Three babysitters are being stalked by Michael Myers, an damaged person with the look of evil in his eyes. Michael Myers escaped from a mental institution and his Doctor, Sam Loomis, is looking for him.
Blaine: A studio executive named Irwin Yablans wanted to make a horror film with the limited amount of money that he had. Irwin had an idea about babysitters being stalked. He thought “Halloween” would be a good title, but also felt that someone else had already used it. Irwin then learned that Halloween had never been used as a title so he took the chance to use it before someone else did. He thought fast and the next thing he had to do was find someone who could develop a script and could direct the film. John Carpenter was that man. John was 29 at the time and was best known for making a low budget movie called “Assault on Precinct 13”. Irwin went to John saying they should make a horror film together about babysitters being stalked by a psychopathic killer during Halloween night. John had wanted to make a horror film ever since he saw Alfred Hitchcock’s “Psycho” in his youth and so this was very exciting for him. John had demanded that he have complete control of his creativeness, which means direct the film the way he wants to make it without anyone else telling him how it should be. Another thing he wanted was to have his name above the title. Irwin told John that he can have anything he wants for this picture just as long as it was under $300,000.00.
John Carpenter had developed a script for “Halloween" in three weeks with Debra Hill, who was John’s script supervisor on “Assault on Precinct 13”. Debra put a lot of herself into the babysitter characters like the dialog because she was a babysitter once. Alfred Hitchcock’s “Psycho” was the influence for “Halloween” because it wasn’t about werewolves, vampires or monsters, it was more about a person who thinks he is two people.
John Carpenter had Anne Lockhart in mind to play the heroine of “Halloween”, Laurie, but she turned it down. Debra Hill had recommended Jamie Lee Curtis because she had the type of qualities they were looking for in Laurie and she did a wonderful job in her audition. But the main reason Jamie Lee was chosen was because she was the daughter of Janet Leigh, who everyone knew in Alfred Hitchcock’s “Psycho”. Jamie Lee Curtis was 19 at the time and she wasn’t aware that she was going to be the lead actress of the movie. She also couldn’t understand why they wanted her to play Laurie because the other two girls who her character hangs out with were more like her. Jamie was acting like someone who is not at all like her. Someone who is quiet and takes things seriously.
One of Laurie’s friends was played by P.J. Soles. John Carpenter had seen the movie “Carrie” and had basically written the part of Lynda for P.J. She would bring a lot of herself into the character. John and Debra wanted an actor with a lot of experience in acting and had a recognized name to play Michael Myers' pursuer, Dr. Sam Loomis. John’s first choice was Peter Cushing, a horror legend. The year before, Peter was in “Star Wars”, which made a lot of money after it’s success. Peter Cushing had turned down “Halloween” because it was a low budget movie. John then went to Christopher Lee, another horror legend, but he turned it down as well. Years later, Christopher Lee ran into John Carpenter and Debra Hill and he said the biggest mistake he had ever made in his career was turning down “Halloween”. Irwin Yablans had recommended Donald Pleasence. Donald agreed to be in the movie even though he couldn’t quiet understand what it was about at first. The reason why he decided to be apart of “Halloween” was because his daughter loved the music John Carpenter did for “Assault on Precinct 13”. John was nervous meeting Donald and directing him in the movie because he never had any experience being around an actor this big before in his life at the time. Donald would be testing John to see how good of a director he was. My favorite part of Donald’s performance is when he telling the officer his origin story of when he first met Michael Myers all those years ago and how he had never seen anyone as damaged before like him.
Principal photography began on May of 1978 and “Halloween” had a 20 day shooting schedule. John Carpenter and Debra Hill didn’t have a lot of money because it was a low budget movie. They asked friends of theirs to help make this movie and they were happy enough to do it for free because hey loved John and Debra. Jamie Lee Curtis would help the crew carry stuff which made her a member of the crew. Making “Halloween” was also a lot of fun for everyone on set. John and Debra could only afford Donald Pleasence for a week so they scheduled to shoot all of his scenes together in the same week. Donald was very good to everyone on set and he would give a performance that John Carpenter would never forget. John was really amazed of how good of an actor Donald was. What amazed Donald the most about being apart of “Halloween” was being surrounded by a crew of very young people.
The murdering psychopath of the movie, Michael Myers, was named after a distributor who John Carpenter was very grateful to for having his movie, “Assault on Precinct 13” premiere at the London Film Festival. So naming the killer, Michael Myers, after him was a tribute to him. John wanted Michael Myers to be human, but also like an indestructible killing machine. John was influenced by the 1973 film, “Westworld”. In that film it would show a killer robot that couldn’t be destroyed. Another inspiration for “Halloween” goes back to John Carpenter’s years in college. He had a psychology class and one day they took a field trip to a mental institution where John saw this twelve year old boy who had this serious and evil look on his face. It scared John seeing that kid.
At the beginning of the movie the camera is moving around the Myer’s house because you are seeing what six year old Michael Myers is seeing. Orson Welles had a long opening shot in his movie, “Touch of Evil”, and that made John Carpenter want to do something like that for “Halloween”. A new device was invented just at the right time where you can attach a camera to your body and walk around with it. It’s called the steady cam. The opening shot would move around the outside of the house, look through a window to see Michael’s older sister fooling around with her boyfriend. Then the shot would go into the house, a small hand would grab a knife, then pick up a clown mask on the floor and put it over it’s face. And finally after the boyfriend leaves and the sister is all alone you would see a knife stabbing the sister. It took all night to shoot that sequence.
Jamie Lee Curtis was nervous the first day of shooting because this was her first movie and she was the lead female actor. She felt that she didn’t do a good enough job the first day and that got her worried thinking she was going to get fired. After Jamie Lee got home from a day’s work, John Carpenter called her saying she did a good job. Jamie felt calm after that and she wanted to make sure she did a terrific job with her performance.
The man who played Michael Myers was a friend of John Carpenter’s back in film school, Nick Castle, who later achieved his own career in filmmaking. All Nick would have to do was stare, walk and breath. John had sent his production designer, Tommy Lee Wallace, out to look for a Halloween mask that Michael Myers would wear over his face through the movie. John needed a mask with a blank look on it. The reason why they had to find a mask was because they didn’t have enough money to make their own. John had written in the script that the mask was pale with human features. It was inspired by “Eyes without a Face”, a horror movie about a girl with a burnt face and would wear this creepy face mask. Tommy had boughten two masks. One was a clown mask and the other was a William Shatner “Star Trek” mask. The reason why Tommy had gotten that mask was because it had a blank look on it’s face. Tommy had cute out the eye holes to make them look bigger. He also got rid of the eyebrows, goofed up the hair, spray painted it whiter and took off the sideburns. It frightened people on the set once it was finished.
“Halloween” didn’t have any special effects or hardly any blood shed. John Carpenter thought of “Halloween” being more about coming out when you least suspect it just like the creepy carnival rides he used to go on when he was a kid.
After Jamie Lee Curtis discovers the dead bodies of her friends, she goes into the other room and hides in one corner thinking she’ll be safe. John asked his cinematographer Dean Cundey how they could accomplish that as people are watching that scene our eyes are getting used to the dark and then all of a sudden we see Michael Myers is there too. So they set up a small light on a dimmer, turned it up slowly and the light would lighten up half of Michael Myer’s mask as he is hiding in the dark ready to come at Jamie.
John Carpenter would also work on the music score for “Halloween” after they were done shooting for the day or night. He spent three days working on it. John’s father bought him a pare of bongos when he was a teenager and taught him Five Four time on them. Five Four became the piano duet in the “Halloween” theme. Without that music the movie wouldn’t be as frightening as it is.
People would scream at the end when Michael Myers is unmasked and you can see his face for three seconds. It was a different person playing Michael Myers when he is unmasked because John and Debra wanted sort of an average face. Dr. Loomis shoots at Michael Myers six times and he falls off the balcony. Loomis looks away from Michael Myers body for two seconds and then sees that Michael is gone. Donald Pleasence told John Carpenter that there are two ways he could act after he discovers the body is gone. He could be shocked or it wouldn’t surprise him. John decided to do two different takes of that and he liked it when Donald is not shocked at all. Donald taught John a lot about acting because of those suggestions. After Michael Myer’s body is gone, it edits to spots where he was and John said “that doesn’t mean Michael is not only gone, but he’s everywhere.”
After “Halloween” was all done and put together, it was time to see what audiences thought of it. Debra Hill had hoped that the film would be a classic. “Halloween” had started off with a limited release and it didn’t gross so much during the first few days, but then the numbers started grow more and more each day. There was people who would recommend “Halloween" to their friends because they thought it was really scary. It wasn’t till the film premiered at the Chicago Film Festival in ’78 that John, Debra and Irwin had found out that they made a film that became successful. The reviews were great and audiences would line to go see the movie after hearing so much about it from their friends. Some people didn’t think the film was all that great, but others would really get into it and be concerned for the characters that were walking into a death trap by Michael Myers. People would leave the theater and go home thinking Michael Myers was watching them because that’s how much the ending frightened them. John couldn’t believe it when “Halloween” had grossed $50 million at the box office. Jamie Lee Curtis became a super star after so many people saw her in “Halloween”. It was her first movie and it gave her a career in acting. John said that Jamie got to do so much in “Halloween” like scream, be very good with the kids she would babysit and fight the psychopath. John Carpenter and Debra Hill also achieved successful careers because of “Halloween”. The studios that had rejected “Halloween” felt stupid that they didn’t accept or give it a chance. “Halloween” also became an inspiration for the slasher genre. It made studios want to make slasher films because that’s one of the things fans were screaming for next to the science fiction genre. Several slasher films were made and released through the 80s and “Halloween” is what started it all.
My rating on “Halloween” is five out of five stars.
