Analysis of Halloween by John Carpenter and Evil Dead by Sam Raimi
The horror genre is characterized by the attempt to make the viewer
experience dread, fear and terror. Some of the most common elements
include vampires, zombies and werewolves.
One of the films which I am going to analyze is “Halloween” by John
Carpenter which starred Jamie Lee Curtis and Donald Pleasence. This
film was made in 1978; this was considered the film which started the
“slasher film” genre. This genre was continued in dozens of violent
movies throughout the 1980s.
Halloween grossed over $60 million, and was a surprise hit; it was one
of the most successful independent films ever made.
The meaning in this film, I believe, is the idea that everyone who
dies in the film is sexually promiscuous, while the “innocent” virgin
heroine survives. With the main character “Laurie” a virgin, she is
able to escape mostly unharmed as does Tommy Doyle, but others who are
more promiscuous and sexually active are less fortunate and suffer
deadly consequences as victims. In this film, murders often occur
after sexual encounters when victims are distracted and off-guard. It
is almost seen as some kind of “punishment” for those who are sexually
active and use drugs. Although Carpenter has said that this was not
intentional.
Halloween made the audience experience fear and terror throughout as
the suspenseful stalkings and killings are seen from the point of the
killer’s eyes, a few times looking through the mask, this makes us as
an audience feel more involved in the film and therefore feel more
fear towards the people getting chased/killed. Other scenes are viewed
through the eyes of the characters in danger or by heavy breathing of
Michael Myers, this builds suspense for us a viewer and we wonder what
will happen next when we most expect it. Almost every scene is filmed
with the camera consistently moving around to make the audience feel
disordered, totally insecure, unsettled and paranoid, believing that
every looming corner, shadow, noise, or shape is potentially life
To begin with, some people would say they enjoy a horror movie that gets them scared out of their wits. They go see these movies once a month on average, for fun, each time choosing a newer sequel like “Final Destination” or “The evil Dead”. King says “When we pay our four or five bucks and seat ourselves at tenth-row center in a theater showing a horror movie we are daring the nightmare” (405). As a writer of best-sel...
Finally, horror became ‘Slasher.’ The 1970’s became obsessed with realistic news stories and characters and films became more stylize and followed similar storyline conventions. Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974), Halloween (1978) and Night Mare On Elm Street (1984) where full of psycho villains, teens in danger and the sole survivor leading to plenty of sequels. The only other horror genre or thriller genre focused on suspense, movie...
The film was about a group of people trying to survive the night against an undead horde. It first showed us a brother and a sister, Barbra and Johnny. They are visiting their father’s grave. Johnny rants about how this is a waste of time and acts very poorly in the cemetery. They are attacked by a zombie and Barbra leaves Johnny behind. She finds a farmhouse and runs inside, hiding from the zombie. Soon after, she goes outside and a new character named Ben is introduced. He helps board up the entire house to hold out for the night. He routinely lit things on fire and threw them in front of the porch, keeping the zombies at bay. Ben tried asking Barbra questions but she was no help. She wouldn’t talk about anything or explain her story to Ben. After barring up the windows and doors they are safe for some time. Now the rest of the characters are introduced,
Halloween is rife with psychological scares that affect its audience greatly. “Symbolism, dreamlike imagery, emotional rather than rational logic” are present in Psychoanalytic criticism. Siskel and Ebert talked about how the movie makes you feel as if you are the protagonist, scared for your life and feeling every bit of suspense (Siskel and Ebert). The movie is purely fueled by emotional responses to what is happening to the characters and focuses itself purely on how the audience will respond. In the clip shown, the main protagonist talks about how she killed the killer but he is shown alive. The movie is not concerned with the logic; otherwise, the killer would have at least been slowed down by the injuries he sustained. Siskel and Ebert laud the movie on its set up of scenes, score, character development, and use of lighting to make the audience feel the terror the characters undergo.
In a society where watching horror movies is considered a social norm, it is less than surprising that the horror industry makes approximately 500 million dollars with the haunted attractions and 400 million dollars at the box office each year, according to Sonya Chudgar’s article “Blood Money: How the Horror Industry Makes a Killing.” Stephen King, a best-selling writer, screenwriter, columnist, producer and director, who is also well-known as a writer of horror fiction, describes the role that horror movies play in the world. He refers to this role as a “dirty job” (King), and suggests that the job is favorable in that horror movies expose us to malevolence and immorality or tense situations in order to suppress our primal instincts of demanding
The genre of horror films is one that is vast and continually growing. So many different elements have been known to appear in horror films that it is often times difficult to define what is explicitly a horror film and what is not. Due to this ambiguous definition of horror the genre is often times divided into subgenres. Each subgenre of horror has a more readily identifiable list of classifications that make it easier to cast a film to a subgenre, rather than the entire horror genre. One such subgenre that is particularly interesting is that of the stalker film. The stalker film can be categorized as a member of the horror genre in two ways. First, the stalker film can be identified within the horror genre due to its connection with the easily recognizable subgenre of horror, the slasher film. Though many elements of the stalker film differ from those of the slasher film, the use of non-mechanical weapons and obvious sexual plot points can be used to categorize the stalker film as a subgenre of the slasher film. Secondly, the stalker film can be considered a member of the horror genre using Robin Wood’s discussion regarding horror as that which society represses. The films Fatal Attraction, The Fan, and The Crush will be discussed in support of this argument. (Need some connector sentence here to finish out the intro)
sample, but it also appeals to population and emotion. To further explain why we crave
Obviously casting Jamie Lee Curtis, a scream queen whose mother (Janet Leigh from Psycho) is the original scream queen, is a nod toward the audience. Additionally with a character named Loomis, after a character in the classic Psycho(1960) and showing clips of horror movies like Howard Hawks' The Thing (1951), Carpenter has created a world that exists primarily in the realm of reality. This world is realistic enough so that the audience can relate and associate with the characters, but also has enough of the self-referentialism to always keep the audience aware that they are watching a movie, not an accurate of representation of
Mysterious, dark, creepy- these traits may seem like an average halloween story; however, they really are elements from Tim Burton’s unique film styles. Tim Burton, a film director, was born in Burbank, California. He spent most of his childhood drawing and watching horror films. As Burton puts it, “I did grow up watching monster movies and I did enjoy playing in the cemetery, but I thought most kids did. It didn’t seem strange to me.” In Charlie and The Chocolate Factory, Edward Scissorhands, and Corpse Bride, Burton employs camera movements and editing techniques to display that anti-heros are relatable and no different from society.
Whilst this is happening the Halloween theme music is playing in the background, this music is very high pitched and uses string instruments to create horror and suspense for the viewers. Once the credits have been shown there is a 'vls' (very long shot) of the house this is used to set the scene, this is a subjective point of view from the killer .This can be related to the German expressionism where they would use bumpy camera movement to seize the audiences concentration .They use a handheld camera to do this scene as it emphasises the killers movements to the audience. As the Killer begins to make his way around the house be looks up to see the light go off. When this happens there is a sharp shrill sound which enforces the killer's actions.
A girl runs frantically through the woods trying to escape an axe wielding villain. The defenseless victim suddenly trips and collapses to the ground. The villain laughs wickedly as he lifts the axe above his head. The girl releases a final scream as the weapon quickly ends her life, causing the audience to go silent as they watch the villain drag away the lifeless body. Death, blood, guts, suspense, screaming, and terror are all just a few things to expect when watching a modern day horror film. What is horror? Horror can be defined as an intense feeling of fear, shock, or disgust. (Wilson) The description of horror is not very pleasant, but for some reason horror films are extremely popular. Why is this so? People are addicted to the synthetic feeling of being terrified.
Each of the teenagers in the group plays an archetypal role that can found in many of the horror films of the last thirty years. Jules plays the role of ‘The Whore’, Curt ‘The Athlete’, Holden ‘The Scholar’, Marty ‘The Fool’, and Dana ‘The Virgin’. The remaining two in the third act of the film, Marty and Dana, discover that the order in which they group dies can be flexible, as long as ‘The Whore’ dies first and ‘The Virgin’ lives or is the last to perish. This revelation for the characters partly acts as a critique of the moralistic view of sex as resulting in death in the traditional slasher movie. For example in films that established the slasher in the horror genre like John Carpenter’s ‘Halloween’ (1978), all of the characters that engage
Too many horror films provide scares and screams throughout their respective cinemas. Not many viewers follow what kind of model the films follow to appease their viewers. However, after reading film theorist Carol Clover’s novel, watching one of the films she associates in the novel “Halloween”, and also watching the movie “Nightmare on Elm Street” I say almost every “slasher” or horror film follows a model similar to Clover’s. The model is a female is featured as a primary character and that females tend to always overcome a situation at some point throughout the film.
Horror films are designed to frighten the audience and engage them in their worst fears, while captivating and entertaining at the same time. Horror films often center on the darker side of life, on what is forbidden and strange. These films play with society’s fears, its nightmare’s and vulnerability, the terror of the unknown, the fear of death, the loss of identity, and the fear of sexuality. Horror films are generally set in spooky old mansions, fog-ridden areas, or dark locales with unknown human, supernatural or grotesque creatures lurking about. These creatures can range from vampires, madmen, devils, unfriendly ghosts, monsters, mad scientists, demons, zombies, evil spirits, satanic villains, the possessed, werewolves and freaks to the unseen and even the mere presence of evil.
Would you rather be horrified beyond repair or thrilled to the point of no return? In horror, the main purpose is to invoke fear and dread into the audience in the most unrealistic way. Horror movies involve supernatural entities such as ghosts, vampires, teleportation, and being completely immortal. As thriller films are grounded in realism and involve more suspense, mystery, and a sense of panic. Though both genres will frighten the audience, it will happen in two different ways. Whether the horror thrills or the thriller horrifies, a scare is always incorporated.