Trick Or Treat
Halloween is the time of year I catch up on horror movies I have yet to see or rewatch old favorites, since they are all handily available on any number of TV channels. One of the more interesting films I saw for the first time was The Omen. I didn’t really find it that scary, but I did think was fantastic in an artistic sense. My favorite moment was probably the closeup of the nanny’s face during her battle royale with the father; something about that rabid determination was much creepier than any of the deaths.
I didn’t see all of the second Omen movie, but I have to say that Damien’s reaction to his true identity was really well done. That kid had some decent acting chops. The third movie was just really horrific. With Damien as an adult, a lot of the power of the first two movies was gone, so they went for shock value instead. The modern-day King Herod slaughter of the children was especially disturbing. That is one of the interesting things about horror movies though… sometimes even the stupid ones can force you to confront the emotional impact of something (like the murder of many tiny babies) that you would normally compartmentalize away as numbers or a historical event or freak occurrence.
Overall, my favorite movie experience was rewatching Scream 2. Although I don’t care that much for the ending of the second one (at least the choice of murderers), the first two Scream movies do an excellent job of satirizing a genre while still being a strong entry into that genre. The opening sequence of Scream 2 is especially brilliant: a horror movie sequel starting in a movie theater showing a horror movie based on the events of the original horror movie. I could probably go on for a while about the great elements in that scene, but do yourself a favor and go watch it if you’ve never seen the movie.