Rating of
2/4
Jamie Lee Curtis at her Weakest
Topher - wrote on 08/16/07
This film is largely responsible for the slasher genre of horror -- a genre which targets a teen audience and lowers the standards of pure horror to cheese.
The underlying subtext of this genre is rape fears/fantasies. The psycho targets nubile young women, usually scantily clad, and chases them with a phallic weapon. Sex is bad: the psycho always goes after the copulating couple. And the heroine is always a virginal do-gooder who must utilize her passiveness to lull the killer into a false complacency.
Women always occupy the victim role; men, the menace. In this way, the films instill sexual fears in the teenage audience and contribute to the victim mentality many women carry over into adulthood.
The good news is this film generated as many smart responses as it did lame ones. The ending to Friday the 13th (the original) spoofs the pretext of Halloween. Nightmare on Elm Street, Alien and Buffy offer female protagonists who overcome the victim status and empower themselves as active agents.
Understanding Halloween is essential for horror afficionadoes and it neatly encapsulates the post-Zodiac atmosphere of sexual fear. However, liking this film, for me, constitutes a guilty pleasure.
