Trick or Treats

USA 1982
produced by
Caruth C. Byrd, Gary Graver, Lee Thornburg (executive)
directed by Gary Graver
starring Jacqueline Giroux, Peter Jason, Chris Graver, David Carradine, Carrie Snodgress, Steve Railsback, Jillian Kesner, Dan Pastorini, Tim Rossovich, J.L.Clark, John Blyth Barrymore, Catherine E.Coulson, Maria Dillon, Allen Wisch, Nike Zachmanoglou, Jason Ronard, Paul Bartel, Owen Orr
written by Gary Graver

review by
Mike Haberfelner

Linda (Jacqueline Giroux) has to spend Halloween night babysitting a spoiled little brat, wannabe magician Christopher (Chris Graver), who loves nothing more than playing one macabre prank after the other on her - and she falls for each of them and gradually loses her cool. What she doesn't know though is that the little brat's mother (Carrie Snodgress) had her husband Malcolm (Peter Jason) admitted to an insane asylum many years ago just to ditch him, but he has chosen Halloween night to break out of the loonie bin, return to his home and kill his wife. And when he finds the babysitter instead of his wife, he doesn't seem to mind too much (or can't he even tell?). However, as soon as Linda notices there's a real homocidal maniac threatening her and not just a little brat, she teams up with Christopher, and the two of them use all of Chistopher's magic tricks to lure the killer into a trap and finally kill him. Thing is, Christopher has become quite fascinated by the knife-wielding killer (it's never made clear if Malcolm is actually his father), so in the end he picks up Malcolm's knife to slash Linda's throat ...

Steve Railsback as Jacqueline Giroux's boyfriend and David Carradine as Carrie Snodgress's new husband might be in the cast, but they have no relevance for the plot.

Judging from the description alone (and even from the title), Trick or Treats sounds pretty much like John Carpenter's ground-breaking Halloween - however, the parallels are purely superficial, as Trick or Treats simply is not your typical formula movie. That said all, this hardly elevates the film above your run-of-the-mill slasher flick: Sure, it features some very nice ideas - like the killer caught and killed by some kid's harmless Halloween pranks in the end, and his efforts to kill his wife that lead him to only killing other people he didn't even want to -, but somehow, their macabre and highly ironic potential seems to get lost on writer/director Gary Graver, who rather spends an enormous amount of screentime showing the brat tricking his babysitter, which after a while gets annoying and then even boring for the audience. And when the thriller aspects of the story finally come into full swing (about the last 15 minutes of the 90-minute-movie), it's definitely too little too late.

Not all bad due to some nice ideas Graver did not completely kill, but not really good either.

review © by Mike Haberfelner

 

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