Halloween

It is clearly displayed to the audience how throughout the film, Halloween, directed by John Carpenter, that the film contains all the aspects of a slasher film. Some of the aspects being, a killer, a victim, a terrible place, and of course, a weapon. In Carol Clover’s article, “Her Body, Himself”, she talks about how all these concepts create the perfect scenario for a slasher film. “Its elements are familiar; the killer is a psychotic product of a sick family but still recognizably human; the victim is a beautiful, sexually active woman; the location is not-home, at a terrible place; the weapon is something other than a gun; the attack is registered from the victims point of view and comes with shocking suddenness.” The movie, Halloween, displays all the aspects of a slasher film.

In the beginning of the film, Micheal (the killer) is seen stabbing his sister to death after he witnesses her having sex with her boyfriend. Clover says, “Michael, at the age of six, is so enraged at his sister (evidently for her sexual relations with her boyfriend) that he stabs her to death with a kitchen knife.” When Michael saw his sister engaging in these acts it triggered something in his brain. It caused him to start acting out violently towards sexual situations and young women who reminded him of sister. In someway, Michael was unable to process the fact that his sister was having sexual relations and this led to him being stuck in the same psychological mind set he was in when he stabbed his sister to death. This connects to a part of Clover’s article when she says, “… although Michael’s body has attained maturity, his mind remains frozen in infantile fury.” This is what causes him to go on his killing spree fifteen years later.

Another aspect of slasher films that Clover talks about are the victims. She talks about how one beautiful victim has turned into a series of beautiful victims. Clover quotes Schoell saying, ” Other filmmakers figured that the only thing better than one beautiful woman being gruesomely murdered was a whole series of beautiful women being gruesomely murdered.” Even the victim’s age has changed, originally the victims were adults, now they are typically in their late teens. Slasher films also brought a new set of victims into play, the male victim. These changes can been seen throughout the film, instead of Michael going after just Laurie, he also goes after three of her teenage friends, one of them being a male victim. These changes were made to horror films to make a whole new type of horror genre, aimed towards young heterosexual males, this new horror genre became known as slasher films.

Halloween contains all the classic components of a horror film. These components were just changed a little bit to cater to the new audience that filmmakers were looking for. The new audience they were aiming for were young, heterosexual males and they used slasher films to gain their attention.