Most Rewatchable Scene
The closet scene
In the discussion (20)
Approx. transcript time · 00:27:51Read transcript
- The segment opens with a warning of Loomis monologue impressions; some people would pick the five-minute single-shot opening, likened to the Goodfellas shot.
- The opening is left out of the picks: the older sister never stands up to a six-year-old with a butcher knife, the teenage boyfriend is upstairs only about two and a half minutes, and the parents just stare at Michael holding the bloody knife.
- Loomis driving to Illinois State Hospital in the rain with the nurse Marion: patients wandering in gowns, no backup, Loomis running ahead to the phone while Myers takes the station wagon, and Loomis partly to blame.
- The three girls walking home from school carrying books, Myers driving by in the wagon, and the "Speed kills" exchange; the speaker might own a Speed Kills coffee mug.
- Their banter sets up the archetypes; the speaker's mom called the dialogue bad, while Debra Hill supposedly wrote the girls' scenes, and Annie's meanness to Laurie rings true for a friend group you are stuck with.
- Laurie's crush on Ben Tramer and the sheriff bumping into her with "Everyone's entitled to one scare" are also liked; the sheriff is a little creepy.
- Annie's last stretch: stuck in the laundry room, Myers floating in and around, the dog dying (the dog category may need to return), and a weirdly long, disturbing strangling in the car before the knife; the throat slit probably lacked blood because of the low budget.
- Loomis parked outside the Myers house yells "Hey, Lonnie, get your ass away from there," is delighted with himself, and is then startled by the sheriff.
- Loomis's monologue in the house about the six-year-old with "the devil's eyes" who was "purely and simply evil" is added as a rewatchable scene; the sheriff's muted response gets mayor-from-Jaws comparisons.
- Loomis's "Death has come to your little town, sheriff" speech meets Brackett's "More fancy talk"; Brackett seems consumed by petty crimes like the hardware store break-in.
- Bob going to get a beer and being pinned to the wall leads to the Myers head tilt, called the single scariest moment in probably any horror movie; widescreen and HD now make it visible.
- Part two: Myers puts on the ghost costume with Bob's glasses, a playful Myers, then kills P. J. Soles's character while she calls Laurie.
- Laurie's reaction on the phone is not terrified enough; the counterpoint is that she thinks her friends are fooling with her after a day of being told to get over what she saw.
- The last 12 minutes play as one continuous scene: the long walk across, the Judith Myers tombstone, the mask out of the dark, the stabbing and the fall over the staircase, Myers coming down the stairs with his shoulders not moving, and "You can't kill the boogeyman."
- The closet is called one of the greatest scenes in horror movie history, up there with anything Hitchcock did: the light, the wire hanger, his arms flailing, the window distraction, and his hands punching through; the reply agrees it is the single best scene in the movie.
- Jamie Lee Curtis is praised as a great, believable scream queen, overqualified next to the Nightmare on Elm Street lead; the hosts doubt they could fashion a wire hanger into a weapon in 15 seconds.
- The single best moment: Laurie standing in the doorway with her back turned while, in the wide shot, Myers rises and turns, maybe the single best horror movie moment of all time.
- A host describes a YouTube clip of 1979 theater audio in which the crowd gasps when he stands up and someone yells "shoot him again!"
- The last rewatchable scene is the ending: six shots, he is not there, and shots of all the scenes.
- Asked for a pick: the final Michael chase, especially the closet, with everything in that bedroom named the most rewatchable scene; as a non-horror pick, the three girls walking home busting each other's chops and seeing Michael behind the bush.
