The new Halloween made a major mark at the box office this past weekend, setting a franchise record and becoming one of the best October openings ever. With that film now in theaters, it seems an appropriate time to revisit John Carpenter's 1978 Halloween, and what better way to do so (short of watching the actual film) than with the latest Honest Trailer. Check out the Honest Trailer for the 1978 Halloween below to see all the slasher clichés packed into the horror classic.
Watching this, you really get reminded of just how many of what we now consider to be slasher clichés this film had in it. The hook-ups, the masked killer with a hatred for suburban teenagers who makes creepy phone calls and the virginal survivor were all in the original Halloween. And the cliché of a killer or any sort of mysterious figure disappearing right before you try and draw attention to him goes beyond the slasher genre and exists across film.
Of course, as the Screen Junkies' Honest Trailer notes, Halloween was the film that invented some of these clichés, while it cemented others. Given how influential Halloween was and still is, it acted as a blueprint for the slasher films that followed. Watching it for the first time now though, you could be forgiven for finding it derivative with all of the well-worn clichés it employs.
That's part of what makes the new film so fun though, as it is aware of the clichés that its predecessor created and attempts to subvert some of these.
One of the funniest parts about this Honest Trailer is how it highlights the confusing nature of the franchise's continuity and titling. The new film is the sequel to the original Halloween, making it the third Halloween II, but it's still called Halloween, not Halloween II.
This film also erases the continuity other than the first film, so for the layman it could all get rather confusing, such is the nature of the reboot-quel. I guess after 40 years and multiple reboots, it's best to not question things and just go with it. That's made a lot easier once you realize that forgetting many of the Halloween sequels is something audiences wanted to do the minute after they saw them.
In its ribbing fun, this Honest Trailer also acknowledges that the 1978 Halloween is still one of the best horror films ever made, thanks in part to John Carpenter's direction and his iconic score, as well as Jamie Lee Curtis' performance and the enduring nature of Michael Myers.
If you haven't seen it in a while, give the original Halloween a rewatch to see how well it holds up, and check out the new Halloween from director David Gordon Green, in theaters now. For all the biggest movies still to come in 2018, check out our release schedule.
