Fall is my favorite time of the year… and, specifically, I love the weeks leading up to Halloween the most. It’s not hot outside anymore, there’s candy on all the store shelves and horror movies all over TV… and people really get into the Halloween spirit.
Halloween as a holiday is great, too. You don’t have to go out and get gifts for anyone, but everyone takes their kids trick or treating, there are dozens of smartly crafted costumes to find (and millions of store bought ones that just don’t quite hold up) and there’s a geniuinely spooky atmosphere to the whole proceedings.
That’s why today I’ve decided to talk about one of my favorite horror movies, which is also a love letter to the holiday itself: “Trick ‘R Treat.”
In the vein of other horror anthologies like “Creepshow” and “Trilogy of Terror,” “Trick ‘R Treat” works best because it not only delivers on the frights, but the laughs as well. It’s a movie that doesn’t take itself too seriously (despite the fact that the filmmakers totally take the holiday seriously).
“Trick ‘R Treat” is one of those rare films that came out after the 1980s that a good portion of my family can agree on being a good film. My mom grew up with the original “Halloween” and has a weird love for horror movies (and the Halloween holiday), and I think that definitely passed on to me.
“Trick ‘R Treat” (2009)
On Halloween night in a small town, several characters have to face off with all sorts of ghoulish fiends, including a serial killer, zombies, werewolves, and the spirit of Halloween himself, Samhain.
^It’s a bit difficult to pinpoint the plot to one sentence for this one. Like I said, this is an anthology film, but I did my best here.
First, let me give you a bit of background information on this one in case you haven’t seen it or haven’t even heard of it until now. “Trick ‘R Treat” was initially supposed to be released in 2007. It’s not clear why it was pushed back, but rumors swirled about how the studio was uncomfortable with some of the children characters being killed off. No matter what the actual reason, I still remember being annoyed after seeing the trailer in 2007 and having to wait two whole years until they finally just released the movie straight-to-DVD. I remember being excited that we were finally getting another great anthology flick.
And when it did finally come out, I watched it and instantly fell in love with it. I remember I was working at Hastings, and I was a freshman in college. I picked it up when I was getting off work one night and sat down with a few family members to watch it…. We had all been intrigued after seeing the trailers. We all really enjoyed it, which is the weird thing. All of our tastes are so different, so to find something we all like is rare (a couple of the only other movies I can think of since this were “Get Out” and, oddly enough, the sequel to “Jumanji.”)
“Trick ‘R Treat” had a sort of charm that horror in the 90s and early 2000s had really lost. It was sick and demented but still managed to make you laugh in a weird way at things you wouldn’t normally laugh at. It had a movie monster that, despite never saying a word, was a character that you couldn’t wait to see again. And the best part about it was, even though the stories are all separate, they all feel connected enough that you can’t really cut any of them out… and none of them feel weak or out of place. Unlike other anthology films, this feels like a whole rather than several stories stitched together.
Spoilers lie ahead for anyone who may be worried.
Let’s talk about the stories.
First, there’s the opening, with a couple coming home from a night out on the town, and the wife blows out the light on a pumpkin… before midnight. It sets up the horror elements of the movie and just how goofy it is (seeing a huge lollipop sticking out of the mouth of a dead person adds just a bit of gallows humor where it’s needed) and sets the stage for a big theme for the whole movie: the rules of Halloween are important, and if you don’t adhere to them, you’re dead. This is also the shortest bit, but the fact that they bring the characters from it back over the course of the movie in the background of other stories lets everything feel connected.
Then there’s the killer storyline. We get introduced to most of the characters in between the opening and this, but the storyline of the killer principal who poisons and then kills a trick or treater is the first full story of the film. Dylan Baker plays creepy well, and this story lets you know the movie isn’t going to shy away from some rather tabboo subjects… including the deaths of children. Most horror movies stay as far away from that as possible, but this does not. This story also has quite a bit of the gallows humor that is seen throughout the rest of the movie. It’s a great way to set the pace and let the audience know what they’re getting themselves into.
I think perhaps the most emotional of all the stories involves a group of kids pulling a prank on a girl named Rhonda… they take her to the old quarry where a bus full of kids crashed years ago, and they make her think the kids from the bus came back as zombies. While the present day scenes do get a bit emotional, the high point is the flashback of the crash. It gives me a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach every time I see it. The bullies getting their comeuppance at the end of the segment is also a fantastic moment, and seeing Rhonda walk away as you can hear the other kids screaming in the background is one of the most chilling moments of the film. I find that usually what we don’t see is more terrifying that what we do.
The penultimate segment actually plays out over the course of the whole film… It follows a group of girls out on the town, trying to get a bunch of guys out to this party in the woods with them. The twist? They’re a bunch of werewolves! And the way the film handles the twist and their transformation is one of my favorite things. In stead of the regular transformations we typically see in films, they have to rip off their skin to reveal the wolf side of them underneath. It’s an interesting way to do it, and not one I would have thought of. It also wraps up the killer principal storyline by having the werewolves take him out in spectacular fashion.
The last segment takes us back to something we saw during the killer principal bit: his neighbor is getting attacked. It also finally gives us a clear look at Sam, the masked figure who keeps popping up throughout the rest of the film. Turns out that he’s the spirit of Halloween in physical form, and he’s upset by people who don’t follow the holiday’s traditions. Sam has quickly become one of my favorite characters in horror, and it’s easy to tell why when you see the movie.
There’s a lot to love in “Trick ‘R Treat.” It’s a campy, horrific good time, and it’s quickly become one of my favorite films to watch every time fall rolls around. The character of Sam appeared in a few ads a few years back for a 24-hour marathon of the film on FearNet and further solidified how iconic he truly is, and if you haven’t watched those videos, I highly suggest you get around to it.
And the writer/director, Michael Dougherty, has gone on to make “Krampus,” which is a new favorite of mine in the Christmas horror category… and is now working on “Godzilla: King of the Monsters.” While I’m not a huge fan of giant monster movies, I’m sure his take on the genre will win me over, as well…
The horror genre is one of my favorites (when done correctly), and “Trick ‘R Treat” is just a small window into the kind of films in the genre that I truly adore, and I really hope the sequel that has been teased time and time again finally comes to fruition before long.
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