I guess the horror collector/nostalgia Halloween Industrial Complex has become so big that we are now celebrating "Halfway to Halloween”. Being a human that loves horror movies, I am totally susceptible to this kind of stuff. A handful of the Halloween movies became available on Shudder so I watched Halloween 1978 and followed it up with Taking Shape, a book about the script development of the entire Halloween franchise.
Freddy, Michael, Jason - Every horror fan has a favorite. Sure, you can enjoy all three but everyone has a favorite. When I think about the three pillars of 80s horror, Halloween, Friday the 13th, and Nightmare on Elm St, the decision is easy. Nightmare on Elm Street has the charismatic Freddy, Friday the 13th has it’s satisfying formula, but Halloween? …Halloween is pure evil.
Appropriately, there is something almost intangible about the appeal of the Halloween movies. The Halloween movies(when done well) are a vibe. Freddy is a roasted trickster demon back from hell, Jason’s Northeastern roots gave him his iconic Hockey mask, but there’s something more abstract about Michael Myers. The strange blank mask was famously made using the same mold as the William Shatner mask from Star Trek. Shatner’s cherubic face makes the mask sort of bubbly-looking, but when hung on the slender face of actor Nick Castle the features of the mask deflate and sag. Michael Myers is so abstract that his character is simply credited as The Shape.
A year ago I was teaching an after-school art class for High School students and we did a movie poster project. I wanted to show them how to use photoshop so I created a poster using photos. I don’t do a lot of photo collage but I actually had a great time working on this. The file has just been sitting on my hard drive, but reading Taking Shape motivated me to finish the design.
Should I make stickers?