31 Days of Halloween – Day 27

Trick r Treat (directed by Michael Dougherty, 2007) Since I was a young kid, I’ve always enjoyed horror anthologies. Blame it on my short attention span or not, whether it was Stephen King’s Cat’s Eye, Creepshow and Creepshow 2, or Twilight Zone the Movie, I like the fact that these films have four or five mini-films that make up the whole movie. Some of these movies have a continuous theme or element, such as a character or object; they connect each story to one another. This is the case with Trick r Treat. There are four interwoven stories that all take place in the same town on Halloween night; a school principal and his son who take jack-o-lantern carving to the next level, a “vampire” who gets more than he bargained for from a group of girls who turn out to be real party animals, a group of kids who enjoy playing mean pranks get the tables turned on them in haunted quarry, and an mean old man who gets to meet the true meaning of Halloween up close and personal. Each story has one common element; Sam. Sam (short for Samhain) is a demonic little pumpkin faced creature who is an enforcer of Halloween rules and traditions. Sam is always there when something goes bad. If you disrespect Halloween, he will find you. Sam has become somewhat of a new horror icon, a deservedly so. He is as cute as a button, and just has deadly. Each story is based on some sort of urban legend or twist on a fairy tale, and are well crafted and infused with some humor. My personal favorite story is the haunted quarry. Years earlier, a bus of mentally disabled and troubled kids is driven into a rock quarry and left to drown. Present time, some kids plan to play a mean trick on a girl. Their plans backfire when they are the ones that fall victim. Great eerie atmosphere and a spooky setting make it a great segment in Trick r Treat. The cast includes Dylan Baker (Spider–Man 3), Anna Paquin (TVs True Blood), Brian Cox (Manhunter), and Leslie Bibb (Talladega Nights). This film has become an annual Halloween watch for me. If you want to watch a charming little anthology with a little bit of everything, make sure to check out Trick r Treat.

Recap

• Day 1 – The Conjuring
• Day 2 – You’re Next
• Day 3 – Rob Zombie’s Halloween
• Day 4 – Dog Soldiers
• Day 5 – Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2003)
• Day 6 – Psycho (1960)
• Day 7 – John Carpenter’s The Thing
• Day 8 – The Prowler
• Day 9 – Pet Sematary
• Day 10 – The Nightmare Before Christmas
• Day 11 – Near Dark
• Day 12 – The Lost Boys
• Day 13 – Child’s Play
• Day 14 – Sleepy Hollow
• Day 15 – House of 1,000 Corpses
• Day 16 – The Devil’s Rejects
• Day 17 – Night of the Living Dead
• Day 18 – Dawn of the Dead (’78)
• Day 19 – Friday the 13th: A New Beginning
• Day 20 – Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974)
• Day 21 – The Cabin In The Woods
• Day 22 – A Nightmare On Elm Street (1984)
• Day 23 – The Exorcist III
• Day 24 – The Evil Dead (1981)
• Day 25 – The Blair Witch Project
• Day 26 – The Shining
• Day 27 – Trick r Treat

T.