John Carpenter’s Halloween is one of the most influential horror movies ever, but when it was released back in 1978, it wasn’t well-received. John Carpenter’s career as a filmmaker began in 1969 with the short-film Captain Voyeur, and his first major film arrived in 1974 in the shape of the sci-fi comedy Dark Star. Two years later, he wrote and directed Assault on Precinct 13, a low-budget thriller in which he worked with Debra Hill, who went on to play a key role in the making of some of Carpenter’s biggest and most important works.
However, the movie that made him a widely-known name was Halloween, which introduced the audience to serial killer Michael Myers and final girl Halloween III: Season of the Witch), but that almost didn’t happen as the movie wasn’t well-received by critics when it was released.
Although Halloween contains very little blood and graphic violence, especially when compared to other slasher movies), and some others felt that the only notable element from the movie was Jamie Lee Curtis’ performance. With that type of criticism, the future wasn’t bright for Carpenter and Halloween, but as years have ed, the critics’ opinions have changed a lot.
As it happens to many other movies not only in the horror genre but in general, Halloween has been revisited over the years, which has made critics see the movie in a different light. While the movie was initially criticized for its Hitchcock influence, this was praised years later and is now credited as one of the movies that helped popularize and develop the slasher genre in the 1980s, something many critics blamed it for back in that decade. Surprisingly, when Halloween was released, many criticized it for being “violent and gory”, when in fact it’s one of the most retrained horror movies, which earned it the praise of critics and viewers, as Carpenter built a scary story without having to show gallons of blood. Halloween is now considered one of the best horror movies ever made, and the early criticism it got has been left in the past.
Halloween has served as inspiration for many filmmakers and other characters from the slasher genre, and Michael Myers has now become part of pop culture thanks to his many, many killing sprees since 1978. The Halloween franchise has gone through retcons, remakes, and reboots, but the impact and importance of the original film remain untouchable.
