This article contains mentions of graphic violence.
Halloween Ends is finally here, released on October 14, 2022, and fans are clamoring to see whether it will redeem the franchise after the middling Halloween Kills. John Carpenter is known as one of the Masters of Horror and has become one of the most influential filmmakers ever. But in reality, his career has had many ups and downs. Sometimes, Carpenter infuses action into his films - successfully with Escape from New York and horrifically unsuccessfully with Ghosts of Mars - other times he ditches horror all together, with films like Starman and Big Trouble In Little China.
But it's his horror films that Carpenter is best known for. From slasher classics to Stephen King adaptations and one very notorious shape-shifting alien in the Antarctic, John Carpenter has made some of the scariest movies ever, and his terrifying legacy is sure to live on for decades to come.
In The Mouth Of Madness (1994)
The '90s were a rough decade for Carpenter, and he suffered numerous critical and commercial failures. 1994's In The Mouth Of Madness was one of these misses. The movie centered around a series of books that, when read, can drive the reader to insanity ... but there's way more to it than just that.
This movie has everything: a portal to another dimension, a woman-monster crawling around with a backwards head, Sam Neil losing his mind, dog attacks, mutant mobs, and more. It could have been a fantastic film, but it was so convoluted and slow that most of its scary moments were drowned out.
Vampires (1998)
Carpenter mostly missed the mark with 1998's Vampires, which walks a weird line between action and horror, never finding its way to do either properly. In the film, a group of Catholic vampire hunters set out to exterminate the bloodsucking menaces. For the most part, the movie feels, like most mediocre '90s movies, tedious.
There is one scene, however, that needs to be seen to be believed. The team of Vatican-hired vampire hunters celebrate a successful kill by partying with lots of booze and hookers in a sleazy motel (paid for ... by the Vatican?) Suddenly, Valek, a powerful vampire elder, arrives and kills everyone one by one, including blowing a priest's head off with a shotgun. It's something else.
The Ward (2010)
Carpenter's last directing gig was 2010s The Ward. The film was, in essence, a cheap rip-off of Identity. A group of girls is trapped in an insane asylum and are getting killed one by one - the twist is that the girls are actually split personalities of one girl, Alice, and when each one "dies," it's actually just Alice reclaiming her own life.
Despite being a blatant (and worse) copy of Identity, the movie was at least a return to slasher for Carpenter, and the killer, "Ghost Alice," had some genuinely good scares and horrific kills. For genre fans, it's worth a watch. For anyone else, probably not.
Village Of The Damned (1995)
In Village Of The Damned, John Carpenter's reimagining of the novel The Midwich Cuckoos, he throws Christopher Reeve, Kirstie Alley, and Mark Hamill into a small town where alien children are running amok, killing off the adults and hoping to breed more of their kind. Upon release, the movie was widely panned by critics and audiences, holding a lousy 30% on Rotten Tomatoes.
However, the film does have some truly creepy moments, like when the alien children force Kirstie Alley's character to cut herself open (while conscious and awake), ultimately killing her. It feels sadistic, horrific, and makes viewers squirm -- exactly what Carpenter wanted.
Prince Of Darkness (1987)
Prince Of Darkness, a film where Satan isn't the most evil being in the universe, but merely the spawn of the "Anti-God." Like most of Carpenter's late '80s and early '90s films, Prince Of Darkness is a bit slow, but the end really picks up and gets juicy.
The most terrifying moment is when Kelly - who is possessed and missing her skin - reaches through a mirror and actually touches the hand of the 'Anti-God' in an attempt to bring it into the earthly world. The moment her hand is grabbed by a giant beast is one of Carpenter's finest and most terrifying moments in his later films.
Christine (1983)
On April 19, 1983, Stephen King's novel, Christine, was released. In December of that same year, Carpenter's film adaption premiered. King was so popular at the time that production on the movie began before the novel was even released to the public, allowing for a quick turnover.
While Christine can come off as a bit cheesy these days, the movie about a killer Plymouth Fury actually has some really creative and sadistic kills, like when Christine kills a man by locking him inside her and then forcing the driver's seat forward until he is completely crushed. It's certainly one of the most unique horror stories out there.
They Live (1988)
There's no one scene of Carpenter's They Live that's particularly terrifying, but the film, as a whole, is brilliant and eerie. After an average Joe gets a pair of mysterious sunglasses, he's able to see reality, which is that half the human population is actually made up of aliens who are secretly lulling society into submission.
The practical effects are fantastic, showing the aliens as morbid, skeletal-like beings, and the movie's plot about world leaders forcing humanity into subservience continues to feel disturbing. In fact, They Live is actually the inspiration for the Despite They Live being underrated upon its premiere, it's developed a huge cult following in the years since.
The Fog (1980)
Jamie Lee Curtis and Carpenter teamed up again in 1980 with The Fog, further cementing Curtis' reputation as the ultimate Scream Queen. In the film, a strange fog engulfs a coastal Californian town, bringing with it the ghosts of those who downed in a shipwreck. It's revealed that the ship was deliberately sank, and the ghosts are seeking vengeance.
The brilliance of The Fog is that it not only used the ghosts to generate terror, but the rolling fog also became a villain of its own, with viewers knowing the dangers that came with it. Interestingly, Stephen King's novella, The Mist, was released the same year.
The Thing (1982)
The Thing is just one of the many film adaptations of the classic sci-fi stories The Puppet Masters and Who Goes There? In the film, a shape-shifting parasitic alien begins infecting crew at an Antarctic research base. The concept itself is scary enough, but the real terror comes from the movie's epic body horror.
Carpenter used practical effects to create gooey, slimy, macabre, and grotesquely inhuman monsters. Without giving too much away, audiences should keep an eye out for the scene with the dog. It's the stuff of nightmares.
Halloween (1978)
Carpenter's scariest movie is easily Halloween, and yet, its story is actually the most perplexing. Myers returns to his hometown to kill babysitters...but also his sister...and virtually anyone he comes in with...also, he's basically eternal...and possibly demonic. But the story of Michael Myers doesn't matter because the suspense and terror are so palatable throughout.
Watching Michael Myers slowly walk towards his victims, seemingly able to hide around every corner, it's pure terror. The fact that he looks like a man instead of a monster also adds to the horror, making it seem all-too-real. Adding to Halloween's scare-factor is Carpenter's now-iconic theme song. These days, the very sound of those simple piano keys is enough to make even the most hardcore horror buff quiver in fear.
