Trick 'r Treat (2009)

Tagline: Poison, Drowning, Claw, or Knife. So Many Ways to Take A Life.

Curiosity: Scott was excited for it, so I was excited for it.

Plot: In this Halloween-themed anthology, several stories overlap over the course of one night. Characters bump into each other, while the film’s mascot Sam (short for Samhain), an adorable little murdering imp with a burlap, pumpkin-shaped mask, flits from scene to scene, sometimes as a mysterious fringe character and sometimes as a primary antagonist. Samhain takes Halloween pretty dang seriously – lest we forget that the holiday originated as a means to appease spirits and the changing of the seasons – and he’ll kill anyone who doesn’t oblige, like the couple (Leslie Bibb and Tahmoh Penikett) who takes down their decorations early in the film’s opening vignette. Elsewhere, Anna Paquin plays an awkward youth trying to find a date for Halloween. Dylan Baker plays a super creepy homicidal maniac/school principal. Brian Cox is mean old Mr. Kreeg, who must do battle with demons both personal and literal. A group of kids visits the site of a mass murder.

Also, there are monsters.

Thoughts: Sorry for the crappy plot description, but you’re better off going into Trick ’r Treat totally blind. Though it’s an anthology movie in the tradition of Creep Show or The Twilight Zone: The Movie, Trick ’r Treat’s stories boast a decent amount of twists and crossovers, making it as much a unified, suspenseful story as it is a collection. It’s a love letter to Halloween itself, not to mention a few horror classics (Homages to Halloween and Pet Cemetery come to mind). It definitely carries some black humor along the way too, so you can either roll with decapitation jokes or go watch Ghosts of Girlfriends Past.

It’s kind of hard to believe that Warner Bros. sat on this movie for two years. Writer/director Michael Dougherty co-wrote X2 (X fucking 2, son! Show some got-damned respek), and his pet project went over well at test and festival screenings. At least it’s finally out now, as the film captures all of the joy in Halloween, from candy to horror movie marathons. It should be an October staple for years to come.

Reflection: Samhain is probably diabetic.