Halloween (1978) vs Friday the 13th (1980) - Halloween (1978) Discussion

[–] DoctorThirteen (12764) 4 months ago

Having just rewatched these two (plus HII) over the last few days, I'm going to partly echo some other posters.

Halloween is better made, better acted, and has the (much) better score.

Friday the 13th has a better setting, better kills, and is more fun.

It's a tie (although Donald Pleasence's Dr Loomis may tip it just a little in H78's favour).

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[–] BlackChristmas (1870) 4 months ago

Always good to see someone repping Friday the 13th.

Halloween enjoys a favorable reputation, pretty much a consensus top 10 horror movie of all time (critics and fans alike, it's always getting voted into the top 10) whilst some people talk like F13 is complete dogshit. Halloween is undeniably a slicker production but F13 has it's own merits and at the end of the day they're both low budget slasher movies that are four and a half decades old now, it's not like Halloween is some sprawling epic. They're both stalk-and-slash movies, Halloween is better at the stalking and F13 is better at the slashing.

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[–] DoctorThirteen (12764) 4 months ago

I really love the setting and the atmosphere of F13. And all that rain just tops it off.

'They're both stalk-and-slash movies, Halloween is better at the stalking and F13 is better at the slashing.'

That is a really good way of summing it up 👍

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[–] BlackChristmas (1870) 4 months ago

I really love the setting and the atmosphere of F13. And all that rain just tops it off.

#MeToo. It has a nice ambience to it and it's got one of the best utilizations of rain I've seen in a movie. It genuinely feels like an isolated spot in the woods that is getting swamped by torrential rain. The early parts of the movie nail that 'small town' feel.

I've always liked F13 but it's definitely a movie that I've grew to like more and more over the years and it is the atmosphere/tone/ambience/mood/whatever you want to call it, that is what I'm drawn to I think, the movie just has a soothing vibe.

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[–] quartz (482) 3 months ago

I found F 13th really, really boring. shrug..

The only difference between the first three F 13th films, seems to be in the first you get 2 seconds of a carcass at the end, in the second you get 2 seconds of a disfigured face at the end, in the third you get 3 seconds of a disfigured face at the end.

Halloween, I'll say that H 3 was one of the most pointless/tedious/dragging films I've ever watched #opinion. The scriptwriters might have agreed about this too and brought back MM and DP in number 4.

I have to say the thing I did like about Fri 13th, is that....that is what people did before smartphones. they actually....did stuff.

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[–] pjl69 (2647) 2 months ago

Better in what sense? Which is more frightening? Definitely Halloween. But some people seem to prefer just large number of spectacular kills and gore. Halloween's success may have jump started the slasher genre, but I think creators of Friday the 13th and other similar movies defined the genre and turned it into a kill fest: less suspense and more kills. Sometimes I have wondered are slasher fans in their right mind because they seem to thirst just kills, the more and bloodier, the better. Halloween is just the opposite of that mentality, a viewer is afraid for the main characters, not just waiting them to be killed.

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[–] BlackChristmas (1870) 2 months ago

Halloween is just a guy in a mask (who has no motive, ergo there is no mystery or revelations) stalking and killing drunk and horny babysitters. The set of victims in Halloween are no better than any other, certainly no more likable save for Laurie Strode but then most final girls are wholesome. I don't see why anyone would care for Lynda and Annie any more than the victims in other slashers.

Some people talk about movies such as Halloween and The Texas Chain Saw Massacre being 'special' because they have little to no gore and rely on suspense. They say directors like Carpenter and Hooper were above relying on gore and nudity to make a movie. The truth is those movies lack gore because they were early ventures into the kill count movie mold.

It's worth remembering that John Carpenter stepped in and did reshoots for Halloween II (1981) making the kills gorier, which is funny because some people say HII is worse than the first because it tried to copy the other gorier slashers that were released post-Halloween, no one likes to point out the fact that Carpenter is the one who did that. Then do I even have to mention The Thing (1982) which is a gorefest?

On the topic of Hooper. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 is extremely gory and he had Mathilda May prance around naked in Lifeforce.

As for questioning the mentality of slasher fans... I guess I get where you are coming from. I often question if The Thing fans are right in the head, they love the movie because it's gory and many of them say the fact no women are in it is one of the reasons it's so good. Gorehound misogynists. A lovely group of people I'm sure!

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