Low Budget

Halloween, John Carpenter's high point

As Halloween, the holiday, approaches, it's time to think about one of the best all-time low-budget horror movies ever made. The greatness of this simple movie has been obscured by workmanlike sequels followed by pathetic sequels followed by slick sequels, followed by, well, burn-out.
With Halloween, the link between low-budget and authenticity in a certain style of horror movie was made explicit. The link had already been established by movies such as Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Night of the Living Dead, but Halloween got the message through to a wider audience, with less drama. It was more real, more creepy, and somehow more pertinent to your life.
Halloween is done with long, slow takes, many of which interpose something wrong with scenes of the town in which nothing could possibly be wrong, not really. The actual "bad-guy" may not exist, but everything else in the movie does. It's our own backyard, and the low-budget style of the movie serves to reinforce that sense. This is probably the kind of movie that any director can only make once in his or her career.

posted by dan @ 10/16/2004 01:19:00 PM