HURRY UP IT’S HALLOWEEN [243]

“Halloween III: Season of the Witch” has been around long enough to be reappraised as an enjoyable cult horror film, successfully separated from the eternally rebooted Michael Myers roadshow - indeed, the first “Halloween” film is treated as a fictional work, with a trailer appearing on TV before one of the incessant Silver Shamrock ads. 

However, because people were apparently expecting to see The Shape again, it was the least successful “Halloween” film at the time, dooming the idea of an anthology series – it may have been released in the US in time for Halloween 1982, but when it ran out of steam, it took until 9th June 1983 for it to reach UK cinemas. “Halloween III” remains my favourite film in the series, only because it is the one I actually wanted to watch.

The plot is essentially an anti-consumerist retelling of “Invasion of the Body Snatchers,” even based in a carefully controlled named Santa Mira, this time overrun by the Silver Shamrock Novelties mask factory, instead of alien plant spores. A man, later established as a toy shop owner, is admitted to hospital, saying “they’ll kill us all” – when he is himself killed, his doctor, and the patient’s daughter, travel to Santa Mira. What unfurls is a tale of watching men in suits, androids, microchips that activate swarms of insects, witchcraft and Stonehenge, all brought together to wipe out large numbers of people, upon activation of a signal embedded in that bloody advertising jingle – corniness is both catchy and deadly.

“Halloween III” has the feel of an episode of “The Twilight Zone” or “The Outer Limits,” the latter especially evoked by the TV interference and lines creating a pumpkin in the opening credits. Producers John Carpenter and Debra Hill would only make a third “Halloween” film if they could tell a different story, and future films in the intended anthology would evoke the same mood. The music, with an electronic score by John Carpenter and Alan Howarth that sounds as if they had a chat with both Philip Glass and Brian Eno first.

The connection with the older TV series is reinforced by the script having been written by one of John Carpenter’s heroes, Nigel Kneale, best known for creating the 1954 live BBC adaptation of “Nineteen Eighty-Four,” starring Vincent Price and Donald Pleasence, and the “Quatermass” series, last seen in 1979 and starring John Mills. “Halloween III” is not horror for horror’s sake, and is reminiscent of the tone and feel found in Kneale’s other work, especially the “Quatermass” series and “The Stone Tape,” which is more along the lines of psychological horror.  

Kneale had his name removed from the credits when some gore and nudity was added to the script by the director, Tommy Lee Wallace, at the behest of a producer, ending Kneale’s only time working in Hollywood. When the producers wanted to change direction back to Michael Myers, John Carpenter and Debra Hill sold their rights to the “Halloween” films to them. Meanwhile Wallace, also heard in “Halloween II” as the cheesy voiceover for the Silver Shamrock mask ads, would next direct episodes of the “Twilight Zone” TV revival series, and write “Big Trouble in Little China” for Carpenter. None of them had anything to do with “Halloween” again until Carpenter co-wrote the music for the 2018 “Halloween” revival, of a revival, of a sequel.

I’LL SUSPEND YOUR DISBELIEF [143]

I don’t need an excuse to think about the “Back to the Future” films, but on 21^st October 2015, everybody had one – we finally reached the day when Marty McFly arrived in his own future, to stop his son from being sent to prison. Every detail was pored over: from flying cars, drones and flat-screen televisions to hands-free computer games, hoverboards, and paying for items using your fingerprints. However, all the misses were also scrutinised: continued use of fax machines, hydrated food, self-drying jackets, and nineteen Jaws films. The makers of the film disliked films that tried to predict the future, but they knew they must have flying cars in their own. Time travel itself appears to have been a moot point.

Having reached 2019, it is now time to break out my copies of “Blade Runner” and “Akira,” both films set “this year,” not to compare with real life, or to compare with each other, but because a coincidence of their settings have made them timely. I am opposed to running any type of granular, futurological analysis of these films – that sort of scrutiny is reserved for Steven Spielberg’s version of “Minority Report,” which employed a think tank of futurologists, or “2001: A Space Odyssey,” with its script written by Arthur C. Clarke. Furthermore, any futuristic elements to artistic works like “Blade Runner” or “Akira” only exist to serve the story they have been made to tell.

What resonated for me is how current preoccupations turn out to be constant. Both films feature issues of identity mixed into resistance against established order, be they Replicants or members of teenage street gangs. The nature of the human body, and what it means to be human, is put under stress, and must be adapted to survive. Both films are set in concrete jungles, washed in neon and advertising, but while what hangs over the city of “Blade Runner” is the broken weather system caused by climate change, in the world of “Akira,” it is the history of nuclear warfare: the original manga, begun in 1982, imagine a third world war, and a nuclear blast on Tokyo, as imminent, given the Cold War climate and Japan’s proximity to the Soviet Union. Terrorism, however, remains as much of a threat as it ever was.

Watching these films today, it is clear they build their worlds extremely well: the background against which the stories of “Blade Runner” and “Akira” are told are entirely believable because they are evocative of our own. It also helps that Jean Giraud, the comic book artist also known as "Moebius," was counted as an influence when both films were made. Of course, you will also see company logos advertised everywhere, because we have them now: Kaneda’s motorcycle in “Akira” is emblazoned with logos for Citizen and Canon, while the now-anachronistic presence of Atari and Pan Am in “Blade Runner” has probably helped the longevity of those brands, Atari having passed through several hands, and Pan Am now being used as the name for an American regional train company.

The year 2019 is remarkable in having been used as a future year by two big films, but it comes as a result of picking a date one or two generations ahead of where you stand. However, if you choose a year to set your story, stick with it, and don’t change it if it didn’t work out. Philip K. Dick’s original story “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?” was published in 1968, and set in 1992, but while it is clear that when it was filmed as “Blade Runner,” made in 1982, a sensible decision was made to set their story further away, later editions of Dick’s novel moved its year further back to 2021. Perhaps John Carpenter should change all the references to 1997 he made in “Escape to New York.”

I can understand why “Akira” had to be set in 2019, as a major part of the plot is it is set one year before Neo-Tokyo is due to host the XXXII Summer Olympic Games... I don’t know if that was why the city subsequently made, and won, a bid in 2013 to host that very games, but with both the manga and film being featured in marketing for the games, expect nostalgia for “Akira” to make it more prescient as time goes on.

[Olympic building site, Tokyo]