>Spoiler Alert

>I’ve been sick with a bad cold since Thursday morning so have been taking things fairly easy. That means lots of leisurely time at the lovely Astoria Park (home to the city’s largest pool and nary a tourist to be found) with books, crosswords and my anipals or at the movies. The Halloween remake generally stunk. I knew better than to see it, but I love a scary movie and am a Rob Zombie fan…well, his music anyway.

I remember seeing the original Halloween on opening night back in 1978. Yes, I was only seven, but that never stopped Mom from taking me and my brother to the movies plus we could interpret for her, if needed. It was a few days before the Halloween holiday so the theater was packed — not an empty seat in the house and some people even sat in the aisles. There is a reason John Carpenter’s version has had so many sequels: It is a masterpiece. The body count is low and there is very little blood or gory murder scenes, but the music coupled with the slow, steady build up of anticipation made the tension in that theater thick as morning fog. By the time Jamie Lee Curtis as Laurie Strode is panting in relief at having jabbed Michael Myers in the eye with a hanger only to have him stand up menacingly behind her unbeknownst to her, the audience was in a frenzy. No exaggeration, a FRENZY! We — and I mean the ENTIRE audience — were screaming at full velocity variations of, “Look behind you!” “He’s still alive!” and “RUN!”

I don’t know that there will ever be a movie that makes a whole theater feel that way again. Not that there aren’t good directors or stories to be told but that we, as a viewing audience, have been spoiled. I hope I’m wrong. I do enjoy a good horror flick.

—Kambri
I saw The Exorcist when I was four. It came out in ’73 but we rented it on reel to reel with closed captioning so watched it at home. Horrifying. But not as horrifying as “Carrie” which I saw when I was five.