Let me explain with a little example from my past. One Halloween quite a few years back, a couple of friends and I rented three classic scary films: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, The Exorcist, and Halloween. We had all seen Halloween, which is essentially an All Hallow's Eve staple, but none of us had ever seen the other two movies. We were just charged up for some scares and some fun.
TCM was the first film we watched, and it lived up to our expectations, and then some. For those who haven't seen it, it's one of the most insane movie experiences ever. It's absolutely the perfect movie to watch at a Halloween party. It's got scares, it's funny, it's totally over the top, and we just ate it up. We were yelling and throwing food at the TV...just laughin' it up, having a great time. I remember my friend's mom walking in on us as we were just howling at the notorious "Grandpa" scene, one of the film's more bizarre moments (which is really saying something); she must have thought we were completely insane. To this day, it's one of my fondest memories.
The next movie we put in was The Exorcist, and we pretty much expected the same kind of thing. Boy, were we ever wrong. It was a complete contrast to the all-out wild horror of TCM. Whereas in that film every single moment was rife for rowdiness (a maniac runs around chasing people with a chainsaw and squealing like a pig...c'mon now!), during our viewing of The Exorcist you could hear a pin drop in that room. It was as if all the fun had just been completely sucked out of Halloween. Thanks a lot, William Friedkin.
Don't get me wrong, The Exorcist is a great film. It's just that it really isn't a good Halloween movie, because when you watch a movie on Halloween, you should really be enjoying yourself while being scared. The Exorcist is scary, for sure, but watching a film with deep themes about regaining one's lost faith and battling your own inner demons as well as a real one isn't really, er, fun. It's a classic movie, but it's also hard to watch (I'm certainly not in any hurry to watch it again) , and we're supposed to be having a good time here.
Ah, Leatherface...you brought us the perfect Halloween movie.
So tomorrow don't just go out and get any scary movie; get one that's scary and fun. Don't get caught up pondering Father Karras's inner torment like we did that night. Texas Chainsaw Massacre is, I'd say, the granddaddy of great Halloween films, but I'd also recommend any in the Evil Dead series, the original Nightmare on Elm Street, Shaun of the Dead, Scream, or Fright Night, as I talked about yesterday. These are all films that can scare you but retain some semblance of camp value that makes them really fun to watch.
Stay away from stuff like Rosemary's Baby, Blair Witch Project, or, as sacreligious as it may seem, the original Halloween. They're fine movies (Halloween is a borderline masterpiece...I'm not knocking it), but, like The Exorcist, they're all slow paced and rely on a slow buildup to get the scares. They'll scare the shit out of you, but they aren't great for watching with a bunch of revved up partygoers.
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