I try to find some redeeming value in all the horror movies I watch, so here’s what I’ll give you here: the fall scenery is spectacular and there are a couple of Jack o’ lanterns.
Of the numerous movies titled All Hallow’s Eve, October 30th is seriously the one to avoid at all costs. This is the kind of film that apparently only makes sense in the mind of the director (who plays the lead character here). At one point, he even has his character say something like, “In a horror movie, the less you know, the scarier it is.” Unfortunately, he goes on to prove that theory wrong, because you never know what the hell is going on in this movie, which isn’t even slightly scary.
We start with a 25-minute intro sequence. No joke. Set in October 1988, the year Michael Myers came home, the sequence, for no good reason at all, bombards us with title cards between scenes, letting us know they are happening at various times of the day and not in sequence. There’s absolutely no reason for this and it just confuses a situation we’re thrown into and can’t understand to begin with. Basically, this is what I got from it. There’s a pedophile trying to score a kiddie in a small town but having little luck. There are three kids who sacrifice a cat to summon the “the lady in white.” Just watch The Lady in White, because you never see her in this movie. There are also two women, sisters, casting spells in the woods. They are the daughters of the pedophile, so he kills them. One of the sisters also happens to be the mother of two of the boys sacrificing the cat…I think.
Nope. That’s not a young Sean Astin on the left.
Flash ahead 20 years. One of the brothers is a filmmaker (played by the director of this movie). He’s also schizophrenic, which you’ll know only if you read the film’s description (otherwise, he just seems like a controlling creative asshole). He drags his cast and crew out into the woods to make a horror movie. Without making the audience aware of it, the film begins delivering a combination of scenes that are a mix of the actual movie and the cast members filming scenes from the movie. There’s no way of telling them apart most of the time.
I also believe there are two killers running around: one in the movie they’re making and an actual killer. I’m not sure which is which, though. There are a couple of death scenes, and I think some of them are real, because at times, there are two murders going on at once. Plus, most of the cast members go missing by the end of the film. Also, the pedophile from the beginning is now an old man who chases them off his land at one point. Which begs the question…isn’t he the grandfather of the filmmaker making the movie? And is he the one killing everyone when they’re not being killed for the movie the filmmaker is making? Did the filmmaker lead them up there to sacrifice to his grandfather? And why would his grandfather even have any interest, since they’re all over eighteen?
Don’t expect an answer to those questions or any other, because after endless scenes that serve no purpose in the long run (and long running time of an hour and 45 minutes), the filmmaker ends up alone with his leading lady. Her name is Tina, and I seriously think the filmmaker begins purposely mimicking Freddy Krueger’s voice every time he speaks her name. Anyway, he puts Tina through “exercises” in acting by tormenting her and speaking dialogue about filmmaking that seems to be the indecipherable philosophy of the actual film director playing the film’s filmmaker. It’s at this point that the film ends with one final nonsensical situation…and you just don’t care. You’re just glad it’s over.
Good news is, there’s a hottie who gets shirtless in a pool earlier on in the film.
