John Carpenter had the talents of a singular artist, but favored popular genre films, and he would proudly steer into his influences. He has one of the cleanest upward trajectories from his semi-student film Dark Star (1974) to Halloween (1978), with this title right in the middle. An action exploitation film made on a budget of $100,000 that combines Night of the Living Dead with Howard Hawks’ Rio Bravo. The script was written in eight days, the movie filmed in twenty, the memorable score took him three. Carpenter also edited the film, so on set he knew exactly what he needed, and could create a mood with some long takes that would get the film to 90-minutes. Like with The Thing, Carpenter’s film failed at the box office, but because he made such a memorable film, it quickly gained a large cult following and is now regarded as a classic of its type.
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