John Carpenter
 

OK - in response to Urge's admonition to push more interesting conversations - I want to pick up a topic that's been often discussed here (so PLEASE DON'T give me all the references to previous discussions - which in and of itself kills a lot of new conversations in their tracks). Also, I suspect that this should be in "filmmakers" but i noticed that forum seems filled with folks actually making films. . . and since JC's "best" work was in the 'modern' period (i.e., nothing coming out that i know of) it seems to fit here.


So, here's my contention: John Carpenter has an amazing imagination but only limited ability to execute it on film. I would argue that virtually every Carpenter film - with the possible exception of The Thing - really fails to visually or dramatically live up to the idea's potential. Halloween could also be an exception - but I think ultimately it fits into my hypothesis.

For me - the biggest examples of this disconnect between idea and execution are Prince of Darkness and Big Trouble in Little China (though I think virtually every other film - including Vampire$ and esp. In the Mouth of Madness).

Now, I don't think this can just be 'budget' constraints - or if it is then JC has an inability to translate his 'vision' into low budget aesthetics (i mean think about Texas Chainsaw Massacre as a low budget but HIGHLY EFFECTIVE visual piece of filmmaking).

Any takers?

I do love Halloween and The Thing, but thought Ghosts om Mars was entertaining, but was a disappointment for a Carpenter flick. Now, I do love In the Mouth of Madness, but that fell apart at times. I have yet to see Vampires, but that's more and less becuase I'm not much of a fan of vampire flicks (besides Dracula and Nosferatu).

i think Carpenter started with such a big bang that it was hard to maintain the level of quality.

I collect Carpenter films. Have everything he's done from Dark Star up (with the exception of one made for TV movie)

Ghosts of Mars (2001) weak effort - poorly written - no budget
Vampires (1998) - weak effort - poorly written
Escape from L.A. (1996) - weak tired effort.
Village of the Damned (1995) - cant remember a thing from this one.
In the Mouth of Madness (1994) - didnt like it
Body Bags (1993) (TV) (segments "Gas Station, The" and "Hair")
so so anthology
Memoirs of an Invisible Man (1992) - enjoyed this one
They Live (1988) - really enjoyed this one
Prince of Darkness (1987) - not bad - not great
Big Trouble in Little China (1986) - really enjoyed this one
Starman (1984) - suffered by using a known actor in the roll
Christine (1983) - good spin on a so so King effort (strong performances)
The Thing (1982) - excellent
Escape from New York (1981) - excellent
The Fog (1980) - excellent
Elvis (1979/I) (TV) - very good
Someone's Watching Me! (1978) (TV) (i havent seen this)
Halloween (1978) - excellent
Assault on Precinct 13 (1976) - excellent
Dark Star (1974) - very enjoyable.


i would say that Carpenter suffered from a general shift in cinema largely because of the fact that (as i'v said before) the horror genre hasnt been taken seriously since the 70's. Now it's just a cheap cash cow - people making garbage films that will still make money on the rentals (most never see the theatres)
And again - i blame the 80s home video invasion for that - and the trend of cheap slasher movies that kids will rent if it has cool cover art.

so where is the incentive for making a mind blowing influential horror film ? why would the studios bother when their garbage still makes money by using no name directors - no name actors and a shit budget.... for straight to home video markets.


i think Carpenter has become an endangered species - he's a product of the 70's .. so are many of the other struggling horror directors.

I think its a fucking shame.

MY general problem with Carpenter- although I think he's one of the best horror directors- is his music.

We all probably saw Halloween first; I know I did. Great! Good music, classic and chilling. However, when you start watching more and more of his films you realize that Carpenter does so much of his own music, and as a result...well, it sucks. It's all just Halloween rehashed, and it sounds like shit.

The only music by him, besides Halloween, that I enjoyed, was Assault ('76).

I HATED the music to The FOg. So repetitive and annoying and BLACH!

ok (for a tv movie)

Whats wrong with Prince of Darkness? I loved it

Contrary to what you may think, you're not the only one who thinks that way, and therein lies the "incentive for making a mind blowing influential horror film". There are filmmakers out there that realise that the genre is going/gone to shit, and want to fix it. The problem is simply that their films wouldnt sell, so Hollywood wont promote them. I think it's up to filmmakers like Rob Zombie, Eli Roth, Alexandre Aja and [to some extent] Brad Anderson, who already have a bit of track record and selling power, to revive the genre. If they continue to make good, horror films on a modest budget, I think we would see a rise in the overall quality of the genre VERY fast. It would open the eyes of Hollywood producers, they would realise that good horror films can make money, and funding would start going to other filmmakers with a love for the genre. I mean, look at some of the crappy DTV horror releases of the last few years. Even though most of them are crap, you can still tell that the filmmakers have a love for the genre, and that the films could have been great with the kind of funding a film like, say, The Grudge had. All Souls Day for example: Awful film, but it had a potentially great concept behind it. With a couple millon bucks to work with, I really think it could have been great.


Anyway, back to the original topic. Im a big fan of Carpenter, though I agree his films are often not as good as they could be. Films like The Thing, Halloween, The Fog and Assault on Precinct 13 are great example of filmaking genius. I loved In the Mouth of Madness, but it certainly had some weak moments compared to what we know Carpenter is capable of.

i have to disagree that most directors have love for the genre.

Rob Zombie for sure ... he has huge love for it ..

but most of the others ... a lot of them that made their name with horror are tired of it .. but are pigionholed.

the straight to video guys .. many of them are made to direct these crap horrors to cut their teeth on.
no loss to the company if the films bomb ... the video market picks them up.

The Grudge/The Ring/Dark Water .... that is the wave that suprised me ... that hollywood picked up on that j-horror wagon .. but i guess they were making big bucks in asia and $$$ draws the movie people like flys to shit.

they smell money, then milk the new trend - wring every last penny out of it and leave it dying on the floor .. spent and mutilated.

Perhaps "most" was an overstatement. I do belive that alot of directors do have a love for the genre, and I think it really shows. Compare The Skeleton Key and All Souls Day for example. Skeleton Key had a big budget, big name stars, and did fairly well at the box office. It admittedly turned out better than most modern horror films, but you could tell that Softley was in it more for the payoff than actually wanting to make a good film. It didnt have that something that someone with a love for the genre would have added. All Souls Day, on the flip side, obviously had no budget, the biggest name involved was Jeffery Combs, and I'd bet it hardly even broke even. The film was undeniably bad, but you could really tell that Kasten wanted to make a good film. He tried things that hadnt been done, and they failed. If he had the multi-million dollar studio backing that Skeleton Key had, however, it could have been a great addition to the recent wave of zombie films.

i thionk - sadly - that they guys who truely love the genre end up making these little backyard films - that although entheusiastic - end up being unwatchable because of rank amateuristic performances, inexperienced fimmakers, and zero budget.

and lets face it - not everyone who loves the genre is good at it either ...

i can appreciate their efforts .. i just cant enjoy them.


skeleton key .. yeah that was just another one - going through the motions. zero passion.

Agreed completly on those points. As for the first one though, dont you think that if folks like Rob Zombie or Eli Roth continue to prove that a low budget aproach to horror can still make money, dont you think that these guys making garbage films in their backyeards might actually start getting funding, and their garbage might turn into something good?

On part two, I definatly see where you're coming from. Ill use myself as an example; I absolutly love horror, but if I tried to make a movie I assure you it would make House of the Dead look like The Shining.


Never said you should; I usually feel the same way. However like Ive been saying...give them some money and some talented people to work with and you could have a classic.

i think the key to making a good film - especially horror - is the same thing as having a good band, or a good sports team ..

it is all about hard work, brains, perseverance, skills
(talent), and a bit of luck thrown in.

budget is good .. but unless all or most of the things above are present .... lets just say there is a lot of room for error.

zombie looks like he puts money into his films .. i dont get the low budget vibe from him .. but what i did get was good performances from an eccentric mix of character actors ..(the actual kids didnt matter - all they had to do is run and scream.)

know the strengths and weaknesses of your players.

a good director can do that .. dont make a less skilled person stretch past the bounds of what's credible .. give them something they can do well, and eliminate what they cant.

example . (and it involves carpenter)

hell comes to frog town. Piper was ass in that .. i dont care what anyone else thinks.

They Live .. piper was great .. Carpenter was fully aware of what piper was capable and he exploited that.


god i'm all over the place in this post ..

i guess what i'm trying to say is that it isnt as easy as one thing to make a success .. budget isnt the answer .. a stellar actor isnt the answer.... or director ..

it's a combination of several things jelling together at once.
there have been a few excellent no-budget productions made by people with brains, vision, imagination and talent.


how does this all apply to the Carpenter question ?

in the beginning he had these things working for him ... as the years progressed, and with the lack of interest in horror films (proper horror films) he didnt always have all of those cylinders firing at the same time.

Here you see Carpenters form curve:

http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d5...1971/curve.jpg

OK - wow great conversation - most intelligent exchange (and no one has called anyone 'stupid' or told them to STFU!) I've seen on here in a while.

(and i love the phrase 'zero passion' being thrown about - but do you mean my passion or the general passion that other people have for me!?!?)

2 thoughts about the above:
1) I agree with Urge about the decline in the horror director but I think its a broader trend. It seems to me that the real high point in the 'big independent director" ran from the mid/late 60s through the 70s and then largely died in the mid-80s. Early BIG directors - Hawkes, Hitchcock, Ford, etc. - were part of the transition away from the BIG Studio systems (as some of these directors names became more influential than the name of the studio attached - I think was caused, in part, as big actors began to break out of the studio contract system and, largely, because the studios were forced to sell off their theater chains after the supreme court decision in the late 40s). The independence of theaters pushed the need for more non-studio films to fill the screens, which opened the space for more experimentation. In turn, as people began taking film 'seriously' in the late 60s and early 70s (beginning of real film criticism and studies) and the advent of "film schools" pushed more and more intelligent and 'educated' filmmakers into the spotlight. Soon, people were at least aware of intelligent filmmakers as the center of the film world - Kubrick, Scorsese, Allen, Altman, etc.

But, (god this is a long rant) the 80s saw the push of the 'blockbuster' and with it more emphasis on effects and actors - hence, the decline of the independent/interesting director (i guess what you'd call auteurs).

I mean, who would be the prominent interesting and unique directors now? A handful it seems to me - Burton, Rodriguez, Shyamalan - maybe the cohen brothers - but it seems to me the films are sold by effects and spectacle more than on the unique authorial vision of the filmmaker.

2) as for carpenter- I think Urge hits the head with the phrase he uses for EfLA - 'tired'. It seems to me that almost every film since his opening quartet - Halloween, Fog, Escape from NY and The Thing (I know not his actual first films but the ones that were prominent) - Carpenter has been at a loss to really craft films that carry the idea effectively through the whole film. (in interviews I've read it seems that the wide negative reaction to The Thing, easily his most accomplished film, really took the wind out of his sails - it was released in 82 just a few months after that other little alien film, ET).

Prince of Darkness is, for me, the best example of this failure. The idea - physics, god, satan, radio transmissions beamed into our dreams from the future - is remarkably cool. But the film fails to really exploit these ideas and ends up with lots of 'people trapped in the building' and hackneyed attempts to 'build tension' a la hack and slash films. I could make the same case about Vampire$ as a more recent film.

(but enough - my fingers hurt and I can't imagine anyone would bother to read this rant all the way to the end anyway)

Carpenter
 

Ya, all you guys make good points. What I wonder about is, how much further can horror films go? What more can be said? Just from one mans point of view, the ones that allways scared me were the movies that were on a personal basis. You know, the killer coming after you, the monster looking for you. When you involve to many people, it just becomes body count.Which may be why I dislike slasher films so much except halloween;now, that was personal.

I really like John Carpenter and most of his films, even some of the films most other people don't enjoy. I do think however that Carpenter reuses his ideas and maybe he's not even doing it consciously but it's VERY apparent in Ghosts of Mars in which he seems to "rip off" a few of his own movies. Now some people might say he's run out of ideas and is just coasting but maybe he doesn't realize his "new" idea isn't exactly new until it's too late. How many people here saw the Masters of Horrors short Carpenter did called Cigarette Burns? I think that may have proved he's still got it. Everybody is fallible and I'm very willing to take a little big of Vampires with my They Live. I'm actually looking forward to The 13th Apostle, hopefully he's got "it" back whether it be passion, drive, or ideas.