Last Wednesday I posted “My Neighbor’s Halloween Movie Recommendations” to a great deal of fanfare.  It was a solid list, leaning a bit more heavily towards the classics.  Naturally, I knew our English correspondent, Pontiac Dream 39, would have some thoughts on the list.

As is often the case, I was right.  Ponty offered up his top three picks in the comments section.  Always on the lookout for easy—uh, I mean, quality—content, I asked the good bloke from across the pond to consider putting together a more extensive “explainer” of his choices.

Happily, he obliged.  Few writers put together a movie review better than good old Ponty, especially when he either loves or hates a film.  In this case, his love for these three flicks—and they are all, assuredly, classics—shines through, as does his acumen for writing a crackerjack film review.

With that, here are Ponty’s Top 3 Halloween Picks for 2024 (I’m hoping if I add “for 2024,” it means he’ll do more next year!):

The season is upon us once more and it’s about time to, as Cartman’s mother sang, ‘decorate the house for Halloween, with lots of ghosts and scary creepy crawly things.’ Ordinarily, we’d stay away from anything creepy and crawly, what with Tina’s arachnophobia, but this year, she spotted some purple string lights with little plastic spiders on them and so we bought them. When they’re put up, with the candles casting their own shadows across the walls and ceilings, and Tina freaks – ‘Mike! Mike! GET THAT SPIDER DOWN!’ – I can say I told her so.

I don’t believe there’s an abundance of good new horrors out for DVD sales this year but we’ll probably pick something up. We always have to watch something new for Halloween but we usually start on the classics, the first, always the same, every year – John Carpenter’s excellent Halloween (1978).

Halloween (1978)

There aren’t enough good things I can say about this film. As basic a story as you can get, the premise is simple. Michael Myers, no relation to Audre, kills his big sister, Judith, on Halloween night in 1963 and is incarcerated in a mental health facility. 15 years later, he escapes and is pursued back to his home town in Haddonfield by his twitchy former psychiatrist, Dr. Sam Loomis (Donald Pleasance), who rightly predicts that Michael will turn Haddonfield into his own personal slaughterhouse. Which he does. Unlike our sweet, kindly Audre, Michael resides on the other end of the spectrum; evil, focused, brutal, kills without mercy or remorse. And the best thing about this film is we don’t know why he’s doing it. Why does he kill his sister, why is he trying to kill Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) and why all the babysitters? Why the dog? Don’t know, don’t care.

It’s a beautifully paced movie and well directed with some nice wide establishing shots and some great tracking sequences. The soundtrack contains a mix of subtle piano and synth and while we’re not looking for groundbreaking, Oscar winning acting in this, Jamie Lee Curtis and Donald Pleasance put in some good performances, the former living up to her title as Scream Queen and the latter displaying the sort of guilt you’d expect from a man who knows that the best thing for Michael Myers would have been a woodchipper and a decent size bucket.

I’ve watched this film a lot and some of the scenes still have me on tenterhooks, like the chase sequence where Laurie is struggling to get back into the house where she’s babysitting, Michael striding towards her, the piano pounding in the background.

After 46 years, this film hasn’t aged a bit. It was a classic then and it remains so now. If you haven’t seen it, WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN?!

Ju-On : The Grudge 2 (2003)

My second recommendation is actually a sequel – Ju-On: The Grudge 2 (2003). I loved the first film but the second, tying in 6 stories, takes you away from the house where everything started, the house where poor Kayako Saeki and her son Toshio were murdered by their cranky, angry husband/father and where their ghostly rage had permeated the very walls. For those who’ve never watched the first film – Japanese or American – anyone who steps foot in this house will be infected, which essentially means they’re subjected to visions, hallucinations and then death by fright. Pretty mean-spirited, I know, but it’s a horror so what d’you expect? It doesn’t matter where you go, where you try to hide, those ghosts have got the black belt in hide and seek, as one unfortunate finds out when she hides under her covers.

The fact of the matter is no one believes in the curse until they are actually infected with it and so it proves for a bunch of unfortunates – a film crew, a pregnant actress, some poor soul with the neighbour from hell – who find themselves stalked by Kayako and Toshio.

As with the first film, this is nicely paced and never feels rushed. We are afforded the time to get to know all our players before the credits roll, allowing us to hope that they can break or at least escape the fate that awaits them. The soundtrack is subtle and the sound and direction plays well with the pace. And despite the cheesiness of the dressing room scene, there’s something really unnerving about watching that wig morph into a threat, Megumi, at first transfixed and then terrified, as the hairpiece grows into the thing that will kill her. Annoyingly, I can’t find the clip for it. Ah well, you’ll just have to watch the movie instead!

My last recommendation is another Japanese scarefest; Ringu (1998). This is the only horror film, and I’ve watched a lot, in which the soundtrack scares me. The composition for this film is amazing, with it’s scratchy piercing violins. I could listen to the music and picture everything that occurs in the movie, my spine tingling with every note. It’s a superb story with some great performances and proper brown shorts moments but that soundtrack is terrifying.

The premise is easy enough to follow. A journalist, Reiko (Nanako Matsushima) learns about a video tape which is killing people and so, sets out to discover more about this tape, the people on it and why it is cursed. She enlists the help of her ex husband, Ryuji (Hiroyuki Sanada), while protecting her young son, Yoichi (Rikiya Otaka) from the dangers presented by the tape. Since she only has seven days, from the time she first watches the video, to solve the mystery, it’s a race against the clock to ensure she doesn’t end up as many others before her have.

This is one of those films where the journey is just as interesting as the scares themselves. Why is this budget rental killing people? Who are the people in the film? How does it even exist? All good questions and if you want to know if they’re answered, that’s easy – just watch the movie.

As it is, this is another subtly paced piece, well acted and directed, the lighting in it is wonderfully artistic and beautifully executed and if you’ve never seen it before, shut the curtains, turn off all the lights and cuddle up next to your honey because you don’t want to watch this alone.