First Annual Halloween Extravaganza

Good day to you, foolish mortals. It’s that time of the year again—autumn, cool crisp autumn. But most of all—it’s time for Halloween.

            Halloween has always been my favorite holiday. In addition to my love of getting free candy every 31^st of October, I love Halloween because it unleashes a creative side in me. The world becomes alive with images of witches, vampires and ghosts and other stuff that is completely fantastic and out of a fairy tale. This time every year, I take no greater pleasure than crafting ghoulish tales and writing them down on paper, thinking, “This would make an interesting legend.” But that’s not all. On Halloween night, I try on new faces and assume a different identity which I would normally be averse to—such as a monster or a gangster. I usually spend months in advance planning my Halloween costume, (I was contemplating the subject while mowing my lawn in July). That’s part of the fun. To me, that is the point of Halloween—to try new things. To try new faces, just like an actor or an actress.

            When September rolls around, and the leaves begin turning red and falling off, I always get myself into a Halloween spirit by reading creepy books and watching scary movies. This Halloween, from today to Halloween night, I will be reviewing twenty-four films that relate in some way to the spirit of Halloween. I hope to do this every year from now on, and for the first time I have carefully selected some very special movies to discuss. My first one is Young Frankenstein, a classic parody of the Universal Horror pictures of the 1930s. This is a spin off of spooky movies, and is purely a comedy. I fear though that the tone will darken.

            October 11 will bring Swedish film industry giant Ingmar Bergman’s 1957 allegorical masterpiece The Seventh Seal, a movie about life and death—a subject crucial to the Halloween theme. From October 12^th to October 15^th will be a spotlight on four films from writer-director M. Night Shyamalan: The Sixth Sense (1999), Signs (2002), The Village (2004) and Lady in the Water (2006).

            October 15^th to October 24^th will return to the 1930s and advance onward. These movies will be Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde (1932), The Wizard of Oz (1939), The Devil & Daniel Webster (1941), The Picture of Dorian Gray (1945), Harvey (1950), Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (1971), The Exorcist (1973), The Shining (1980) and The Witches (1990).  

            October 25^th to Halloween night is the finale of this eerie extravaganza and something I have personally been looking forward to—a spotlight on the great Horror films of the 1920s and ‘30s, including several made by Universal. In order, these films are Nosferatu: eine Symphonie des Grauens (1922), The Phantom of the Opera (1925), Dracula (1931), Frankenstein (1931), The Invisible Man (1933), The Bride of Frankenstein (1935), The Son of Frankenstein (1939), The Wolfman (1941). As I’ve mentioned above, I love to get myself into the Halloween spirit by watching eerie movies. My final review will be of my favorite Halloween film of all. It’s a 1949 Disney cartoon version of the classic horror tale, The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, narrated by Bing Crosby.

            Some of these movies I’m reviewing are not as obviously related to Halloween as others (i.e. Harvey might not be considered a Halloween film while Dracula definitely is). For the films that are not obvious like this, think about them and try to understand why I chose them for this Halloween cycle. So over the next three weeks be sure to lend an eye—take a closer look at the haunted side of Hollywood.