"Halloween" (1978)

Ooooo...tis the season to enjoy a really scary movie.

I recently watched the making of "Halloween" the 1978 John Carpenter horror classic. And if you ever want to see how fragile making a movie is, and how "off" things can get, or just the moxie youth has. THIS IS THE MAKING OF you have to see.

Given 21 days to shoot, Carpenter, along with then-girlfriend Debra Hill, wrote an amazing B-grade movie and set the standard for what is to come in slasher flicks.

But I'm not gonna talk about that. Nope. I'm going to talk about Carpenter. In one segment of the documentary, the producer interviewed said that John wanted three things to make this $300k movie.
1) Must be shot Panavision
2) Must be processed at MGM labs (best at the time)
3) Must be sound mixed at studio

Now, as I take a step back I realized, that this was an uncompromising (somewhat arrogant) stance.

If you look at "Texas Chainsaw Massacre" (which was shot 16mm blown up to 35mm), they filmmakers there did what they had to do to get by. In "Halloween" Carpenter may've had the budget of most craft services on big movies. But he refused to let the quality of his film lapse.

That is the problem with today's movie makers. They've set no high standard in image quality for themselves. YET, they still believe that with a great story, it doesn't matter what medium you shoot in. Yes, I agree with you there. BUT...what most are forgetting is the seriousness that goes into making movies on film shot with film cameras.

For those who don't know, being filmed "in Panavision" is what is known as anamorphic. There is an extra piece of glass that warps images to use the full 4 perf frame. If you see a typical Academy frame, you will see the spacing between the images. By stretching out to edge to edge, you are essentially obtaining the full resolution of the frame. This added glass does have a few issues. There is warping from the edges. Especially if you use wide angle lenses (as they did in this film). To offset you will need a diopter to fix. The bigger issue was that you had to get through another piece of glass which meant you needed more light. And they shot mostly at night!

Did this bother Carpenter or cinematographer Dean Cundey? Nope. They wanted the quality. Take note, you fucking Canon 5D hacks...that is quality!

I applaud them for shooting this in 'scope, even though it was, for most DoPs...a hassle. Because dedication to the craft far trumps convenience. That's what made his movie a classic. That you can see the effort behind it. It may not be on the screen, but you feel it.