Horror Hound Countdown Day #4

Halloween: 25 Years of Terror

(2006)

Halloween is probably the most played out movie of them all 'round this time of year, so I decided to take a little different route. Instead of watching the 1978 classic, I watched Halloween 25 Years of Terror; a documentary about the entire series of films called. I had been thinking about buying this for a while and found it the other day at the record store (yes, I know it's lame that I call it the "record store") in a double pack with Halloween for $19.99. I take it up to the counter and find out that there's a buy one get one free deal going on. So, I bought Slither too. And then on top of everything else, the whole mess of DVDs rang up as costing $14.99! I have to say, though, that this documentary would have been worth the $19.99 on its own.

Originally intended as a convention video, the documentary contains a lot of footage from the 25th anniversary "Return to Haddonfield" convention where thousands of Halloween fans from around the world converged on Pasadena, CA (the filming location of the fictional Haddonfield) to schmooze wi th other fans and franchise celebs. Sensing that they had much more on their hands than a simple souvineer for the attendees, the producers cobbled together what is the definitive overview of the series. With brand new interviews from the stars, directors and other sundry film people, no stone is left unturned from part one all the way through Ressurrection.

Probably the coolest feature of the disc (and, in fact, the reason I bought it) is Sean Clark's contribution, Horror's Hallowed Grounds; wherein he takes the viewer on a tour of the major shooting locations from the original film. Clark was at the last convention where he screened the Halloween episode of the show and it was so much fun that I really felt like it was something I needed to support. Shot with a good mix of humor and fanboy awe, it's a blast to watch and leaves you wanting to see it done with more movies (he's done scads of others in print, find the links at the myspace page below). It's a pretty cool concept and one that I hope he's able to parlay into an ongoing series.

Video Goodness!

Horror's Hallowed Grounds: Myspace

Horror's Hallowed Grounds: Panel at TX Fearfest