Eli Roth's History of Horror (2018–…): Season 3, Episode 5 - Episode #3.5 - full transcript
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- This is Halloween,
the night when all the creepy
things are supposed
to stalk the earth.
- Halloween and horror films,
to me, go hand in hand.
They are one,
they are married,
they are united and that's it.
- The last thing in the world
I thought I would do
is another "Halloween" movie.
- Happy Halloween, Michael.
- Every major holiday
that we celebrate...
Has some sort
of bloodshed underneath it.
[dramatic music]
- We love the holidays,
but we dread the holidays.
- Happy Thanksgiving, Grandma.
- Holidays are exhausting.
[tense music]
- It's Christmas I hate most.
- So there's something
very forbidden and cathartic
about watching
everybody get chopped up.
- Merry Christmas.
- All holidays tend to feel
like bull(bleep) after a while.
- Ah!
- To take it over
and to completely
desecrate it
with a horror movie...
- Happy Father's Day.
...is always kind of nice.
- Punish!
- No!
[eerie music]
♪ ♪
- [screams]
- Holidays are
usually the time we get
together with our families.
- Tra la la la la!
- For better...
- Bless you heart,
I was afraid you weren't coming.
- Or worse.
- Grandpa is nothing
but a crazy old fool.
- But even if you get
along with your relatives,
holidays can be stressful.
[loud bang]
- Ah!
- Passive aggressive behavior.
- Careful, kids,
remember that your Aunt Sarah
likes everything to be
clean and perfect and that's why
she makes so much food
that you can't pronounce.
- Forced cheerfulness.
♪ Season to be jolly ♪
- Heavy drinking.
- Where's the nog,
I need to get merry.
- They're typical parts
of the holiday experience.
All that tension
needs to be released.
Enter the holiday
horror film...
Bringing our wildest
homicidal holiday
fantasies to life.
- It's juxtaposing what
gives us great comfort
with something
that terrorizes us.
- Ah!
It's a very simple equation...
♪ Happy birthday ♪
- That is effectively
executed in many films.
♪ To me ♪
- Trick or treat!
- For horror fans,
Halloween is the happiest
holiday of the year,
but it wasn't until 1978 that
filmmakers combined
its inherent spookiness
with graphic murders.
John Carpenter's "Halloween"
set the standard
for slasher films.
It's been imitated many times,
but rarely equaled.
"Halloween's" success kicked
off a wave of the festive
fright films that
continues to this day.
Of course,
after "Halloween," people
started realizing that
it was a pretty good
gimmick to market a horror
movie around a holiday.
[eerie music]
- Like what's Valentine's Day?
Okay, let's
do "My Bloody Valentine."
There's New Year's Eve,
let's just do "New Year's Evil."
- Happy New Year!
- Ahhh!
- Holiday horror
never went away,
but it returned to center
stage with the revival
of the franchise
that started it all.
"Halloween," 2018,
was a massive hit that
brought Jamie Lee Curtis
back to the role that
made her a star.
What was it like playing
Laurie Strode 40 years later?
- Well, it was just... it
honored all of it, it honored
the trauma, it honored the thing
that I've always wondered about
about these movies, which
is what happens to these people.
There's a lot of stuff
that happens, but then what
happens to the people
that survived after wards?
- David Gordon Green's
reboot made the bold choice
of ignoring all nine
"Halloween" sequels
and remakes.
- What made the first
film scary, and what made
Michael Myers scary,
you didn't know who he was.
All you knew is he killed
his sister, you don't know why.
You know, let's go back
to that pure dread that came
with Halloween
and let's go back
to that singular strong
final girl
that took him on, and let's
see what she's like 40 years
later, and she's, you know,
she's... she's kinda messed up.
- From a clinical perspective,
Doctor, would you say
that Laurie strode has
lost her (bleep)ing marbles?
- There are many
ways for tragedy
and violence to change a victim.
- She's still very deeply
affected by what happened,
but she's also a survivor
and she's ready for anything.
- Laurie lives in the woods,
she is a sure shot,
she practices every day
on these dummies, and she's
an end of days prepper,
ready for Michael Myers
because she knows Michael's
gonna come back.
Sometime someplace,
she will be prepared.
- Girl is as hard as can be.
The trauma
of what she went through,
you see it in her life down
to the way she built her house.
Everything is wrapped up.
This safety and the way
that she interacts with
her daughter,
and her daughter's daughter.
- If the way I raised
your mother means that she
hates me,
but that she's prepared
for the horrors
of this world, then...
I can live with that.
- We didn't see that
journey fully, but we know it.
- The opening sequences
with Michael Myers
in the insane asylum.
- There he is.
- Go right there
with some of the most
chilling stuff in any
Halloween picture ever.
- It is so beautiful,
the checkerboard floor,
those other people
out on the yard,
that strange man having a fit,
the dog barking.
- I love the fact they
brought back Nick Castle,
the original actor to play
The Shape in the asylum
scenes at the start,
I thought that was really great.
- He's being transferred and,
of course, he commandeers
the bus through acts
of incredible violence, and...
- He gets out.
- So now you've set up
a woman who's been
waiting and he comes back.
[eerie music swells]
[boot thuds]
- This movie finally
gave us that moment
of Michael Myers going
around on Halloween,
walking around
the neighborhood,
children bumping into h.
Just walking
through the house.
[eerie music]
[woman gasps]
- Spectacular... it's spectacular.
- After considerable mayhem,
Laurie, her daughter,
and her granddaughter
have a final showdown
with the unstoppable fiend.
- Michael's here,
get downstairs.
Go, baby, go!
- Michael seems certain
to win, but this is a film
about a woman who turns
the tables on her abuser.
[gunshot blasts]
- She successfully traps him...
[gate slams]
- And, actually, has trained her
daughter to do so as well,
which I thought was really cool
because she plays
the damsel in distress
to the last moment.
- I can't do it!
Gotcha.
[gunshot blasts]
[thud]
- Happy Halloween, Michael.
- Were you surprised that
it resonated the way it did,
that it was
such a cultural milestone?
- As we were
launching the 2018 movie,
it was right in the center
of the Me Too movement,
and so women taking power
and speaking truth to power,
voicing their experiences as
trauma victims, was echoing all
over the world when we released
that movie, a movie about
a woman taking power from her
trauma against her oppressor.
- Goodbye, Michael.
- So I think there
was this spectacular
confluence of life
and evolution of women,
and Laurie Strode coming
to grips with Michael Myers.
- Today, horror
and holidays go hand in hand,
but it wasn't always that way.
In 1974,
one movie started it all.
- Hello?
[man screaming]
- Hello?
[man screaming]
♪ ♪
- Christmas, it's the most
wonderful time of the year.
- Good morning, Merry Christmas.
[laughter]
- A time of joy, unmarred
by the dark side of life.
[dramatic musical sting]
- So they say.
- People forget that
Christmas used to be
a very spooky holiday,
that people used to get
together and tell ghost
stories on Christmas.
Only recently, over the last
few decades, has it been turned
into this very glossy,
shiny, family oriented event.
- So, it should not have
come as a surprise when
Bob Clark Combined Christmas
with graphic murders
and launched
a new style of horror.
[glass shattering]
- I think
Bob Clark's "Black Christmas"
is ground zero
for holiday horror.
I mean,
Bob Clark was a genius,
the guy created,
of course, "Deathdream,"
"Children Shouldn't Play
with Dead Things."
He takes the POV from
Mario Bava's "Bay of Blood,"
he applies the holiday
to it, basically
starts a slasher film
with "Black Christmas."
- On a snowy Christmas Eve,
a serial killer breaks
into the attic
of a sorority house.
He terrorizes
the women downstairs
with disturbing phone calls.
[creepy laughter on phone]
- They're so raw, those
phone calls are so intense.
- Let me lick your pretty,
pink, (bleep).
- That's so insane,
I don't even feel like
anyone would
put that in a movie now.
- Pretty, pink, (bleep).
- Even though I feel like,
as a society,
we've gotten more vulgar, those
phone calls just still shock.
- I'm going to kill you.
- Then he murders them
one by one.
- Ahhh!
- And that is where
a lot of the slashers
take their root,
and the idea that we can do
it at Christmas time just brings
this whole 'nother level to it.
[carollers singing]
- It makes it all shiny,
and beautiful, and pretty,
and then the blood feels
that much more bloody.
[dramatic music]
- [giggles]
- Bob Clark knows that to make
us fear for the characters,
we have
to care about them first.
- I thought the characters
felt so real, and that was my
favorite thing about it,
just, it felt like a real group
of friends, enemies, you know,
just a real group of women.
- Oh, come on, this is
a sorority house, not a convent.
- Margot Kidder,
and Keir Dullea,
and Olivia Hussey
and Andrea Martin,
the cast really made that
movie something really special.
- Oh, why don't you
go find a wall socket
and stick your tongue in it,
that'll give you a charge.
- As her friends disappear,
the film's heroine, Jess,
grapples with her decision
to have an abortion.
- You don't want it.
- No.
- It's a bold plotline for
a film made the year after
Roe v. Wade,
the Supreme Court ruling
protecting a
woman's right to choose.
By making her disapproving
boyfriend a suspect...
- Peter, Jesus,
you scared the hell out of me.
- The abortion debate becomes
part of the murder mystery.
- You selfish bitch.
You're talking about
killing our baby as though
you were having a wart removed.
- Now can you see why
I didn't want to tell you?
- And you're like, "Oh my god,
her boyfriend is now
stalking and killing
her because she wouldn't
have his baby..."
[glass shatters]
...because she
feels like she's too
young and she wants
to finish college.
- Retrospectively, we
look at "Black Christmas"
and it's very progressive.
- You can't ask me to drop
everything I've been working
for and give up all my ambitions
because your plans have changed.
- There's a lot going
on with these characters that is
reflective
of what was happening
in the early '70s for women.
- Clark's direction was
just as forward thinking.
- Hey!
- Introducing many
of the stylistic
tropes that
define the slasher genre,
baiting the audience
with a whodunit mystery.
- You think it's my fault,
don't you?
- Staging a series
of brutal murders,
each more
outlandish than the last.
[chainsaw rumbling]
- Ahhhh!
- And having
the killer hide inside
the house with his victims.
[phone ringing]
- Taunting them by telephone.
- The caller is in the house,
the calls
are coming from the house.
[dramatic music]
- And this is kind of one
of the first great examples
of the subjective camera
in a slasher movie.
But it's something that critics
jumped on later on, in "Friday
the 13th," they really attacked
it because they were saying,
"Oh, it's putting you
in the killer's point of view,
it's attacking women,
and it's misogynist."
No, at least in the beginning,
that's not the point.
The point is,
you never see the face,
that's what's so scary.
You have no idea what this guy
looks like,
all you see is his eye.
[dramatic musical sting]
- Jess is the only survivor
of the massacre,
making her one of the first
final girls in horror.
She confronts her
boyfriend and kills him.
But unlike "Halloween"
and other slashers to come,
there's no cathartic victory.
The police,
assuming the murders are over,
leave her asleep in the house,
then the phone rings.
[phone ringing]
- Because her boyfriend
was not the killer,
and the cops are wrong,
and they didn't get him, and now
she's probably going to die
because of their incompetence.
[phone ringing]
[eerie music]
- And it's written that way
deliberately to infuriate us.
We're supposed to see
how society leaves
this woman vulnerable.
[phone ringing]
- As those credits are
rolling and you just hear
that phone ringing,
and ringing, and ringing,
it's supposed to leave
you uneasy,
like even after the credits
stop, you know, you're like,
"Okay, am I safe now?"
You know,
and you don't know.
- And we weren't safe
because "Black Christmas"
led to "Halloween" and the
slasher glut of the 80s.
- Ahhh!
- Agghh!
- Ahh!
- Perhaps in penance,
the next holiday film
Bob Clark directed was
"A Christmas Story,"
a film as warm and fuzzy
as "Black Christmas" is cold
and creepy, but even that
film featured a bad Santa.
- Ho, ho, ho.
- Ahhh!
- Sinister Santas were
soon to become fixtures
in the landscape
of holiday horror.
- Naughty!
[dramatic music]
- Chris Kringle,
Father Christmas, Saint Nick,
Santa Claus,
we know him by many names.
He's a jolly old elf.
- Merry Christmas!
- But in horror,
even Santa has a dark side.
- If you
think about Santa Claus,
the whole thing is creepy.
There's a man coming into
your house, down your chimney
to bring you gifts, and you
feed him, it's low-key grooming.
- I want you to remember
to stay good boys and girls.
Now if you do this,
I'll make sure you get
good presents from me
every year.
- It's weird.
- Sinister Santas have
popped up in movies
for decades.
- Ahh!
- The most notorious remains
"Silent Night, Deadly Night"
from 1984.
- If you've
seen all the slashers,
you're a little taken aback
by "Silent Night, Deadly Night."
- Ahh!
- The idea of putting on
a Santa Claus suit and going
out and killing, taking horror
to that level, it's brutal.
- The movie begins as
young Billy watches a man
dressed as Santa Claus
murder his parents.
- No! No!
[tires squealing]
[gunshots]
- No!
- Billy grows up and gets
a job at a toy store.
When he's forced to dress
as Santa Claus for Christmas,
he has a psychotic break.
- You remember what Santa Claus
does on Christmas Eve, don't ya?
- Where are ya,
you little bastard?!
- Yeah, I know what he does.
- He starts killing
everyone he deems naughty.
- Punish.
[glass shatters]
Punish!
Punish.
- Ahhh!
- People who don't understand
the concept of slasher movies,
to them, it's all violent porno,
as far as they're concerned,
because they just don't get it,
and most of the films that they
made a big deal about,
I wish they were closer to what
they think they were,
I wish they were that strong.
- Mm-hmm.
- "Silent Night, Deadly Night"
is (bleep)ed up
for a horror film fan.
[eerie piano music]
- The film's desecration
of Christmas caused a scandal.
Protests by angry parents
and religious groups led
to the film being pulled
from theaters
after only a week.
But the figure
of a sinister Santa
has been around for centuries.
Europeans grow up haunted
by stories of Krampus,
St. Nick's
sinister doppelganger.
The film "Krampus"
brought him to suburban
America and satirized
the commercialization
of Christmas.
- I was getting a little bit
more cynical
about the holidays,
and I think it was an effort
to sort of try and turn the tide
inside of myself and rediscover
the magic of Christmas,
even if it
was through a horror story.
- "Krampus" begins like
a family relationship comedy.
- Merry Christmas!
- Move it, we don't have to keep
the traffic jam going now.
- Oh, let me help you.
[thud]
- Two families are getting
together for Christmas.
They're very different
types of families.
- Well, I just thought
you guys might like a break
from macaroni
and cheese with hotdogs.
- Yeah, okay.
- They don't necessarily
get along and they don't
share a lot
of the same worldviews.
- Honey, we said no gun
talk at the dinner table.
- This family needs
a little gun talk whether
it's at the dinner
table or anywhere else.
- I think it was really
fun that the family was
kind of dysfunctional
'cause it kind of reminded
me of every Christmas
dinner out there where
you invite the cousins
you don't like...
- [belches]
- The uncle you never see.
- Ha ha,
that's my boy!
- It sure is.
- Adam Scott,
Toni Collette, David Koechner,
the late great Conchata Ferrell.
- Looks like Martha Stewart
threw up in here.
- Allison Tolman, these are
all actors that you almost
would expect to see in "National
Lampoon's Christmas Vacation"
or something like that.
- The center of the story
is young Max, played by
Emjay Anthony,
who is struggling
not to lose faith
in Christmas.
- He's trying to desperately
hold on to the family.
He misses his big sister,
you know,
he wants to actually have good
things happen for his family.
- Wait, mom, aren't we
gonna watch Charlie Brown?
- And the second
he gives up...
- I just wanted to Christmas
to be like it used to be,
but forget it, I hate Christmas,
I hate all of you.
- The Krampus is like,
"Yep, you messed up now."
- Krampus is
a shadow of St. Nicholas.
He represents everything
that Santa Claus isn't and he's
dispatched to punish
non-believers on the holiday.
- And so, power goes out,
then their daughter goes
to see her boyfriend,
now she's missing.
Something is happening,
something monstrous
is out there.
- I've hunted a lot of game
in my day, those are hooves.
- The house starts
getting attacked by all
manner of Krampus minions.
- Ahhh!
- Oh sh...
- From these trollish,
dwarfish, horrors,
gingerbread men...
...beautifully, creepy,
sinister clown snake.
- Come on.
[roars]
- Shoot it,
Tom, shoot it!
- So this whole family
that normally doesn't like
each other, is forced
to come together, put aside
their differences, and overcome
Krampus and his minions.
- Shepherd's gotta protect
his flock.
[monster roaring]
- Like many Christmas tales,
everyone learns
a valuable lesson...
- I'm sorry.
- The hard way.
- Noooo!
[dramatic music]
- Ahh, ahhh!
- It's a very personal
statement for myself,
just how hard it is
to maintain optimism
and a belief in the goodness
of human beings when
you're confronted
with the opposite every time you
wake up in the morning
and turn on the news.
- Merry Christmas, Max.
- I do think it's kind
of a good family horror movie.
I was so happy to be in it.
I felt like, "(bleep) yes, this
is awesome, this is awesome,"
and I thought this is
going to just blow people away.
[monsters shriek]
- Holiday partyers
are literally blown away
in two famous slashers
from the Great White North.
[eerie music]
- Two of the most memorable
holiday slashers came
out of Canada
in the early 1980s.
The first was "Terror Train"
starring Jamie Lee Curtis,
two years after "Halloween."
Can you tell me the plot
of "Terror Train?"
- "Terror Train" is
a bunch of college kids,
New Year's Eve,
taking a train for a party
on the train,
and a bad guy shows up.
- On New Year's Eve
of their senior year,
a group of pre-meds gather
for an ill-fated
costume party.
- Happy New Year!
- Three years earlier,
they played a cruel
prank on virginal young Kenny.
- Elena?
- Hello, Kenny.
- Baiting him
with the promise of sex.
- Don't be shy,
this is my first time, too.
- Then surprising him
with a corpse.
[dramatic music]
- The shock drove him insane.
- Ahh, ahh, ahhh!
- Now he's back for revenge.
- All aboard.
- Early on in the film,
a character is literally killed
in front of other people
and nobody notices because
everybody's in costume,
everybody's drunk,
everybody's having a good time,
and he's the joker so
they're like, "Ha ha,
funny joke, dying."
And the killer assumes
this person's identity
by wearing their costume.
Nobody notices that
all of a sudden he's
taller or doesn't speak.
- We're at
the station with a sword.
- And that's the key
essence of the film.
It's... it's a revenge slasher
about someone that you never
used to pay attention
to except to make fun of,
and now you're still
not paying attention
to them,
and they're gonna kill you.
- In "Terror Train,"
appearances
aren't just deceiving,
they're deadly.
Beneath their surface beauty,
the students
are callous brats,
reeking of unearned privilege.
- Mo and I worked
in an emergency
gynecological ward.
- Doc won
an award.
- Best pap smear in a
supporting role, come on.
- The killer mocks
their superficiality
by disguising himself
with the masks of his victims.
- It adds
to the paranoia because
your sweetheart might be
in the gorilla suit one minute,
and then the next
minute you think you're
getting a midnight kiss
and it's the killer.
- Ahhh!
- "Terror Train" was
shot entirely at night
aboard an actual steam
train by John Alcott,
the man who
photographed "The Shining"
and "Barry Lyndon"
for director Stanley Kubrick.
- John Alcott figured
out how to shoot in very
low natural light.
In "Barry Lyndon,"
he would shoot scenes
with natural candle light,
for example,
which was something
that people
hadn't really seen before.
And that got him an
Academy Award.
Now, "Terror Train,"
in its own way,
it's also a bit of a ground
breaker because
they were shooting it,
you know, with this real train,
and they had to figure out
how to light the darn thing.
- John Alcott wired
all of the practical
lights on the train
to a lightboard, and he would
light the scene by dials,
that's it.
- It's very painterly,
if you look at that film,
almost every shot.
I think it's one of the most
beautiful slasher films of the era.
- What are your memories of it?
- I remember that it was nights,
I remember it was cold AF,
and I wore big hoop earrings,
and I said to them,
"In the fight,
it would be great if he pulls
through the hoop earring,
and like splits her ear open."
- Ahh!
- But it was all one take and so
how was I going to get bloody?
So, I go under, like,
a bed or something and there
was a pool of blood
that we had left there.
So, when I went under there...
- You'd do your own makeup
and come out.
- I did my own makeup and then
come out and now it's all bloody
and you really think like, "Wow,
he really ripped her ear apart."
- That's third grade stuff.
- Really?
[switchblade clicks]
- For much of the movie,
we're led to believe that
a magician, played
by real life illusionist
David Copperfield,
is the killer.
- A magician.
- Magician?
- But in keeping
with the film's theme,
all is not what it seems.
- The big reveal was that
it was his female assistant,
who was trans...
- Yeah.
- Was ultimately the killer.
- It brings you back
to that illusion idea,
that he's
creating this magic trick.
When you see the movie again,
you're kind of like,
"It's totally Kenny,"
but because your brain is
making assumptions,
it's not seeing that.
It's saying, "Oh, well,
that's the magician,
that's his assistant."
So, you label him
or her as an assistant,
it couldn't
possibly be the killer.
And so, I really think
that the magic theme,
sort of, underscored what they
were trying to achieve
with the reveal of the killer.
- It was you.
- Still, seen 40 years later,
it's a controversial choice.
- It's a version of the queer
panic subgenre that
you (bleep)ed
with my sexuality
in some way that made me
question my gender identity
and kill people.
[dramatic music]
[train rumbling]
[wind howling]
[thud]
- A year
after "Terror Train" made
us leery of New Year's
and costume parties,
"My Bloody Valentine" did
the same for the day of love.
- Ahhhh!
[dramatic music]
- The night
of the Valentine's Day dance,
everybody was there except
for seven miners who
were out at the Hanniger Mine.
- An accident
on Valentine's Day
in a small mining town
kills a score of men
and turns a traumatized
survivor into
a cannibalistic serial killer.
The town bans
Valentine's Day celebrations.
20 years later,
a new generation decides
it's time
to get the party started.
- Roses are red,
violets are blue,
one is dead and so are you?
- Then the murders begin.
- Mabel!
[dramatic music]
- To me,
it's the best of the Canadian
slasher films,
partly because it commits
to being
a Canadian slasher film.
- Yeah, it's not like
well-to-do kids in a sorority
house being picked off.
- No, no,
it's in a steel mining town
in Canada where they
have thick Canadian accents.
- There ain't
nothing to do about it.
- You can't have 'em both, you know?
- I don't want them both.
- You'll be sorry you didn't
listen to me, you'll be sorry.
- As the party rages,
a mysterious killer
picks off the miners
and their girlfriends
one by one
in creatively macabre ways.
[heavy breathing]
- Sylvia?
[eerie music]
- Like "Terror Train,"
"My Bloody Valentine" makes
the most out of its location.
The last half hour
of the film takes place
deep inside an actual mine.
- There's one way out
and that way is probably blocked
by your
pursuing maniac in a mask.
It's tight, it's dark,
there are no places of light
except those that are
strung by the mining company.
So you're completely removed
from civilization,
and you are thrust
into the most claustrophobic
environment possible.
- [gasps]
- Nowadays,
"My Bloody Valentine"
is one of the most significant and
beloved of the Golden Age slasher films.
[maniacal laughter]
- Sarah, be my bloody Valentine.
[laughing continues]
- It's really just
a textbook example of how
you pull off
one of these things.
[maniacal laughter]
- Some people like to head
out for the holidays,
to get in touch with
old friends,
or spend quality time
with dear old mom.
- Ain't we havin' fun?
- Well, I don't know
about the two of you,
but I'm getting out of here.
- Wait for me.
- Holidays are a great
time for a getaway
with your friends...
except in horror movies.
Exhibit A,
1980's "Mother's Day."
Three college friends
on a camping trip are
kidnapped
by psychotic brothers.
- Why don't you get the Kodak?
- Yeah, I'll get the Kodak.
- They subject the women
to a night
of abuse and torture,
all for the entertainment
of their sadistic mother.
- My boys.
- One woman dies,
the others escape,
but then they turn back.
- We'll get those bastards.
- These women actively said,
"We're gonna go back,
and we're gonna hunt these
people down, and we're gonna
kill them and get revenge for
what they did to our friend."
That was badass,
there was a certain
feminist element to it
that I really appreciate,
that was unusual
for a film of that time.
- Jackie, every way you
turned in life you got shit.
Well, now we'll do
the fighting back for you.
♪ ♪
- When I was a kid, I was
obsessed with Mother's Day.
I even screened it at
my bar mitzvah party
with my mom in attendance.
I had very tolerant parents.
It's not for everyone.
- Now take
care of the big one, Ike.
- But look
past the sensationalism
and you'll find a wicked
satire of pop culture.
- Wake up, it's me, Big Bird,
and it's time to get up.
- The mother has these
psychopathic sons who have been
weaned on television
and so they have no way
of distinguishing between
fantasy and reality.
- All right, now,
it's beautiful day, see?
You're readin' somethin'
real good.
- Yeah, like a muscle magazine.
- All three villains are
punished with ironic deaths.
One brother is literally
killed by television,
the other
gets an axe to the groin,
and the mother meets
a uniquely maternal end.
- No, let me be, let me be,
I'm a sick woman!
- I wanted something
more from the mother's death.
- Yeah.
- Then I thought,
"Oh, my God, it's perfect,
mother's been
suffocated by the breasts."
- Yeah.
- It's really what made
me see what you could
do with a slasher film.
I started
watching Mother's Day over,
and over,
and over, and thinking,
"Oh my god, you can actually
say a lot with a slasher movie."
- "April Fool's Day"
from 1986 is another film
about a gory getaway and,
unlike some holiday
slashers, it takes its
title seriously.
- We've talked about before that
I like "April Fool's Day."
- I love
"April" for Fred Walton,
man, I mean, what a great film.
- College student,
Muffy, invites her smug,
overprivileged friends to her
family's secluded island
for an April Fool's Day party.
- We're gonna
spend a weekend there?
- The pranks begin
almost immediately.
- Well, what... what
are you scared?
- Hey, I said give it a rest.
- You have a fake
death at the beginning.
You have
a guy pretending to get killed.
- We got 'em.
- Ha, ha, April Fools.
- It's like you're never quite
sure what's real and what's not.
- The childish prank
is followed
by a horrific accident.
- Buck, look out!
- Ahhhh!
[crunching]
- Ahhhh!
- Soon it seems we're
watching a whodunnit
slasher where the students
are picked off one by
one with not entirely
convincing special effects.
- There's that one scene where,
you know,
the risky couple's in bed.
- What is this, show and tell?
- And she, like,
gives him a nudge and his hands
fall over and we know
that he has been dismembered.
- And, of course,
they don't bother to think about
all your buddies
are getting killed off
on April Fool's Day,
maybe there's something
else going on here?
[dramatic music]
- But they're not really
the brightest bulbs
so you let it slide.
- The final survivors learn
that Muffy's homicidal twin,
Buffy, is the killer.
- No, nooo!
- Then, in one of the most
divisive horror endings
of all time, they discover
everybody is still alive.
Muffy has pulled
a massive prank
on her friends
and the audience.
- April Fools!
- I don't condone pranks like
that in real life because you
really never know how someone's
gonna react to a situation.
- I love you.
- I love you
too, babe.
- Ahh, aggh!
- Watching it in a film
and having it all play out
on screen,
I think, is fantastic.
[laughing]
- For me,
the ending was what kept it
from being
a classic horror film.
- It's unfair that
people write the movie
off because of the ending.
- Does that negate
the whole movie, yeah.
- That it
negates the whole film.
Now, I really like the ending,
now I know what to expect,
I really like the ending.
- But is that about it
breaking its own rules?
- Yeah, but in the case
of "April Fool's Day,"
I think that's our failure
because, no, it's April Fools,
it didn't happen,
that's the point.
- They played a joke.
- It's the point of the holiday,
"April Fool's!"
It's clearly
marked on the label,
it's our misunderstanding of it,
they did a perfect job.
- Yeah, you're right,
I never even thought
of it that way,
that's really funny.
[laughter]
- April Fool.
[eerie music]
- Happy birthday.
- What's worse than being
murdered on your birthday?
Endlessly reliving that day
and dying over and over again.
- Hey!
[tense music]
See you soon
(bleep)hole.
Ahhh!
[dramatic music]
- Holiday horror films
are often about the terror
of facing our families.
Christopher Landon's slasher
comedy, "Happy Death Day..."
is about the terror
of facing ourselves.
- "Happy Death Day" is
about a very stereotypical
mean girl sorority member
named Tree Gelbman,
who I play, who
kind of only cares about herself
until one day she is murdered.
- Ahhhh!
- But then immediately
wakes up again on the day
of her birthday.
And then she's thrown into,
kind of, this ongoing cycle,
Groundhog's Day loop
of being killed again,
and again, and again,
no matter what she does.
[dramatic music]
- This has gotta be,
like, the strangest
birthday you've
ever had, huh?
- You have no idea.
- This being a slasher,
the movie is filled
with spectacular kills
committed by a silent
murder in a baby mask.
- Ahhhh!
[glass shatters]
- I hate to say it, but I really
love killing people on camera.
There's definitely a challenge
to coming up with
unusual kills,
but, like, it's also,
like, it's really fun
and I've always kind
of had a funny knack for it.
- Oh, (bleep).
[explosion thunders,
glass shatters]
- As Tree
is tested by the ordeal,
her layers of defensive
snark break down...
- Mmm, have a little,
a few calories won't kill you.
- Revealing her
complex inner core.
- In Hollywood,
and especially in genre
and horror movies, so often,
women get kind of pigeonholed.
You're either the good girl,
or you're the bad one who
gets killed right away,
or you're the bitch,
or you're the angel, and Tree
gets to be all of those things.
[tense music]
- Who are you?!
Show your face you pussy!
- She has this great trauma,
she lost her mom, the person she
was closer to than anyone
else in the world,
and she's never really
been able to process it.
- I bet you miss her.
- Yeah.
You know what's funny,
you relive
the same day
over and over again...
you kind of start to see
who you really are.
- If I have a jam,
or a gimmick, or whatever,
it is bringing that grounded
emotional stuff and then jamming
it into horror movies where they
don't belong, typically.
Because as a horror fan,
like, I know all the tricks.
[dramatic music]
- Like, I've
grown up watching all
the tricks and so it's really
fun to have this grab bag.
- Ahhh!
- But then know that,
like, all of that is
going to be infused
with something that's
really foreign to...
to these types of movies.
- Happy birthday, baby.
- I love the message
that the film has when it
comes to grief and loss,
and how you have to, kind of,
confront it and really
go through it, and spend some
real time with that loss and
not run away from it because
I think Tree's been running
for a really, really long time.
[wind whistling]
- Holiday horror films
can be cathartic releases
of bottled up emotions...
- Come on!
- Or deliberate stabs
in the eye of polite society.
Some find them offensive.
- Merry Christmas, Frank.
- But that's kind of
the point.
- Good horror is all about
uncomfortable juxtapositions.
It's about taking something
like Christmas,
something we love
and find comforting, and then
ruining it for everyone forever.
[gunshot blasts]
- Ahhhh!
- It is in the nature
of horror fiction,
horror cinema, to be a little
bit like punk rock.
[gunshots]
- If you
fail to piss anyone off...
- Die!
- Ahhhh!
- You're
probably doing it wrong.
- Oh, God!
---
- This is Halloween,
the night when all the creepy
things are supposed
to stalk the earth.
- Halloween and horror films,
to me, go hand in hand.
They are one,
they are married,
they are united and that's it.
- The last thing in the world
I thought I would do
is another "Halloween" movie.
- Happy Halloween, Michael.
- Every major holiday
that we celebrate...
Has some sort
of bloodshed underneath it.
[dramatic music]
- We love the holidays,
but we dread the holidays.
- Happy Thanksgiving, Grandma.
- Holidays are exhausting.
[tense music]
- It's Christmas I hate most.
- So there's something
very forbidden and cathartic
about watching
everybody get chopped up.
- Merry Christmas.
- All holidays tend to feel
like bull(bleep) after a while.
- Ah!
- To take it over
and to completely
desecrate it
with a horror movie...
- Happy Father's Day.
...is always kind of nice.
- Punish!
- No!
[eerie music]
♪ ♪
- [screams]
- Holidays are
usually the time we get
together with our families.
- Tra la la la la!
- For better...
- Bless you heart,
I was afraid you weren't coming.
- Or worse.
- Grandpa is nothing
but a crazy old fool.
- But even if you get
along with your relatives,
holidays can be stressful.
[loud bang]
- Ah!
- Passive aggressive behavior.
- Careful, kids,
remember that your Aunt Sarah
likes everything to be
clean and perfect and that's why
she makes so much food
that you can't pronounce.
- Forced cheerfulness.
♪ Season to be jolly ♪
- Heavy drinking.
- Where's the nog,
I need to get merry.
- They're typical parts
of the holiday experience.
All that tension
needs to be released.
Enter the holiday
horror film...
Bringing our wildest
homicidal holiday
fantasies to life.
- It's juxtaposing what
gives us great comfort
with something
that terrorizes us.
- Ah!
It's a very simple equation...
♪ Happy birthday ♪
- That is effectively
executed in many films.
♪ To me ♪
- Trick or treat!
- For horror fans,
Halloween is the happiest
holiday of the year,
but it wasn't until 1978 that
filmmakers combined
its inherent spookiness
with graphic murders.
John Carpenter's "Halloween"
set the standard
for slasher films.
It's been imitated many times,
but rarely equaled.
"Halloween's" success kicked
off a wave of the festive
fright films that
continues to this day.
Of course,
after "Halloween," people
started realizing that
it was a pretty good
gimmick to market a horror
movie around a holiday.
[eerie music]
- Like what's Valentine's Day?
Okay, let's
do "My Bloody Valentine."
There's New Year's Eve,
let's just do "New Year's Evil."
- Happy New Year!
- Ahhh!
- Holiday horror
never went away,
but it returned to center
stage with the revival
of the franchise
that started it all.
"Halloween," 2018,
was a massive hit that
brought Jamie Lee Curtis
back to the role that
made her a star.
What was it like playing
Laurie Strode 40 years later?
- Well, it was just... it
honored all of it, it honored
the trauma, it honored the thing
that I've always wondered about
about these movies, which
is what happens to these people.
There's a lot of stuff
that happens, but then what
happens to the people
that survived after wards?
- David Gordon Green's
reboot made the bold choice
of ignoring all nine
"Halloween" sequels
and remakes.
- What made the first
film scary, and what made
Michael Myers scary,
you didn't know who he was.
All you knew is he killed
his sister, you don't know why.
You know, let's go back
to that pure dread that came
with Halloween
and let's go back
to that singular strong
final girl
that took him on, and let's
see what she's like 40 years
later, and she's, you know,
she's... she's kinda messed up.
- From a clinical perspective,
Doctor, would you say
that Laurie strode has
lost her (bleep)ing marbles?
- There are many
ways for tragedy
and violence to change a victim.
- She's still very deeply
affected by what happened,
but she's also a survivor
and she's ready for anything.
- Laurie lives in the woods,
she is a sure shot,
she practices every day
on these dummies, and she's
an end of days prepper,
ready for Michael Myers
because she knows Michael's
gonna come back.
Sometime someplace,
she will be prepared.
- Girl is as hard as can be.
The trauma
of what she went through,
you see it in her life down
to the way she built her house.
Everything is wrapped up.
This safety and the way
that she interacts with
her daughter,
and her daughter's daughter.
- If the way I raised
your mother means that she
hates me,
but that she's prepared
for the horrors
of this world, then...
I can live with that.
- We didn't see that
journey fully, but we know it.
- The opening sequences
with Michael Myers
in the insane asylum.
- There he is.
- Go right there
with some of the most
chilling stuff in any
Halloween picture ever.
- It is so beautiful,
the checkerboard floor,
those other people
out on the yard,
that strange man having a fit,
the dog barking.
- I love the fact they
brought back Nick Castle,
the original actor to play
The Shape in the asylum
scenes at the start,
I thought that was really great.
- He's being transferred and,
of course, he commandeers
the bus through acts
of incredible violence, and...
- He gets out.
- So now you've set up
a woman who's been
waiting and he comes back.
[eerie music swells]
[boot thuds]
- This movie finally
gave us that moment
of Michael Myers going
around on Halloween,
walking around
the neighborhood,
children bumping into h.
Just walking
through the house.
[eerie music]
[woman gasps]
- Spectacular... it's spectacular.
- After considerable mayhem,
Laurie, her daughter,
and her granddaughter
have a final showdown
with the unstoppable fiend.
- Michael's here,
get downstairs.
Go, baby, go!
- Michael seems certain
to win, but this is a film
about a woman who turns
the tables on her abuser.
[gunshot blasts]
- She successfully traps him...
[gate slams]
- And, actually, has trained her
daughter to do so as well,
which I thought was really cool
because she plays
the damsel in distress
to the last moment.
- I can't do it!
Gotcha.
[gunshot blasts]
[thud]
- Happy Halloween, Michael.
- Were you surprised that
it resonated the way it did,
that it was
such a cultural milestone?
- As we were
launching the 2018 movie,
it was right in the center
of the Me Too movement,
and so women taking power
and speaking truth to power,
voicing their experiences as
trauma victims, was echoing all
over the world when we released
that movie, a movie about
a woman taking power from her
trauma against her oppressor.
- Goodbye, Michael.
- So I think there
was this spectacular
confluence of life
and evolution of women,
and Laurie Strode coming
to grips with Michael Myers.
- Today, horror
and holidays go hand in hand,
but it wasn't always that way.
In 1974,
one movie started it all.
- Hello?
[man screaming]
- Hello?
[man screaming]
♪ ♪
- Christmas, it's the most
wonderful time of the year.
- Good morning, Merry Christmas.
[laughter]
- A time of joy, unmarred
by the dark side of life.
[dramatic musical sting]
- So they say.
- People forget that
Christmas used to be
a very spooky holiday,
that people used to get
together and tell ghost
stories on Christmas.
Only recently, over the last
few decades, has it been turned
into this very glossy,
shiny, family oriented event.
- So, it should not have
come as a surprise when
Bob Clark Combined Christmas
with graphic murders
and launched
a new style of horror.
[glass shattering]
- I think
Bob Clark's "Black Christmas"
is ground zero
for holiday horror.
I mean,
Bob Clark was a genius,
the guy created,
of course, "Deathdream,"
"Children Shouldn't Play
with Dead Things."
He takes the POV from
Mario Bava's "Bay of Blood,"
he applies the holiday
to it, basically
starts a slasher film
with "Black Christmas."
- On a snowy Christmas Eve,
a serial killer breaks
into the attic
of a sorority house.
He terrorizes
the women downstairs
with disturbing phone calls.
[creepy laughter on phone]
- They're so raw, those
phone calls are so intense.
- Let me lick your pretty,
pink, (bleep).
- That's so insane,
I don't even feel like
anyone would
put that in a movie now.
- Pretty, pink, (bleep).
- Even though I feel like,
as a society,
we've gotten more vulgar, those
phone calls just still shock.
- I'm going to kill you.
- Then he murders them
one by one.
- Ahhh!
- And that is where
a lot of the slashers
take their root,
and the idea that we can do
it at Christmas time just brings
this whole 'nother level to it.
[carollers singing]
- It makes it all shiny,
and beautiful, and pretty,
and then the blood feels
that much more bloody.
[dramatic music]
- [giggles]
- Bob Clark knows that to make
us fear for the characters,
we have
to care about them first.
- I thought the characters
felt so real, and that was my
favorite thing about it,
just, it felt like a real group
of friends, enemies, you know,
just a real group of women.
- Oh, come on, this is
a sorority house, not a convent.
- Margot Kidder,
and Keir Dullea,
and Olivia Hussey
and Andrea Martin,
the cast really made that
movie something really special.
- Oh, why don't you
go find a wall socket
and stick your tongue in it,
that'll give you a charge.
- As her friends disappear,
the film's heroine, Jess,
grapples with her decision
to have an abortion.
- You don't want it.
- No.
- It's a bold plotline for
a film made the year after
Roe v. Wade,
the Supreme Court ruling
protecting a
woman's right to choose.
By making her disapproving
boyfriend a suspect...
- Peter, Jesus,
you scared the hell out of me.
- The abortion debate becomes
part of the murder mystery.
- You selfish bitch.
You're talking about
killing our baby as though
you were having a wart removed.
- Now can you see why
I didn't want to tell you?
- And you're like, "Oh my god,
her boyfriend is now
stalking and killing
her because she wouldn't
have his baby..."
[glass shatters]
...because she
feels like she's too
young and she wants
to finish college.
- Retrospectively, we
look at "Black Christmas"
and it's very progressive.
- You can't ask me to drop
everything I've been working
for and give up all my ambitions
because your plans have changed.
- There's a lot going
on with these characters that is
reflective
of what was happening
in the early '70s for women.
- Clark's direction was
just as forward thinking.
- Hey!
- Introducing many
of the stylistic
tropes that
define the slasher genre,
baiting the audience
with a whodunit mystery.
- You think it's my fault,
don't you?
- Staging a series
of brutal murders,
each more
outlandish than the last.
[chainsaw rumbling]
- Ahhhh!
- And having
the killer hide inside
the house with his victims.
[phone ringing]
- Taunting them by telephone.
- The caller is in the house,
the calls
are coming from the house.
[dramatic music]
- And this is kind of one
of the first great examples
of the subjective camera
in a slasher movie.
But it's something that critics
jumped on later on, in "Friday
the 13th," they really attacked
it because they were saying,
"Oh, it's putting you
in the killer's point of view,
it's attacking women,
and it's misogynist."
No, at least in the beginning,
that's not the point.
The point is,
you never see the face,
that's what's so scary.
You have no idea what this guy
looks like,
all you see is his eye.
[dramatic musical sting]
- Jess is the only survivor
of the massacre,
making her one of the first
final girls in horror.
She confronts her
boyfriend and kills him.
But unlike "Halloween"
and other slashers to come,
there's no cathartic victory.
The police,
assuming the murders are over,
leave her asleep in the house,
then the phone rings.
[phone ringing]
- Because her boyfriend
was not the killer,
and the cops are wrong,
and they didn't get him, and now
she's probably going to die
because of their incompetence.
[phone ringing]
[eerie music]
- And it's written that way
deliberately to infuriate us.
We're supposed to see
how society leaves
this woman vulnerable.
[phone ringing]
- As those credits are
rolling and you just hear
that phone ringing,
and ringing, and ringing,
it's supposed to leave
you uneasy,
like even after the credits
stop, you know, you're like,
"Okay, am I safe now?"
You know,
and you don't know.
- And we weren't safe
because "Black Christmas"
led to "Halloween" and the
slasher glut of the 80s.
- Ahhh!
- Agghh!
- Ahh!
- Perhaps in penance,
the next holiday film
Bob Clark directed was
"A Christmas Story,"
a film as warm and fuzzy
as "Black Christmas" is cold
and creepy, but even that
film featured a bad Santa.
- Ho, ho, ho.
- Ahhh!
- Sinister Santas were
soon to become fixtures
in the landscape
of holiday horror.
- Naughty!
[dramatic music]
- Chris Kringle,
Father Christmas, Saint Nick,
Santa Claus,
we know him by many names.
He's a jolly old elf.
- Merry Christmas!
- But in horror,
even Santa has a dark side.
- If you
think about Santa Claus,
the whole thing is creepy.
There's a man coming into
your house, down your chimney
to bring you gifts, and you
feed him, it's low-key grooming.
- I want you to remember
to stay good boys and girls.
Now if you do this,
I'll make sure you get
good presents from me
every year.
- It's weird.
- Sinister Santas have
popped up in movies
for decades.
- Ahh!
- The most notorious remains
"Silent Night, Deadly Night"
from 1984.
- If you've
seen all the slashers,
you're a little taken aback
by "Silent Night, Deadly Night."
- Ahh!
- The idea of putting on
a Santa Claus suit and going
out and killing, taking horror
to that level, it's brutal.
- The movie begins as
young Billy watches a man
dressed as Santa Claus
murder his parents.
- No! No!
[tires squealing]
[gunshots]
- No!
- Billy grows up and gets
a job at a toy store.
When he's forced to dress
as Santa Claus for Christmas,
he has a psychotic break.
- You remember what Santa Claus
does on Christmas Eve, don't ya?
- Where are ya,
you little bastard?!
- Yeah, I know what he does.
- He starts killing
everyone he deems naughty.
- Punish.
[glass shatters]
Punish!
Punish.
- Ahhh!
- People who don't understand
the concept of slasher movies,
to them, it's all violent porno,
as far as they're concerned,
because they just don't get it,
and most of the films that they
made a big deal about,
I wish they were closer to what
they think they were,
I wish they were that strong.
- Mm-hmm.
- "Silent Night, Deadly Night"
is (bleep)ed up
for a horror film fan.
[eerie piano music]
- The film's desecration
of Christmas caused a scandal.
Protests by angry parents
and religious groups led
to the film being pulled
from theaters
after only a week.
But the figure
of a sinister Santa
has been around for centuries.
Europeans grow up haunted
by stories of Krampus,
St. Nick's
sinister doppelganger.
The film "Krampus"
brought him to suburban
America and satirized
the commercialization
of Christmas.
- I was getting a little bit
more cynical
about the holidays,
and I think it was an effort
to sort of try and turn the tide
inside of myself and rediscover
the magic of Christmas,
even if it
was through a horror story.
- "Krampus" begins like
a family relationship comedy.
- Merry Christmas!
- Move it, we don't have to keep
the traffic jam going now.
- Oh, let me help you.
[thud]
- Two families are getting
together for Christmas.
They're very different
types of families.
- Well, I just thought
you guys might like a break
from macaroni
and cheese with hotdogs.
- Yeah, okay.
- They don't necessarily
get along and they don't
share a lot
of the same worldviews.
- Honey, we said no gun
talk at the dinner table.
- This family needs
a little gun talk whether
it's at the dinner
table or anywhere else.
- I think it was really
fun that the family was
kind of dysfunctional
'cause it kind of reminded
me of every Christmas
dinner out there where
you invite the cousins
you don't like...
- [belches]
- The uncle you never see.
- Ha ha,
that's my boy!
- It sure is.
- Adam Scott,
Toni Collette, David Koechner,
the late great Conchata Ferrell.
- Looks like Martha Stewart
threw up in here.
- Allison Tolman, these are
all actors that you almost
would expect to see in "National
Lampoon's Christmas Vacation"
or something like that.
- The center of the story
is young Max, played by
Emjay Anthony,
who is struggling
not to lose faith
in Christmas.
- He's trying to desperately
hold on to the family.
He misses his big sister,
you know,
he wants to actually have good
things happen for his family.
- Wait, mom, aren't we
gonna watch Charlie Brown?
- And the second
he gives up...
- I just wanted to Christmas
to be like it used to be,
but forget it, I hate Christmas,
I hate all of you.
- The Krampus is like,
"Yep, you messed up now."
- Krampus is
a shadow of St. Nicholas.
He represents everything
that Santa Claus isn't and he's
dispatched to punish
non-believers on the holiday.
- And so, power goes out,
then their daughter goes
to see her boyfriend,
now she's missing.
Something is happening,
something monstrous
is out there.
- I've hunted a lot of game
in my day, those are hooves.
- The house starts
getting attacked by all
manner of Krampus minions.
- Ahhh!
- Oh sh...
- From these trollish,
dwarfish, horrors,
gingerbread men...
...beautifully, creepy,
sinister clown snake.
- Come on.
[roars]
- Shoot it,
Tom, shoot it!
- So this whole family
that normally doesn't like
each other, is forced
to come together, put aside
their differences, and overcome
Krampus and his minions.
- Shepherd's gotta protect
his flock.
[monster roaring]
- Like many Christmas tales,
everyone learns
a valuable lesson...
- I'm sorry.
- The hard way.
- Noooo!
[dramatic music]
- Ahh, ahhh!
- It's a very personal
statement for myself,
just how hard it is
to maintain optimism
and a belief in the goodness
of human beings when
you're confronted
with the opposite every time you
wake up in the morning
and turn on the news.
- Merry Christmas, Max.
- I do think it's kind
of a good family horror movie.
I was so happy to be in it.
I felt like, "(bleep) yes, this
is awesome, this is awesome,"
and I thought this is
going to just blow people away.
[monsters shriek]
- Holiday partyers
are literally blown away
in two famous slashers
from the Great White North.
[eerie music]
- Two of the most memorable
holiday slashers came
out of Canada
in the early 1980s.
The first was "Terror Train"
starring Jamie Lee Curtis,
two years after "Halloween."
Can you tell me the plot
of "Terror Train?"
- "Terror Train" is
a bunch of college kids,
New Year's Eve,
taking a train for a party
on the train,
and a bad guy shows up.
- On New Year's Eve
of their senior year,
a group of pre-meds gather
for an ill-fated
costume party.
- Happy New Year!
- Three years earlier,
they played a cruel
prank on virginal young Kenny.
- Elena?
- Hello, Kenny.
- Baiting him
with the promise of sex.
- Don't be shy,
this is my first time, too.
- Then surprising him
with a corpse.
[dramatic music]
- The shock drove him insane.
- Ahh, ahh, ahhh!
- Now he's back for revenge.
- All aboard.
- Early on in the film,
a character is literally killed
in front of other people
and nobody notices because
everybody's in costume,
everybody's drunk,
everybody's having a good time,
and he's the joker so
they're like, "Ha ha,
funny joke, dying."
And the killer assumes
this person's identity
by wearing their costume.
Nobody notices that
all of a sudden he's
taller or doesn't speak.
- We're at
the station with a sword.
- And that's the key
essence of the film.
It's... it's a revenge slasher
about someone that you never
used to pay attention
to except to make fun of,
and now you're still
not paying attention
to them,
and they're gonna kill you.
- In "Terror Train,"
appearances
aren't just deceiving,
they're deadly.
Beneath their surface beauty,
the students
are callous brats,
reeking of unearned privilege.
- Mo and I worked
in an emergency
gynecological ward.
- Doc won
an award.
- Best pap smear in a
supporting role, come on.
- The killer mocks
their superficiality
by disguising himself
with the masks of his victims.
- It adds
to the paranoia because
your sweetheart might be
in the gorilla suit one minute,
and then the next
minute you think you're
getting a midnight kiss
and it's the killer.
- Ahhh!
- "Terror Train" was
shot entirely at night
aboard an actual steam
train by John Alcott,
the man who
photographed "The Shining"
and "Barry Lyndon"
for director Stanley Kubrick.
- John Alcott figured
out how to shoot in very
low natural light.
In "Barry Lyndon,"
he would shoot scenes
with natural candle light,
for example,
which was something
that people
hadn't really seen before.
And that got him an
Academy Award.
Now, "Terror Train,"
in its own way,
it's also a bit of a ground
breaker because
they were shooting it,
you know, with this real train,
and they had to figure out
how to light the darn thing.
- John Alcott wired
all of the practical
lights on the train
to a lightboard, and he would
light the scene by dials,
that's it.
- It's very painterly,
if you look at that film,
almost every shot.
I think it's one of the most
beautiful slasher films of the era.
- What are your memories of it?
- I remember that it was nights,
I remember it was cold AF,
and I wore big hoop earrings,
and I said to them,
"In the fight,
it would be great if he pulls
through the hoop earring,
and like splits her ear open."
- Ahh!
- But it was all one take and so
how was I going to get bloody?
So, I go under, like,
a bed or something and there
was a pool of blood
that we had left there.
So, when I went under there...
- You'd do your own makeup
and come out.
- I did my own makeup and then
come out and now it's all bloody
and you really think like, "Wow,
he really ripped her ear apart."
- That's third grade stuff.
- Really?
[switchblade clicks]
- For much of the movie,
we're led to believe that
a magician, played
by real life illusionist
David Copperfield,
is the killer.
- A magician.
- Magician?
- But in keeping
with the film's theme,
all is not what it seems.
- The big reveal was that
it was his female assistant,
who was trans...
- Yeah.
- Was ultimately the killer.
- It brings you back
to that illusion idea,
that he's
creating this magic trick.
When you see the movie again,
you're kind of like,
"It's totally Kenny,"
but because your brain is
making assumptions,
it's not seeing that.
It's saying, "Oh, well,
that's the magician,
that's his assistant."
So, you label him
or her as an assistant,
it couldn't
possibly be the killer.
And so, I really think
that the magic theme,
sort of, underscored what they
were trying to achieve
with the reveal of the killer.
- It was you.
- Still, seen 40 years later,
it's a controversial choice.
- It's a version of the queer
panic subgenre that
you (bleep)ed
with my sexuality
in some way that made me
question my gender identity
and kill people.
[dramatic music]
[train rumbling]
[wind howling]
[thud]
- A year
after "Terror Train" made
us leery of New Year's
and costume parties,
"My Bloody Valentine" did
the same for the day of love.
- Ahhhh!
[dramatic music]
- The night
of the Valentine's Day dance,
everybody was there except
for seven miners who
were out at the Hanniger Mine.
- An accident
on Valentine's Day
in a small mining town
kills a score of men
and turns a traumatized
survivor into
a cannibalistic serial killer.
The town bans
Valentine's Day celebrations.
20 years later,
a new generation decides
it's time
to get the party started.
- Roses are red,
violets are blue,
one is dead and so are you?
- Then the murders begin.
- Mabel!
[dramatic music]
- To me,
it's the best of the Canadian
slasher films,
partly because it commits
to being
a Canadian slasher film.
- Yeah, it's not like
well-to-do kids in a sorority
house being picked off.
- No, no,
it's in a steel mining town
in Canada where they
have thick Canadian accents.
- There ain't
nothing to do about it.
- You can't have 'em both, you know?
- I don't want them both.
- You'll be sorry you didn't
listen to me, you'll be sorry.
- As the party rages,
a mysterious killer
picks off the miners
and their girlfriends
one by one
in creatively macabre ways.
[heavy breathing]
- Sylvia?
[eerie music]
- Like "Terror Train,"
"My Bloody Valentine" makes
the most out of its location.
The last half hour
of the film takes place
deep inside an actual mine.
- There's one way out
and that way is probably blocked
by your
pursuing maniac in a mask.
It's tight, it's dark,
there are no places of light
except those that are
strung by the mining company.
So you're completely removed
from civilization,
and you are thrust
into the most claustrophobic
environment possible.
- [gasps]
- Nowadays,
"My Bloody Valentine"
is one of the most significant and
beloved of the Golden Age slasher films.
[maniacal laughter]
- Sarah, be my bloody Valentine.
[laughing continues]
- It's really just
a textbook example of how
you pull off
one of these things.
[maniacal laughter]
- Some people like to head
out for the holidays,
to get in touch with
old friends,
or spend quality time
with dear old mom.
- Ain't we havin' fun?
- Well, I don't know
about the two of you,
but I'm getting out of here.
- Wait for me.
- Holidays are a great
time for a getaway
with your friends...
except in horror movies.
Exhibit A,
1980's "Mother's Day."
Three college friends
on a camping trip are
kidnapped
by psychotic brothers.
- Why don't you get the Kodak?
- Yeah, I'll get the Kodak.
- They subject the women
to a night
of abuse and torture,
all for the entertainment
of their sadistic mother.
- My boys.
- One woman dies,
the others escape,
but then they turn back.
- We'll get those bastards.
- These women actively said,
"We're gonna go back,
and we're gonna hunt these
people down, and we're gonna
kill them and get revenge for
what they did to our friend."
That was badass,
there was a certain
feminist element to it
that I really appreciate,
that was unusual
for a film of that time.
- Jackie, every way you
turned in life you got shit.
Well, now we'll do
the fighting back for you.
♪ ♪
- When I was a kid, I was
obsessed with Mother's Day.
I even screened it at
my bar mitzvah party
with my mom in attendance.
I had very tolerant parents.
It's not for everyone.
- Now take
care of the big one, Ike.
- But look
past the sensationalism
and you'll find a wicked
satire of pop culture.
- Wake up, it's me, Big Bird,
and it's time to get up.
- The mother has these
psychopathic sons who have been
weaned on television
and so they have no way
of distinguishing between
fantasy and reality.
- All right, now,
it's beautiful day, see?
You're readin' somethin'
real good.
- Yeah, like a muscle magazine.
- All three villains are
punished with ironic deaths.
One brother is literally
killed by television,
the other
gets an axe to the groin,
and the mother meets
a uniquely maternal end.
- No, let me be, let me be,
I'm a sick woman!
- I wanted something
more from the mother's death.
- Yeah.
- Then I thought,
"Oh, my God, it's perfect,
mother's been
suffocated by the breasts."
- Yeah.
- It's really what made
me see what you could
do with a slasher film.
I started
watching Mother's Day over,
and over,
and over, and thinking,
"Oh my god, you can actually
say a lot with a slasher movie."
- "April Fool's Day"
from 1986 is another film
about a gory getaway and,
unlike some holiday
slashers, it takes its
title seriously.
- We've talked about before that
I like "April Fool's Day."
- I love
"April" for Fred Walton,
man, I mean, what a great film.
- College student,
Muffy, invites her smug,
overprivileged friends to her
family's secluded island
for an April Fool's Day party.
- We're gonna
spend a weekend there?
- The pranks begin
almost immediately.
- Well, what... what
are you scared?
- Hey, I said give it a rest.
- You have a fake
death at the beginning.
You have
a guy pretending to get killed.
- We got 'em.
- Ha, ha, April Fools.
- It's like you're never quite
sure what's real and what's not.
- The childish prank
is followed
by a horrific accident.
- Buck, look out!
- Ahhhh!
[crunching]
- Ahhhh!
- Soon it seems we're
watching a whodunnit
slasher where the students
are picked off one by
one with not entirely
convincing special effects.
- There's that one scene where,
you know,
the risky couple's in bed.
- What is this, show and tell?
- And she, like,
gives him a nudge and his hands
fall over and we know
that he has been dismembered.
- And, of course,
they don't bother to think about
all your buddies
are getting killed off
on April Fool's Day,
maybe there's something
else going on here?
[dramatic music]
- But they're not really
the brightest bulbs
so you let it slide.
- The final survivors learn
that Muffy's homicidal twin,
Buffy, is the killer.
- No, nooo!
- Then, in one of the most
divisive horror endings
of all time, they discover
everybody is still alive.
Muffy has pulled
a massive prank
on her friends
and the audience.
- April Fools!
- I don't condone pranks like
that in real life because you
really never know how someone's
gonna react to a situation.
- I love you.
- I love you
too, babe.
- Ahh, aggh!
- Watching it in a film
and having it all play out
on screen,
I think, is fantastic.
[laughing]
- For me,
the ending was what kept it
from being
a classic horror film.
- It's unfair that
people write the movie
off because of the ending.
- Does that negate
the whole movie, yeah.
- That it
negates the whole film.
Now, I really like the ending,
now I know what to expect,
I really like the ending.
- But is that about it
breaking its own rules?
- Yeah, but in the case
of "April Fool's Day,"
I think that's our failure
because, no, it's April Fools,
it didn't happen,
that's the point.
- They played a joke.
- It's the point of the holiday,
"April Fool's!"
It's clearly
marked on the label,
it's our misunderstanding of it,
they did a perfect job.
- Yeah, you're right,
I never even thought
of it that way,
that's really funny.
[laughter]
- April Fool.
[eerie music]
- Happy birthday.
- What's worse than being
murdered on your birthday?
Endlessly reliving that day
and dying over and over again.
- Hey!
[tense music]
See you soon
(bleep)hole.
Ahhh!
[dramatic music]
- Holiday horror films
are often about the terror
of facing our families.
Christopher Landon's slasher
comedy, "Happy Death Day..."
is about the terror
of facing ourselves.
- "Happy Death Day" is
about a very stereotypical
mean girl sorority member
named Tree Gelbman,
who I play, who
kind of only cares about herself
until one day she is murdered.
- Ahhhh!
- But then immediately
wakes up again on the day
of her birthday.
And then she's thrown into,
kind of, this ongoing cycle,
Groundhog's Day loop
of being killed again,
and again, and again,
no matter what she does.
[dramatic music]
- This has gotta be,
like, the strangest
birthday you've
ever had, huh?
- You have no idea.
- This being a slasher,
the movie is filled
with spectacular kills
committed by a silent
murder in a baby mask.
- Ahhhh!
[glass shatters]
- I hate to say it, but I really
love killing people on camera.
There's definitely a challenge
to coming up with
unusual kills,
but, like, it's also,
like, it's really fun
and I've always kind
of had a funny knack for it.
- Oh, (bleep).
[explosion thunders,
glass shatters]
- As Tree
is tested by the ordeal,
her layers of defensive
snark break down...
- Mmm, have a little,
a few calories won't kill you.
- Revealing her
complex inner core.
- In Hollywood,
and especially in genre
and horror movies, so often,
women get kind of pigeonholed.
You're either the good girl,
or you're the bad one who
gets killed right away,
or you're the bitch,
or you're the angel, and Tree
gets to be all of those things.
[tense music]
- Who are you?!
Show your face you pussy!
- She has this great trauma,
she lost her mom, the person she
was closer to than anyone
else in the world,
and she's never really
been able to process it.
- I bet you miss her.
- Yeah.
You know what's funny,
you relive
the same day
over and over again...
you kind of start to see
who you really are.
- If I have a jam,
or a gimmick, or whatever,
it is bringing that grounded
emotional stuff and then jamming
it into horror movies where they
don't belong, typically.
Because as a horror fan,
like, I know all the tricks.
[dramatic music]
- Like, I've
grown up watching all
the tricks and so it's really
fun to have this grab bag.
- Ahhh!
- But then know that,
like, all of that is
going to be infused
with something that's
really foreign to...
to these types of movies.
- Happy birthday, baby.
- I love the message
that the film has when it
comes to grief and loss,
and how you have to, kind of,
confront it and really
go through it, and spend some
real time with that loss and
not run away from it because
I think Tree's been running
for a really, really long time.
[wind whistling]
- Holiday horror films
can be cathartic releases
of bottled up emotions...
- Come on!
- Or deliberate stabs
in the eye of polite society.
Some find them offensive.
- Merry Christmas, Frank.
- But that's kind of
the point.
- Good horror is all about
uncomfortable juxtapositions.
It's about taking something
like Christmas,
something we love
and find comforting, and then
ruining it for everyone forever.
[gunshot blasts]
- Ahhhh!
- It is in the nature
of horror fiction,
horror cinema, to be a little
bit like punk rock.
[gunshots]
- If you
fail to piss anyone off...
- Die!
- Ahhhh!
- You're
probably doing it wrong.
- Oh, God!