Editorials
The 5 Best (And 1 Worst) Films Of John Carpenter!!!
I’m a writer/director guy. Meaning, moreso than who starred in any given film, I plan my trip to the theater based on who wrote and/or directed it. When I become invested in someone’s creative output, I’ll often follow their “voice” through all kinds of highs and lows, which means finding things to love in their lesser projects. I understand why the public at large doesn’t have the time or inclination to subscribe to this practice (though many more people seem capable of forging this kind of unbreakable alliance with sports teams), but I honestly think it’s an interesting – and compassionate – way to watch films (or listen to music).
Every career has peaks and valleys. In some careers the valleys are more severe and in others the peaks are more triumphant, but they exist. They’re unavoidable from both creative and commercial standpoints. I think it would be fun to examine this from time to time on BD (even though some of the most exciting voices in horror need another film or two under their belt to qualify), with the amount of “Bests” and “Worsts” varying each time.
First up? John Carpenter. I feel like he’s the perfect starting point. Not only does he have a large output, but he’s had one of the more interesting careers in horror, full of ups and downs (and the occasional creative triumph that he was punished for professionally).
Head inside for the 5 Best (And 1 Worst) Films Of John Carpenter.
1: THE THING
No surprise here, most Carpenter fans I talk to have either this or Halloween at the top of their list. For me, The Thing just has a better replay value. It’s an incredibly assured film, expertly paced with a perfectly dour tonal pitch. Carpenter has made several classics, but none quite as perfectly balanced. It was also his first foray into big-budget (at the time $10M was a lot for a horror film) studio filmmaking. Famously, The Thing tanked at the box office. In an alternate universe where this film was a hit, Carpenter’s post 1982 career-trajectory looks quite a bit different.
2: HALLOWEEN
Halloween has had the biggest cultural impact out of any film in Carpenter’s filmography. Without it, the slasher genre as we know and love it today wouldn’t exist (and if it did, it wouldn’t be the same – there certainly wouldn’t be a Friday The 13th). Aside from its massive popularity, Halloween is another near-perfect film. On only his third feature (after Dark Star and Assault On Precinct 13), Carpenter had mastered a sense of restraint that eludes most horror filmmakers to this day. I’m not just talking about the largely bloodless nature of the film – the decision to simply not explain how or why Michael Myers became evil incarnate is a master stroke. He just is, which is scarier than any cause and effect scenario.
3: BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA
Initially I put Big Trouble In Little China at number four, just under Escape From New York. But, as good as Escape is, I simply don’t reach for my copy of it nearly as much as I reach for this one. China is just too much fun. It feels huge, has a great villain in Lo Pan and is more fun than the last two Indiana Jones films combined. It also plays out a neat reversal on the hero/sidekick dynamic, with Kurt Russell’s Jack Burton being way more ineffectual than Dennis Dun’s Wang Chi despite his leading man status and placement. You can really feel Carpenter spreading his wings here but, much like The Thing, his ambition went unrewarded financially.
4: ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK
Escape From New York gave birth to Carpenter’s most iconic anti-hero in Kurt Russell’s Snake Plissken in addition to an entertainingly menacing and apocalyptic vision of New York City. This film, along with They Live, really hammers home Carpenter’s mistrust of authority and actually feels a bit dangerous at times. It certainly doesn’t play it safe when it comes to its characters.
5: IN THE MOUTH OF MADNESS
I know a lot of people would put They Live in this spot but, truth be told, that film only works for me in fits and starts (not that it doesn’t have some brilliant moments). Dark Star and Assault On Precinct 13 might be “cooler” contenders as well, but there’s something relentlessly entertaining about In The Mouth Of Madness. It has a great madcap energy, some genuinely freaky images, a great villain in Jurgen Prochnow’s Sutter Cane and a deliciously unhinged performance by Sam Neill at its center. From opening to closing credits, it’s every bit as alive as some of Carpenter’s more traditionally well regarded works.
GHOSTS OF MARS
It’s not like the five movies above are the only great Carpenter films. The tender Starman is surprisingly great and They Live works as an entertaining political statement while The Fog, Christine and Prince Of Darkness are all rock solid horror films.
While Vampires and Escape From L.A. were fairly flawed, they actually have their moments. But I can’t really say the same for Ghosts Of Mars. The red planet might be our closest neighbor, but you’d have to travel light years beyond it to find a universe in which this film actually works.
The Ward is something of an improvement, but I can’t help but agree with the general consensus that Carpenter probably feels discouraged with the film business (and with making movies in general). I can’t say I blame him, he’s made more great films than most “name” directors but has rarely attained anything resembling their commercial success. Here’s hoping he gets back in the saddle and, afforded the opportunity, makes another great film. I know he’s got at least one left in him.
What are your favorite (and least favorite) John Carpenter films?
The penultimate season of Tales from the Crypt (1989–1996) aired its first three episodes on October 31, so it’s understandable that at least one of those three stories is set on Halloween.
Sandwiched between “Let the Punishment Fit the Crime” (Russell Mulcahy, Ron Finley) and “Whirlpool” (Mick Garris, A. L. Katz & Gilbert Adler) is the most severe episode of the bunch. Maybe the entire series? William Malone and Dick Beebe’s “Only Skin Deep” traded the show’s typical sense of fun for startling amounts of bleakness and kink.
“Only Skin Deep” is, apart from the Crypt Keeper’s intro and outro, noticeably unfunny. There are no considerable attempts at making the viewer laugh. Come to think of it, if those bookends had been replaced, and there was more of a sci-fi element in the story, HBO could have easily squeezed this tale into that successor anthology, Perversions of Science (1997). In Crypt, though, “Only Skin Deep” is much too grim for an audience that had become accustomed to campiness and levity.
What makes “Only Skin Deep” feel dark, among other things, is its protagonist. Showing up to a Halloween party where he’s not welcome, and where his former girlfriend (Diane DiLasco) is attending, Carl Schlag (Peter Onorati) first comes across as your standard bitter ex. You soon realize it’s much worse than that, once Carl threatens Linda (“You know, silly me, thinking I gave you what you deserved. If I’d have done that, I’d have killed you”). Now, I haven’t forgotten that Tales from the Crypt was teeming with vile men who did women harm. Yet Carl’s brand of misogynistic menace hits differently—it borders on being too realistic for this kind of series.
Mike Vosburg’s EC-style comic cover for “Only Skin Deep”, as seen in the Tales from the Crypt episode.
Despite donning a party mask for much of the episode, Carl can’t ever mask his true nature. The invitation did say “come as you are”, after all. That inability to change and be better, however, is why Carl ends up in such a karmic predicament. His outburst of anger at the party attracts the attention of one loner partygoer named Molly (Sherrie Rose, who was also in Season Four’s “On a Deadman’s Chest”). Her bone-white, featureless “mask” and body-bag costume don’t initially register as too strange, especially on a night like this. But at a party chock-full of colorful, cartoonish, and lighthearted ensembles, it does look out of place.
Darkness attracts darkness as Carl ditches the party and accompanies the mysterious Molly to her place. Which, by the way, should have been an immediate red flag. But perhaps she’s so hot, he doesn’t seem to mind the serial killer aesthetic. Resembling a warehouse that has been converted into living spaces, but never then decorated to remove the cold, industrial look, Molly’s home (or lair) is as gloomy as this whole episode feels. It’s like the set of a grungy music video, albeit a tad cleaner. The environments in a typical Crypt episode tend to be small, overfilled, and broken-in. Warm, regardless of any weird goings-on. All that empty space in Molly’s hovel, on the other hand, elicits a creepy feeling that Carl was unwise to ignore.
Tales from the Crypt featured more sex than it didn’t, but hands down, “Only Skin Deep” boasts the steamiest scene in the show’s history. Pushing it over the line, in addition to Onorati showing bare buns and the camera never turning down one of his pelvic thrusts, is the twisted dirty talk. Carl stays in the moment, whereas Molly unleashes charged lines like “the hurt, the anger, give it to me” and “take it out on my flesh like you want to”. It’s all quite kinky, as well as tied into the story’s theme of pain.
How else “Only Skin Deep” differs from other episodes is its twists. Or rather, its lack thereof. Nothing comes as a great surprise here, particularly because the deuteragonist’s ulterior motives are so obvious. By no means is Molly a wolf in sheep’s clothing; her face is a fright mask, she practically reeks of death, and she lives in what can best be described as a serial killer’s hideout. That last-act revelation of Molly’s mask really being her face is also nothing shocking. Cleverness is certainly not this episode’s strength.
A page from “…Only Skin Deep!”, as seen in EC Comics’ Tales from the Crypt.
While “Only Skin Deep” isn’t the most universally loved episode of Tales from the Crypt, it’s an interesting preview of William Malone’s future as a director. Most notably, he went on to helm House on Haunted Hill (1999) and FeardotCom (2002), the former of which was co-written by Dick Beebe, this episode’s writer. Dark Castle Entertainment, that genre house founded by Crypt producers Joel Silver, Robert Zemeckis, and Gilbert Adler, was instrumental in bringing out Malone’s gruesome, over-the-top vision in House on Haunted Hill. However, FeardotCom and Malone’s Masters of Horror episode, “Fair-Haired Child”, are the most stylistically compatible with “Only Skin Deep”.
As one might guess, this episode is nothing like its source material. The “…Only Skin Deep!” found in the pages of EC Comics is set during Mardi Gras in New Orleans, and save for its last couple of pages, is pretty sweet in nature. There, a man named Herbert is enamored with a woman he met five years prior to the present-day story. Every year, he has come down to Mardi Gras to see Suzanne, who’s always dressed as a hag-faced witch. Well, this time, Herbert plans on popping the question and marrying someone who is, for the most part, a total stranger. Suzanne accepts his proposal, but with one condition: they stay in costume until they’re officially hitched. You can probably see where this is going…
Once they are married, Suzanne remains incognito, even when she and Herbert have consummated their vows. A semi-predictive nightmare then rattles Herbert; he dreamt that Suzanne’s real face was as wizened as her mask. Finally, in his haste to find out the truth, Herbert winds up killing his new wife. Faceless and well on her way to bleeding out, the dying Suzanne manages to say she never wore a mask.
For more traditional EC-style ghastliness, your best bet is reading the comic. It’s wickedly sad. For something less conventional, as far as Tales from the Crypt goes, the role-reversing adaptation is worth watching. It’s not the best this show had to offer, although Malone’s visual style, plus the sexual abandon, does set the episode apart. If nothing else, “Only Skin Deep” leaves an impression that, even years later, shows no signs of fading.
Season Six of Tales from the Crypt can be streamed on Shudder, starting on June 5.
Tales from Tales from the Crypt celebrates the show’s Shudder premiere by singling out one episode from each season. So don’t even think about changing that dial, boys and ghouls. More spot-“frights” are to come.
Carl discovers Molly’s collection of human ‘masks’ in the Tales from the Crypt episode, “Only Skin Deep”.
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