I went out for a ten-mile run this morning in preparation for York next week. It went really well – probably better than any ten-mile run I’ve ever done – with no tiredness and hardly any aches and pains. Of course, when I do the same distance in York I’m fully expecting all my usual problems to show up, because that’s been the pattern for races this year!
When I got home, though, I did crash a bit and was sorely tempted to go back to bed. Instead, I just made the sofa feel like bed by getting out my mohair blanket for the first time this autumn, and have been semi-getting on with things while trying not to fall asleep.
Geth is about to put YouTube back on for the evening, so I’ll be hearing lots of fan theories about Star Wars and Final Fantasy!
OOTD: comfy post-run outfit. T-shirt Lauren Ralph Lauren (modern but bought from Headlock Vintage 2018), skirt Calvin Klein Jeans (2004), tights Primark (2017), shoes La Redoute (2018).
Today’s earworm playlist:
Sigala and Ella Eyre – Came Here For Love
Freya Ridings – Lost Without You
Duran Duran – Come Undone
Jennifer Lopez – Louboutins
Tracey Ullman – They Don’t Know
Brother Beyond – The Harder I Try
I was a bit surprised I hadn’t already had this one this year, but when we arrived in South Shields after the GNR I needed bottled cider (the draught was crap) and it was pear cider a-go-go at the local pubs.
Bulmers Pear.
Bulmers Pear actually has near-perfect sweetness – it’s very slightly dry, which you wouldn’t expect from a commercial pear cider. I should remember to look for it more often!
When I was a young teenager, out of the ‘Big Three’ of slasher horror (Halloween and Friday the 13th being the other two), it was A Nightmare On Elm Street that I found really scary. It’s clever, because if you think too much about the film, you end up having nightmares about Freddy Krueger yourself. This happened to me for years, so I was careful not to watch it too often!
This boxset contains all the films up to New Nightmare (1994), but I’ve only ever watched the first one!
Being less easily spooked nowadays, I really appreciate the innovation of this one. It’s not always clear whether something is a dream or not, just like in real life, and the whole feel is really unsettling.
The boiler room opening sets up the atmosphere really well. The creepy skipping rhyme (‘one, two, Freddy’s coming for you‘) is also inspired and is one of the most memorable aspects of the film.
There’s a bit of a theme of bad mothers in this one – Tina’s mother seems only to care about her boyfriend, and Nancy’s mother is an alcoholic. I think the latter can be explained, however (unless I’m giving the script more credit than it deserves), by her trying to cope with having been part of the angry mob that killed Krueger with fire.
Johnny Depp makes his first ever film appearance, looking crazily young from today’s perspective!
I find it a bit odd that the local high school just goes on with classes as normal when one of their students has been brutally killed!
I’ve not seen most of the sequels (I plan to rectify that partly this month) but a common complaint is that Krueger’s not scary in the subsequent films due to being overexposed and having too many wisecracking lines. That is not a problem in this film – the character is brilliantly creepy and gruesome.
‘Oh, God…I look twenty years old,’ says Nancy as she looks in the mirror after a week of avoiding sleep. I can never work out whether this is meant to be a sly joke about the fact that the actors playing the fifteen-year-old characters ARE twenty years old, but it kind of takes you out of the story.
I like the bit with the doctors studying Nancy at the sleep disorders clinic, but Geth will probably know better than me whether it’s realistic or not.
When Freddy is on fire in the ending sequence, it’s really obviously a stuntman, ’cause he looks about five stone heavier than when he’s played by Robert Englund!
The ending scene is a bit confusing. Is it a dream sequence? Is Nancy dead now? What’s going on? Apparently the reason it makes no sense is because Wes Craven and the producer wanted different endings, so they came up with a nonsensical compromise.
And finally, here we have the very ’80s thing of having a rock song (Nightmare by 213 in this case – not to be confused with ’90s rap supergroup 213 – this was the band’s only credit as far as I’m aware) over the end credits. Gotta provide some work for small unknown local bands from the Los Angeles area!
More admin, more TV-watching, more getting stuff done.
Geth is watching YouTube videos tonight, which is quite a relaxing form of background noise!
OOTD: heels around the house, because I can. Blouse Logo (2007), skirt UK2LA (thrifted from Steff 2016), tights Primark (2017), shoes Vivienne Westwood Anglomania for Melissa (2009).
Today’s earworm playlist:
Yanomamo! – Tree Of Life
Hardy Caprio and One Acen – Best Life
China Crisis – Christian
Jennifer Lopez – Louboutins
J Geils Band – Centrefold
Abba – Happy New Year
Duran Duran – Ordinary World
Whitesnake – Is This Love?
Macklemore and Skylar Grey – Glorious
INXS – Need You Tonight
Joe South – Games People Play
The Chordettes – Mr Sandman
It Bites – Calling All The Heroes
Duran Duran – Come Undone
This one is insane – you can really taste the bourbon! Way whiskier (it’s a word, honest) than Thistly Cross Whisky Cask, but not as strong a cider. Very interesting, but not one for every day!
I’ve not watched Halloween II (1981) for a while. It’s set on the same night as the first film and is a continuation of the story, but there are a few things that give away the fact that it was now the ’80s when it was made. You can’t hide the ’80s!
Gotta love those early ’00s DVDs and the long boring anti-piracy ads you can’t skip.
The film opens with the Chordettes’ Mr Sandman playing over the top. I’m currently catching up with Doctor Who Magazine in preparation for the new series, and so I recently reread an interview with Mark Gatiss from last year in which he was discussing his episode Sleep No More, in which Mr Sandman was also used. Apparently it was Russell T Davies who pointed out to him how creepy the song was – but being a horror fan, Gatiss should have known that the Halloween series did it first!
The opening sequence is a reprise of the end of the first film, mostly with original footage that has been recut slightly, but with the final reveal on the balcony having been reshot, which is a bit jarring. The reshot sequence results in a continuity error – throughout Halloween II, Loomis is constantly insisting that he shot Michael Myers six times. In the original film, that was indeed the case, but in the reshot sequence, there are actually seven gunshots! The sequence is also overdubbed with new music – it is, of course, ’80s synth music, which is the first giveaway that this is indeed an ’80s movie.
We get the cool spooky pumpkin opening again, this time with an added bit where the pumpkin cracks open to reveal a skull. Showing off the shiny new ’80s special effects! I have to say I prefer the simplicity of the lantern flickering out in the first film.
The series continues with the nods to classic horror through the old films that are playing on TV. This time it’s Night of the Living Dead, with the infamously badly acted ‘They’re coming to get you, Barbara!’ scene.
Michael Myers’ MO seems to have shifted slightly as soon as he gets back to killing. He ignores a barking dog (in contrast to the first film, where he killed nearly as many dogs as he did humans) and the nice old couple in the nearby house – he just steals their carving knife instead. As soon as he spots a teenage girl in the house next door, though, he just nips in and offs her for no reason!
Laurie Strode has been taken to a local hospital, and there’s a couple of fairly pointless characters who get two scenes here – a mother with a child whose mouth is bleeding profusely. It’s not 100% clear, but it looks like he’s got a razorblade stuck in his lip, which would be a nice (if grisly) nod to the ubiquitous American Hallowe’en myth about razorblades being hidden in apples to hurt kids out trick-or-treating.
The doctor who treats Laurie is clearly a bit tipsy. I assumed this was just for comedic value, but there’s a brief line later about him having been at the same party as Laurie’s parents, whom the hospital can’t track down.
I quite like the gang of nurses and paramedics who comprise this film’s gang of young, disposable, doomed, horny idiots. Jimmy, the paramedic with the crush on Laurie, makes for a cute sideplot too.
There’s a great bit where some journalists are in front of the Wallace house desperately trying to get the whole story, and then Dr Loomis is just shouting the whole truth about Michael Myers right in front of them, but this is never followed up!
In comes the security guard cliche! This became a real trope of slasher horror, the poor incompetent overweight security guard who’s too distracted by reading a magazine or something to notice the killer wandering across the security monitors.
Speaking of tropes, we’ve got the good old ‘phone lines are cut’ going on here as well. In more recent films, in addition to the landlines being cut, they always have to throw in a line about there being no reception for mobiles (how convenient!). Oh, for simpler times.
Laurie has a creepy dream/flashback to when she was a young child circa 1970. In contrast to the non-attempt at 1963 from the first film, the costume/makeup department here actually does quite a good job of period 1970 hair and clothes.
The thing about Laurie being Michael Myers’ secret baby sister who was later adopted by the Strodes is introduced here. This continued to be the official story in the two different continuities of Halloween 4/5/6 and Halloween H20/Resurrection, as well as (I believe – I’ve not watched them yet) the Rob Zombieremakes, but apparently they’re not going with that in the new one, which should be interesting.
There’s an unintentionally hilarious bit when Jimmy discovers Mrs Alves’ body, realises he’s standing in a pool of blood, and decides it would be a good idea to start running. Obviously, he immediately slips in the pool of blood and knocks himself out like a prat. Who didn’t see that coming? Jimmy, apparently.
One nurse nearly escapes! She knows there’s danger and that she has to call the police, makes it out to the car park, realises the tyres on all the cars have been let down…then goes back into the hospital building. Why?
The ending sequence is really well done – there’s a bit with Laurie waiting for a lift to arrive that’s nearly as tense as the first film.
However, just like the nurse, Laurie doesn’t leave the scene when she makes it out to the car park, instead hiding inside a car. Why will no one leave the hospital grounds? Surely the best thing would be to run away from the building to try and find a phone box (or booth as I think they might be called across the pond) or flag down the nearest driver for help?
I love the bit with Laurie and Dr Loomis teaming up at the end, but I find it odd that Laurie’s such a good shot given that she’s clearly never held a gun! Also, it’s interesting, having not watched it in a while, that neither Loomis nor Jimmy are confirmed alive at the end. Indeed, Loomis is clearly meant to be dead, having done the whole heroic sacrificial blowing-up-the-room-while-still-inside. (Spoiler alert: he shows up in later films, which is why I never think of him as having died in this one.) I can’t remember why I had the impression that Jimmy survived, but maybe something in the next few films will remind me.
I kind of feel like I’m saying the same thing pretty much every day at the moment! Life admin is not exciting, but it needs to be done, and I’m taking advantage of a quiet work period to do a lot of it. Same again tomorrow!
Geth is out boardgaming this evening, and I’m catching up with TV, which has become quite a nice Monday evening pattern.
OOTD: that is my ‘is it actually going to focus this time?’ face. Blouse Heartsoul (2004), skirt Primark (2018), tights Primark (2017), shoes Zara (2018).
Today’s earworm playlist:
Cliff Richard and Sarah Brightman – All I Ask Of You
Jennifer Lopez – Louboutins
T’Pau – Heart And Soul
Tears For Fears – Everybody Wants To Rule The World
Shakin’ Stevens – This Ole House
Duran Duran – Come Undone
Yes, it’s another Sheppy’s, but I promise this is the last one.
Sheppy’s Dabinett Apple.
Sheppy’s Dabinett Apple is a bit like the Kingston Black variety I logged yesterday, except it has more of a medium taste. It also has a very spirit-y aftertaste, which was quite a nice surprise.
It’s October! One of my favourite months of the year.
I’m a goth, a Celt, a lover of autumn, and a horror film fan, so it will probably come as no surprise that I absolutely adore Hallowe’en. What I’ve found over the years, though, is that I never have time on the day/weekend itself to watch as many horror films as I’d like. As such, this year I’m starting early, and watching a horror film every day of the month!
I’m starting with Halloween (1978), which may seem a bit backwards, but rest assured I’ll be watching it again on the day itself. I must have seen this film over a hundred times – it’s my joint favourite film of all time (Velvet Goldmine is the other joint favourite, if you’re interested!). There’s a new Halloween film coming out this month, so I’ll be watching all the others in the series before I go to see the new one at the cinema.
Dr Loomis and Sheriff Brackett explore the Myers house.
I love the opening credits with the slow zoom on the lit pumpkin lantern. It’s especially fun around Hallowe’en itself when I have my own lanterns on and can compare them with the one on the screen! (I don’t have lanterns carved yet – I’m not quite that obsessed.)
The opening section, set fifteen years before the main story, I always found super scary as a young teenager and always fast forwarded through it. These days, though, I just marvel at how poor the period feel is – I’m sure every attempt was made at the time to make it look like 1963, but the hair and clothes of the teenage characters just scream ‘1978’, like the rest of the film! (This is a persistent problem with recent retro/vintage period costuming in film and TV and I’m going to do a whole post on it at some point.) It’s shot in real-time from the POV of the killer (although there is a notorious continuity error with the clock in the hall) and so it’s also fairly hilarious when you notice that the teenage tryst only takes about ninety seconds between the couple going upstairs and the dude pulling his shirt on as he heads out the front door. The reveal of the child killer is brilliant and still really creepy forty years after the film was made.
Fifteen years later, we’re introduced to Dr Loomis, who is an amazing character – his obsession with Michael Myers comes across right from the off during the drive to the sanatorium with the nurse. Donald Pleasence’s accent is all over the place though! He starts off attempting an American accent, but it rapidly disappears. I like to assume the character is a Brit who has lived in the US for many decades, and is reverting to his native accent due to the stress.
Blue Öyster Cult’s Don’t Fear The Reaper is used beautifully when Annie and Laurie are driving to their babysitting jobs, and it’s been a favourite track of mine since my teens as a result.
Speaking of ways Halloween influenced teenage me, the fashions in this, with the costuming done by Nancy Loomis (who also played Annie), are awesome – as a result of this film I have been wearing colourful knee-high socks since age seventeen. Usually under jeans nowadays, but they’re still there (and very cosy in the autumn!).
Unlike later slashers of the ’80s (which was when the slasher craze really took off), all the characters are well-rounded, rather than just being one-note carving knife fodder. No matter how many times I’ve seen the film, I always find myself wishing they didn’t die and imagining an alternative universe where Michael Myers didn’t exist and they all got to live happily ever after. I know that would kind of defeat the point of the film, but maybe I’ll write that AU fanfiction one day!
I generally find the kid character of Tommy a little annoying, but I do appreciate his comic book geekery!
The tension in the final sequence, where Laurie investigates the Wallace house only to find all her friends dead, and then has to escape Michael, is brilliantly done. Even knowing all the scenes and dialogue by heart, I still find it incredibly tense to watch. Jamie Lee Curtis’ first film performance is fantastic, and you can see already why she went on to be such a big star. I also like the fact that Pleasence and Curtis’ characters don’t actually meet until the last sequence.
Also, the very first shot and very last shot of the film are both of the Myers house, which is quite cool.
The ‘it’s not over’ ending is great too! I’ll discuss how it was resolved in future films over the next couple of weeks – starting tomorrow, when I’ll be watching Halloween II.
