Unlike most horror movies that are a pretty straight forward journey from point A to B, from the creation of a movie monster to the final showdown with the protagonist, Trick ‘r Treat is a movie that mixes things up and always keeps you guessing. There are four different stories going on, a jumbled up timeline, and a whole host of characters you need to get to know. Things happen that appear to be out of context, but eventually make sense later on. Expectations for where the stories are going get set up purposefully and then are subverted. Trick ‘r Treat keeps you on your toes. Plus, it’s got a group of actors that are largely better than the actors you see in typical horror movies, a nice amount of gory killings, some supernatural goings on, and a scene where a bunch of sexy ladies dance and strip next to a raging fire out in the woods. Rumor has it this thing even got shelved by the studio for a while due to overpowering awesomeness.
What really makes this movie work though is the way it fetishizes Halloween. Candy, jack-o-lanterns, costumes, parties; this movie is swimming in the aesthetics of the holiday, and it incorporates every element of our yearly celebrations into the story in deadly ways. The concept of exploring how deadly the “trick” part of the trick or treat deal can become is such an obvious one that I can’t believe it hasn’t been done to death already. The way this movie takes modern urban legends like razor blades and poison in trick or treat candy and brings them to horrific life is sure to make it a favorite that fans of Halloween revisit on the holiday year after year. And the character design on Sam, the trick or treater who links all of our four stories together, it’s somehow at the same time adorable and terrifying. He’s one of my favorite of the last 20 years of movie monsters. Trick ‘r Treat is a celebration of horror movies that gives you a little taste of everything the genre has to offer, it’s a celebration of Halloween, which is the coolest holiday that we’ve yet created, and it’s one of the best horror movies I’ve seen that’s been made after the 80s era golden age.
