A classic slasher: review of “Halloween” (1978)

To celebrate the Halloween season, the Auburn Plainsman Lifestyle section reviews and recommends related movies for people to watch. Ranging from scary and nightmarish thrillers to wholesome and family films, reviews will cover a variety of genres. Read a synopsis and our thoughts, then take a look at the “scary” metric, a rating out of five that details whether we think this movie is worth watching during the Halloween period. If you would like to write a Halloween movie review and have it published, email srb0106@auburn.edu.

On October 25, 1978, director John Carpenter’s breakthrough film “Halloween” was released. This film follows the iconic masked character, Michael Myers (Nick Castle), who had been admitted to a mental institution for the murder of his teenage sister when he was just six years old. After 15 years, Myers managed to escape from this institution and return to his hometown of Haddonfield, Illinois to begin his search for new victims. “Halloween” became a staple of slasher films as we know them and paved the way for the “Final Girl” trope, in which a female character outlives everyone and beats the killer in a horror film, with its main character Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis).

Despite only having a budget of $325,000, “Halloween” grossed approximately $70 million worldwide, making it one of the most successful independent films of all time. The cultural phenomenon remains one of the most popular in its slasher genre to this day, with 11 sequels spanning nearly five decades.

In my opinion, the strongest aspect of this film is Michael Myers himself. Between the eerie appearance of his mask and his complete silence throughout the film, Myers has an inhuman presence that makes him truly terrifying. It’s not until he attempts to murder Laurie in the last ten minutes of the film that this is depicted differently. Myers growls as he struggles to fight off the girl and she even manages to remove his mask – showing that Michael Myers is, in fact, just a man. I find these decisions by Carpenter brilliant, and it annoys me that the sequels decided to undo this scene by making Myers immortal.

I also think that the special effects in the film are still up to our modern standards. The blood and gore feels real, which only adds to the impact of Myers’ violent actions. I’ve seen other recently released movies and TV shows where the effects are so poor that they take you out of the story, so I find it satisfying that “Halloween” was able to make the murders seem real, even with the low budget.

I’m also a big fan of the music in this film. Carpenter also composed the score, which he wrote in just three days. The piano theme is unique and extremely recognizable, and I think the anxious feeling of this song fits the overall mood of the film.

Unfortunately, I think the weakest part of this movie has to be the acting. I find that some of the dialogue in this film is strangely delivered, particularly by the actors who play Laurie’s friends. I found many of the actors’ reactions, mainly the facial expressions or screams when being attacked by Myers, to be ridiculously unrealistic. Even from the first minutes, it felt like Michael Myers’ sister wasn’t there. even being attacked, because her acting did not properly portray the character’s supposed fear.

However, I found some of the performances to be quite excellent. “Halloween” was the directorial debut of the famous Jamie Lee Curtis, and I found her speeches and expressions realistic to how a teenage girl would act in this scenario and she was dramatic, but not overly dramatic, with her performance. Also a surprising character is Dr. Loomis (Donald Pleasance), a mental institution employee who searches for Myers after his escape. I find his account of his interactions with Myers quite compelling. On the other hand, the other actors weren’t great.

Some of the characterizations were also poor. In my opinion, Laurie’s friends, especially Annie Brackett (Nancy Kyes), were all horrible, hateful people. The audience is supposed to be saddened by the murders of Annie, Lynda (PJ Soles), and Bob (John Michael Graham), but how can we feel bad for them when we’ve spent the movie watching these people treat Laurie so horribly? Annie treats Laurie like a nuisance and completely ignores her feelings, and then Lynda and Bob are just weird all the time, with Bob making an absurd joke about the kid Annie is babysitting and Lynda laughing being the most prevalent incident in my mind. I don’t think they were supposed to be good characters, but the murders would have made me more upset if Myers had killed decent humans.

SPOOKY RECOMMENDATION COUNTER: 3/5

I think “Halloween” is a product of its times, and the impact it had on American culture as a whole cannot be denied. For one of the very first slasher films, it’s pretty good, which makes the popularity understandable. But from a modern perspective, there are so many fantasy films these days that, if it came out in 2025, “Halloween” wouldn’t have the same appeal or impact as it once did.