Jamie Lee Curtis’ one and only convention appearance, at the HorrorHound weekend show in November 2012. Curtis admits right up front that she has essentially chosen to ignore her horror fan base since it’s not really her thing and she no longer identifies with that genre. But now she’s back to monetize her fandom by signing items at this show and donating her earnings to the Children’s Hospital Los Angeles. Accompanied by the ubiquitous Sean Clark, Curtis spends hours each day talking to fans, cracking jokes, and reminiscing about her horror days. She’s open and candid, holding nothing back while she squeezes every last drop out of this, her one-time gift to fans all over the world. You’d think it could get boring watching Jamie sign posters and gab with fans for an hour, but this doc breezes right by with no lag. On Location: 25 Years Later is an old featurette that appeared on one of the previous DVD releases done by Anchor Bay. Running for just over 10 minutes, the piece looks at some of the key locations alongside interviews with a few cast & crew members. TV Version Footage collects all of the scene Carpenter shot to pad out the network premiere of the film, some of which add important details to the mythos. Of course, it would have been better if they saw fit to include the TV Version on this disc. Wrapping things up are a handful of trailers, TV spots, and radio spots.

Another selling point of this disc is the DigiBook packaging. The profile is very slim, with the interior containing a 20-page booklet featuring production photos and essays. The disc itself is contained inside a paper sleeve, which has been glued to the last page. It’s a cheap design, and I wouldn’t be surprised to hear many fans hate it. The cover art admittedly did little for me when glimpsed online, however, in person the minimalist artwork does look a little more impressive. The cover is also slightly embossed, giving it a bit of texture, too. And, hey, if you don’t like you can just hold off and buy the 40th anniversary edition that is no doubt forthcoming. Like me, I’m sure all of you are sick to death of re-buying your favorite classics again and again and again. This release stands as the definitive representation of Halloween from an audio and video standpoint, but the clear omission of numerous bonus features means that, at the least, you’ll have to hang on to all the old copies piled up on your shelf.

Prince Of Darkness (1987) Blu-ray review

Without a doubt, horror auteur John Carpenter enjoyed one of the greatest runs in the history of the genre, spanning from his under siege gang tale Assault on Precinct 13 (1976) and ending with the Roddy Piper classic They Live in 1988. His results after that period are generally considered a mixed bag, but the films he made during those 12 years are sacrosanct to horror fans. But even within that winning streak, with so many films to choose from some people are inevitably going to dismiss a couple as sub-par - and for some reason that always seems to be the fate for Prince of Darkness (1987). Lately, however, fans seem to be getting a little more forgiving. It seems like an obvious analogy, but some of Carpenter’s films really are like a fine wine, only gaining more appreciation with age. The Thing (1982) was a total bomb when it was released, and now many fans (myself included) put it at the top of their favorite horror films. So, now, some 25 years later, Prince can be seen as more than “that movie with liquid Satan” thanks to Scream Factory’s new blu-ray release.

Prince of Darkness was made at a time when Carpenter was interested in theoretical physics and quantum mechanics, and he decided it would be a novel concept to present themes of good and evil contained within matter and anti-matter. For the few who don’t know the film’s plot, a priest (Donald Pleasence) is given possession of a key that unlocks a door behind which an ancient, swirling liquid evil is contained within a massive cylinder. The priest arranges for Professor Birack (Victor Wong) and some of his students to stay the weekend at the church so they can study his findings. Once they arrive, strange vagrants surround the church and prevent anyone from leaving. Everyone also begins to experience a bizarre, shared dream that warns them of an apocalyptic future. The mysterious liquid begins to leak from the container, infecting some of the students with its contents and causing them to act violently. Kelly (Susan Blanchard) is afflicted with a bruised mark on her arm, and eventually she is possessed by the full contents of the container, bringing to life the Anti-Christ himself. Only a few survivors are left to battle Satan’s forces before he can bring his father, the Anti-God, back into the world.

Carpenter considers this film as the second in his “apocalypse trilogy” (the other two are The Thing and 1995’s In the Mouth of Madness). Although all three have vastly differing plots, they each share an ending that suggests mankind’s future may not be so bright. Prince presents a lot of intrigue by employing a plot that isn’t needlessly nebulous. Even John himself admits he doesn’t know what some things in the film are supposed to mean. And that’s a good thing, because not everything always has to be explained away. I’ve often found the scariest horror films are the ones where nobody is safe and everything seems like a threat. Here, we’ve got worms and bugs and beetles scaling the walls, a group of nefarious homeless people who seem to spring up out of nowhere to attack, an evil liquid that shoots in people’s mouths like Satan’s personal Super Soaker, a man made of bugs delivering a cryptic message, and the embodiment of Satan which not even Donald Pleasence’s ax can defeat.

Speaking of which, I have to give credit to Blanchard for making that nearly-silent performance as the Anti-Christ so memorable. As if that grotesque, runny, bloody, half-melted skin-falling-of-the-face make-up wasn’t almost enough to make a man dry heave, the sense of wonder she can elicit just by using her eyes added another element to that character. Satan hasn’t been fully formed in around seven million years or so according to the movie, and Blanchard plays the role like a newborn with a profound sense of power. And when her eyes widen, making the whites stand out amongst a bloody mess of red, it looks very goddamn creepy. Big props also to an uncredited Mark Shostrom for handling the gruesome duties on Blanchard’s rotten face. I remember seeing her face as a massive fold-out poster in Fangoria’s Bloody Best back in the ‘90s and the image stuck with me ever since.

Casting was always a strong suit for Carpenter as well, and while we don’t get a Kurt Russell or a Roddy Piper here we do get one Jameson Parker and, with that, one damn fine mustache. Seriously, did someone in makeup put a wig on a NY strip steak and glue it to his lip? I’ll bet that push broom has swept more than a few corners clean. Parker might be one of the few leading men to be upstaged by his own facial hair. He’s a fine leading man, mildly charismatic, but he’s also got a bit of a creeper vibe to him. His early come-ons to Catherine (Lisa Blount) are awkward, but then I guess he is supposed to be a bit of a nerd here, right? Pleasence is here for gravitas, nothing more. Other than saying, “Hey guys, here’s this evil liquid I found”, there isn’t a lot for him to do in the film. He spends half the movie hiding and reading his bible. Peter Jason has his Carpenter debut here, his first of seven films they did together, and he mostly provides comic relief. He’s one of those great character actors that round out a picture and elevate it. Dennis Dun had been seen previously in Big Trouble in Little China (1986), and he plays his character here with the same frantic energy and horn dog nature we got in that film.

As a huge Alice Cooper fan, can I just say how fantastic it was seeing him in a horror movie I love? Just two years earlier he starred in Monster Dog (1985), which is only worth watching for the two music videos he performs. To give you an idea of how bad it is if you haven’t seen it, the director is Claudio Fragasso. Yes, the guy who did Troll 2 (1990). Anyway, Cooper got involved because his manager, Shep Gordon was a producer on the film and suggested Alice record a song for the movie. He did, and then he wound up playing the “leader” of the homeless people, eventually using one of his own stage props to impale a victim who also happened to be listening to the song Cooper recorded for the film.

Prince of Darkness contains many of the themes and settings that Carpenter liked to employ – the church’s forced isolation and confined setting, paranoid, mistrust, a small outnumbered group fighting against many, and an ending that suggests things aren’t going to just go back to being how they once were. This film has one of those powerful endings that knows exactly when to cut, leaving viewers’ brains in a scramble trying to hypothesize what happens next. It’s a vastly underrated film, and now thanks to Scream Factory we get it served up on blu-ray with healthy upgrades in both picture and sound, as well as enough extras to keep Satan occupied through the next millennia.

Carpenter shot this film using wide-angle lenses in an anamorphic format, which often results in some softness around the edges. Make no mistake; this is the best the film has ever looked. There’s a moderate layer of grain over the image, preserving the filmic aesthetic. Fine detail receives a big boost over the previous DVDs, as exemplified in the cracks on Pleasence’s face, or the ability to count the individual hairs that make-up Parker’s luxurious flavor saver. An occasional problem with films being seen in HD is that make-up work or other effects lose their magic under the scrutiny of hi-def, but thankfully the only element that’s made more apparent is the matte work used in the beginning. The palette used is fairly dark and devoid of bright colors, but this disc has no problem making sure everything is delineated and crisp. Black levels likewise hold up well, allowing for detail to appear even through shadow. The audio comes with both 2.0 and 5.1 DTS-HD MA offerings. The multi-track is the better choice, allowing the full range of Carpenter and Howarth’s incredible score room to breathe through every available speaker. The rear channels provide nice support to the front mix, enveloping listeners with a chilling ambiance.

Don’t let the back cover fool you, since it erroneously states the disc includes only a commentary with Carpenter, some new interviews, and a trailer. Fact is, there is much more to the disc. Fans will be extremely pleased. The audio commentary should sound familiar to those who owned the Momentum Region 2 DVD. This is a direct port of that track, featuring Carpenter alongside actor Peter Jason, and it’s another winner. Jason is infectiously funny, hardly stopping for a beat between zingers, anecdotes, and questions for Carpenter. There’s a lot of talk about how he directs scenes and actors, what he tries to achieve in scoring the film, and how he views some of the aspects of this movie. Highly recommended for fans. Sympathy for the Devil is a ten-minute interview with John Carpenter, where he discusses his influences on this movie, how it all came about, location scouting, as well as acknowledging that maybe the opening credits are a bit lengthy. Alice at the Apocalypse is another ten-minute interview, this one with legendary shock rocker Alice Cooper. He discusses how film appeals to him, how he got involved with this picture, and the cult status it has attained. The Messenger is a 12-minute interview with special visual effects supervisor Robert Grasmere, who also plays the role of Frank (the “I’ve got a message for you…” guy). He initially was hired on just to do effects, but one night Carpenter asked him if he could act and he said yes. The guy was clearly thrilled beyond belief, still sounding struck by how awesome it was to have his own stunt double as well as a trailer with his name on it. Hell on Earth – A Look at the Film’s Score is a 10-minute piece that finds composer Alan Howarth talking about his work with Carpenter. John knows what he wants and he runs the ship, so it was Alan’s job to be the engineer and see that his vision was preserved. Alternate Opening for TV Version runs for around seven minutes; the major difference being that this presents the film as a dream of Brian’s. Sean Clark’s ever-popular Horror’s Hallowed Grounds pops up here as well, running for 13 minutes we get a rundown on all of the major locations used in the film alongside Clark’s usual parodies and constant humor. All I know is whoever came up with the mustache gag at the end is a damn genius. Trailers & Radio Spots contains one of the former and two of the latter. A Still Gallery runs for around 4 minutes and showcases many behind-the-scenes and publicity shots. Finally, an easy-to-find Easter Egg appears on the second page of extras. Click it to access a 12-minute interview with John Carpenter, as moderated by Brian Collins, at Screamfest 2012 where he talks in depth about Prince of Darkness.

As usual, feel free to flip your cover art right around to display the original key art beneath your fancy new-art slipcover. I’m not a huge fan of “everything but the sink” artwork, but this one works well - mainly because Jameson Parker’s thigh tickler is given prominent placement. Scream/Shout! Factory are doing everything in their power to massacre fans’ wallets this year, and their latest release of this underrated ‘80s classic is a necessary addition to all shelves. As if it wasn’t enough to provide the best audio and video presentation the film has ever received, they go and dump a big pile of supplements right on top of it. Buy without hesitation, because this is THE definitive release for Prince of Darkness.