The sadly late producer Debra Hill really wanted the Halloween franchise to be an anthology, of all aspects of horror & not just a continuing story of Michael Myers, so instead of continuing with the slasher story, they decided to do a creepy, sci-fi/horror, with elements of witchcraft set the week before & including Halloween. & here in lies the problem people have with this movie. It bombed at the box office since it departed from the slasher Myers story & veered off an a less slasher more creepy tangent. The result (for me at least) was a superbly, sinister supernatural creep-fest, which became one of my favorite films of all time!
The plot starts with a man being chased while carrying a rubber latex Halloween mask. He is persued by non descript men in suits. Eventually he is driven to hospital where he is under the care of an alcoholic Dr, but the suits men find him & murders him, yet a few days later the mans daughter finds the Dr (Tom Atkins) is a bar & she want an explanation. The two then investigate the company that makes the Halloween masks. The masks are manufactured by Silver Shamrock Novelties & its owner Conal Cochran who is no kindly Willy Wonka character, but he has a deadly obsession with paganism & clockwork toys, that are anything but!
I really liked Tom Atkins in the Fog, but he is terrific in this, however the star of TSoTW is Irish actor Dan O'Herlihy who is wonderful as the sinister Cochran. The script is well done & the pacing is good. Viewing this today though the soundtrack comes across as very dated, but this is distracted by the excellent screenplay, some shocks & even a bit of gore. Saying all this though I would not recommend this movie to anyone who suffers from epilepsy as there are flashing lights scenes. But there is no sex or nudity & bad language is minimal. I would also like to add a warning about creepy crawlies. If you are really concerned with creepy crawlie critters, snakes & bugs, this movie will surely give you nightmares! You have been warned!
Simply put this is a terrific vintage sci-fi/horror which can still chill the bones, just don't view this as part of the Halloween franchise & appreicate it as a stand alone horror flick. & if I am honset I think this movie out ranks ANY of the other Halloween films, by a country mile, but perhaps this is just me as, although I love horror, I am not really a slasher fan. So if you are going to watch this & are not sqeemish about creepy crawly things, you are in for a excellent retro horror, trick or treat!
The plot starts with a man being chased while carrying a rubber latex Halloween mask. He is persued by non descript men in suits. Eventually he is driven to hospital where he is under the care of an alcoholic Dr, but the suits men find him & murders him, yet a few days later the mans daughter finds the Dr (Tom Atkins) is a bar & she want an explanation. The two then investigate the company that makes the Halloween masks. The masks are manufactured by Silver Shamrock Novelties & its owner Conal Cochran who is no kindly Willy Wonka character, but he has a deadly obsession with paganism & clockwork toys, that are anything but!
I really liked Tom Atkins in the Fog, but he is terrific in this, however the star of TSoTW is Irish actor Dan O'Herlihy who is wonderful as the sinister Cochran. The script is well done & the pacing is good. Viewing this today though the soundtrack comes across as very dated, but this is distracted by the excellent screenplay, some shocks & even a bit of gore. Saying all this though I would not recommend this movie to anyone who suffers from epilepsy as there are flashing lights scenes. But there is no sex or nudity & bad language is minimal. I would also like to add a warning about creepy crawlies. If you are really concerned with creepy crawlie critters, snakes & bugs, this movie will surely give you nightmares! You have been warned!
Simply put this is a terrific vintage sci-fi/horror which can still chill the bones, just don't view this as part of the Halloween franchise & appreicate it as a stand alone horror flick. & if I am honset I think this movie out ranks ANY of the other Halloween films, by a country mile, but perhaps this is just me as, although I love horror, I am not really a slasher fan. So if you are going to watch this & are not sqeemish about creepy crawly things, you are in for a excellent retro horror, trick or treat!