2023 was a weird year for movies.
Due to strikes, boneheaded executive decisions, and various scandals, several movies I was anticipating this year were delayed, had limited releases, or were outright canceled. This also happened to be the busiest year of my life so far, so I didn’t get out to see very many of the movies that were released.
But what I did manage to do was watch every single theatrically released movie ever directed by John Carpenter.
In the unlikely event that anyone needs an introduction, John Carpenter is a prolific filmmaker whose influence on movies in general (but especially horror) can hardly be overstated. He directed, often wrote, and usually composed the soundtracks for 18 films between 1974 and 2013, when he retired to focus on his music. Personally, I like his filmmaking style for a few reasons, and the most important is his honesty. Even though all of Carpenter’s movies were intended to please general audiences (he’s never been an arthouse director), they never feel like studio-mandated or focus group-tested projects, which might be part of the reason that so few were commercial successes in their own time. In his heyday, he was always willing to experiment with new styles and genres, while giving each movie a fresh, original twist of its own.
That honesty comes with a healthy dose of cynicism. This particular auteur is not one of those horror directors who set up their protagonists with a peaceful, happy life before putting them through the wringer. On the contrary, almost all of Carpenter’s movies begin in hell and find a way to go lower, whether the hell in question is crime-ridden 70s LA, even more crime-ridden futuristic New York, the frozen wastes of Antarctica, or *shudder* the suburbs. The “heroes,” such as they are, tend to be the only people willing to face up to the world’s cruelty and unfairness without shrinking from it (and this is often their only redeeming character trait). This underlying bleakness gives a grounded feeling to even Carpenter’s most fantastical films, and ironically allows many of them to have pretty uplifting conclusions. And even when they have high budgets, there’s a blunt, unpolished honesty to his movies that I appreciate, especially in contrast to so many of the big studio-produced films of today.
However, towards the end of his career, John Carpenter’s cynicism (and increasingly bad luck at the box office) started to stifle his creativity, and his last few movies feel more and more phoned in. But I don’t really feel like talking about his mediocre period. So, in the spirit of the holidays, I’m going to write about my 12 favourite John Carpenter movies, one for each day of Christmas (which is still ongoing until January 6, lest we forget). They will be listed roughly in chronological order, and they will be rated on a scale of 1 to 10. Don’t be put off if some get a lower score–I highly recommend all of them. I even recommend watching them as a festive movie marathon! The score for each is relative to Carpenter’s absolute peak.
- Assault on Precinct 13 (1976)
“It’s a goddamn siege!”
Plot: When Los Angeles’ toughest gangs team up to attack a defunct police headquarters, a Black cop is forced to team up with a white murderer to defend the ordinary citizens trapped inside–and hopefully survive the night themselves.
My Thoughts: I consider this to be Carpenter’s first “real” movie. (His earlier feature, Dark Star, is a padded-out student film, so it doesn’t quite count in my book.) And it sets the tone for much of what would come later. It’s a low-budget, extremely simple, gritty crime thriller that reeks of ’70s LA (as in, I feel like I know what LA literally smelled like in the ’70s after watching this movie). Calling it a crime thriller is a bit misleading, though, because this is, for all practical purposes, a zombie movie. The “interracial gang alliance” is comprised of nameless thugs who don’t speak, have unlimited ammo, show a complete disregard for personal safety, and seem to have no goals beyond causing as much death and destruction as possible. Several scenes and plot points are ripped directly from Night of the Living Dead. Why Carpenter didn’t just make a zombie movie is probably between him and George A. Romero, but I suspect that at this stage of his career, he may not have had the money for makeup.
The seeds of Carpenter’s style are all very present in Assault on Precinct 13. It’s got his slow pacing and gradual build-up of suspense. It’s got his bleak, cynical outlook on the world (the plot is kicked off with the murder of a child) and his wannabe progressive, often uncomfortable handling of race. It was still somewhat rare at the time for white filmmakers to cast Black actors in major roles, let alone as authority figures, so I suppose the movie’s very sympathetic Black cop protagonist somewhat balances out the inhuman way the multiracial gang members are treated. Inhuman antagonists would also become a trend for Carpenter–it’s rare for his villains to have clear motivations or to be sympathetic in any way. This movie also showcases Carpenter’s distrust of authority, which would become even more pronounced later in his career. The reason cop and criminal have to team up is that the higher-ups in the police department have stopped caring about their neighbourhood and won’t send help.
Most importantly, though, this is the first movie that John Carpenter scored, and that is critical to its appeal. The minimalist electronic soundtrack drives the action, sets the hard-boiled mood, and elevates the entire movie. It’s pretty amazing how a low-budget action flick can stand out among the rest with just a simple “dun da-da dun-dun.”
Rating: 6 out of 10 Vanilla Twist Ice Cream Cones
2. Halloween (1978)
“I spent eight years trying to reach him, and then another seven trying to keep him locked up, because I realized that what was living behind that boy’s eyes was purely and simply…evil.”
Plot: Fifteen years after murdering his sister as a young child, Michael Myers escapes from a mental asylum and returns to his hometown of Haddonfield, IL, where he interrupts the babysitting business of local high schooler Laurie Strode.
My Thoughts: It’s probably an exaggeration to say that this movie did for Halloween what Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol did for Christmas…but I don’t think it’s a huge exaggeration. It’s certainly not exaggerating to say that this movie singlehandedly codified and popularised the slasher genre. All the tropes are here: a masked, unstoppable killer; a bunch of interchangeable teenagers who get killed for having sex; a pure, virginal Final Girl; and even an unlikely sequel hook (which would lead to a decades-long franchise of ever-diminishing returns). As far as story and characters go, it doesn’t really have anything interesting or unique to say, at least not to me, as someone who’s seen a few of the other slashers it inspired. But it’s easy to understand why other horror fans and creators found it so inspiring at the time: the creepy yet festive autumn atmosphere it creates is incredibly potent, and all the more impressive considering the movie was very obviously filmed in sunny southern California. And Michael Myers succeeds where many slasher villains have failed in being a truly unknowable, supernaturally unkillable murder machine. He’s exactly the kind of monster who is stronger for having no motive and no relevant backstory.
Probably my most controversial John Carpenter opinion is that I don’t enjoy Halloween as much as many of his other movies. It was his biggest hit at the box office, and it’s arguably what he’s best known for among the general public to this day. But it has so many derivatives nowadays that watching it doesn’t feel very special–and slashers aren’t my favourite horror subgenre anyway. Also, Laurie Strode is just objectively one of the worst Final Girls in the business. Can’t even pick up a knife to save her life. Disgraceful.
But there are a couple of things I do appreciate about this movie: the soundtrack is another classic, featuring possibly the best theme Carpenter ever composed; and the cinematography by Dean Cundey, who would continue to work with Carpenter for all of his peak years, is more beautiful than it has any right to be on this movie’s budget. I also appreciate the slow, steady buildup of suspense before anything violent occurs in the present, which amplifies Michael’s terror and is something a lot of modern horror movies don’t seem to have the patience for.
It’s also fun to see the original Thing from Outer Space playing on a TV at one point in this movie. An excellent bit of meta-foreshadowing.
Rating: 6 out of 10 Jack O’ Lanterns
3. The Fog (1980)
“Get inside and lock your doors! Close your windows! There’s something in the fog!”
Plot: When a mysterious fog bank rolls in over the 100-year-old town of Antonio Bay, California, a radio DJ, a drifter, and a few local sailors are confronted with a ghostly threat and the town’s long-buried secrets.
My Thoughts: This is the perfect cozy horror movie. It’s spooky and suspenseful, but not too violent or gory, and, like Halloween, it creates a potent atmosphere that easily draws the viewer in. Like all good ghost stories, it deals with the theme of past wrongs coming back to bite their perpetrators in the present, and a California town with an old Spanish mission is the perfect setting for a story like that. I think it’s also the closest Carpenter ever came to writing female characters with agency. Not that the radio DJ protagonist in this has the most compelling arc ever, but at least she’s a POV character with a real job and motivations that don’t involve attraction to a male character. This is balanced out, of course, by a subplot in which Jamie Lee Curtis randomly hooks up with a much older Tom Atkins, who is treated like the male lead even though he has no direct connection to the plot–but, you know, it’s something. And it’s rare for Carpenter to give women in his movies even that much.
This is also the first of many Carpenter movies to portray the Catholic church in a sort-of-but-not-entirely negative light. Like several later films, this one features a heroic priest, but also places the blame for the supernatural threat squarely at the feet of the church (it turns out that the ghosts are taking revenge for something an earlier iteration of the town church did and covered up). I suppose it’s just another aspect of JC’s problems with authority–individual priests, like individual cops, can be cool, but the larger organisation is always going to be portrayed as morally ambiguous at best.
Rating: 7 out of 10 Foghorns
4. Escape from New York (1981)
“About an hour ago, a small jet went down over New York City. The President was on board.”
“President of what?”
Plot: In the distant future of 1997, crime in the U.S. has skyrocketed so much that the entire city of New York is converted into a maximum-security prison. When the President’s private jet gets shot down over the city, the government has no choice but to send in war hero-turned-criminal Snake Plissken to rescue him.
My Thoughts: The best thing John Carpenter ever did was cast Kurt Russell. That man and his beautiful mane of hair improved the guy’s ’80s period more than any other single factor. And he’s especially essential to this movie. There are two things the viewer needs to know about protagonist Snake Plissken: 1) He is the coolest human ever to wear an eye patch; and 2) He does not give a single shake of his cigarette about anything, especially not the establishment or continuation of “civilisation.” Kurt Russell fully embodies this attitude, playing the character with a permanent sneer and a gravelly voice that almost, but not quite, edges over into self-parody. This is a movie in which the main villain shows how wealthy he is by driving a car with chandeliers hanging on the hood, so it’s very important that the lead actor plays it completely straight throughout. The magic of Escape from New York is that it’s based on an utterly ridiculous concept, but it takes itself so seriously that it wraps around to become awesome.
Kurt Russell aside, I love the post-apocalyptic atmosphere created here. It’s very light on fight scenes, or any kind of action, considering that it’s usually billed as an “action movie,” but it doesn’t matter. The point of this movie is to immerse oneself in a grim, yet badass, post-apocalyptic environment, and to join Snake as he revels in society’s breakdown and the stripping away of all pretense of just authority or a moral ruling class. It has probably my favourite Carpenter soundtrack for casual listening, and there’s a scene where Snake shoots a Snake-sized oval into a wall and then breaks through it like the Kool-Aid man. Every few scenes a weird new side character, like the Cabbie or the Brain, is introduced by telling Snake they know who he is, but they thought he was dead.
I adore this movie.
Rating: 9 out of 10 Presidential Uzis.
5. The Thing (1982)
“Nobody trusts anybody now…and we’re all very tired.”
Plot: As the personnel at an Antarctic research base prepare for winter, they get a surprise visit from a dog, which is chased into their camp by Norwegian scientists who promptly crash their helicopter and die. When the all-male team of scientists and engineers investigate the dog’s origin, they slowly realise that it is actually a malevolent shape-shifting alien, capable of impersonating anything–or anyone.
My Thoughts: I’ve mentioned this movie briefly before, because it was one of several horror movies I watched while I was quarantined in 2020 and getting diagnosed with Crohn’s disease. Maybe because I’ve experienced some of it firsthand, I have a special fascination for body horror in movies, and this might be the best example of that subgenre ever made. Monsters, even alien monsters, are a dime a dozen in the horror genre, but it’s extremely rare for a movie monster to be scary by itself. Human imaginations and effects budgets don’t usually allow for creatures that look truly alien and frightening on their own. Most filmmakers have to create terror by making the monster do extra horrifying things to people, or by showing it as little as possible and relying on fear of the unknown. The Thing is one of the few movies that doesn’t have to use either of those crutches–because just looking at its monster is enough to scare even seasoned horror fans. And it stays scary for the entire film, because it’s constantly changing shape and revealing itself in newly disgusting ways. I don’t think it can ever be replicated–certainly not with the weightless, sterile computer-generated images that make up most “special effects” these days.
Then there’s the paranoia, the isolation, and the threat of pure cold that surrounds our boys in this movie. Even though Kurt Russell once again winds up as the most sympathetic character, every member of the team gets a unique personality and, by the end, a unique way of breaking down into insanity. They all feel so believable and real, which makes the threat feel almost real, too. And even though shape-shifting things from outer space haven’t visited Earth (that we know of), the more mundane horrors in this movie are very real. Going on a snowy expedition with the boys always sounds like a good idea…until literally anything goes wrong.
What else is there to say? This movie was a critical and box office failure when it was released, but the freakier filmmakers have been chasing its brand of terror ever since, and they’ve all fallen short. Nowadays, it’s pretty universally considered one of the greatest horror movies ever made. I certainly consider it the best horror movie John Carpenter ever made. It’s a must-watch winter movie for me. Specifically for the “first goddamn week of winter.”
Rating: 10 out of 10 Dog Tongues
6. Christine (1983)
“Let me tell you something about love, Dennis. It has a voracious appetite. It eats everything–family, friendship–it kills me how much it eats. But I’ll tell you something else. You feed it right, and it can be a beautiful thing, and that’s what we have.”
Plot: Nerdy teenager Arnie Cunningham buys a used 1958 Plymouth Fury on a whim and experiences a sudden change in his fortunes–he grows more confident, he gets a girlfriend, he’s able to stand up to bullies, and his new car has a mysterious way of maintaining itself after fender benders. Unfortunately, Christine is also a bit of a jealous car…
My Thoughts: This is Carpenter’s only Stephen King adaptation, and I think that’s kind of a shame, because he seems to really get what makes King’s work appealing. I haven’t read the book that this movie is based on, but I’ve read enough of his other writing to recognise the made-up crude sayings, the deep understanding of young male angst, the bizarre supernatural elements (which I’m sure were toned down for the movie), etc. But it’s all tied together with the usual Carpenter slow-burn style, some truly beautiful visuals, and, of course, a killer soundtrack.
This one might feel like a bit of a letdown if you watch it right after The Thing–its violence is much, much tamer, and of course, a regular-looking car is never going to be as inherently scary as that movie’s creature. But personally, I love this movie for how non-silly it is. You would think that a movie about a killer car would be at least as campy as Escape from New York. But this movie just treats the car like any other character, framing her desires and emotions as clearly and centrally as Arnie’s–which arguably makes her the strongest female character Carpenter ever directed, funny enough. The toxic romance between her and Arnie works well as a commentary on American consumer culture–particularly the tendency for men to conflate their masculinity with their possessions–and it works equally well as a typical motivation for an atypical slasher villain. Honestly, the only thing that puts this below some of the other horror films in this series, for me, is the ending–which I find just a tiny bit anticlimactic. But at least, unlike Halloween, this one hasn’t spawned any terrible sequels (knock on wood).
Rating: 8 out of 10 George Thorogood Needle Drops
To Be Continued in Part 2!
Wizard at the Clicks 