By Paul Costello
IT'S HALLOWEEN! And for this week’s monologue, I’m doing something slightly different. Today, I’m focusing on the brief monologue first delivered by the character of Dr. Samuel Loomis in the original film in the Halloween series. However, I’m going to be highlighting two different versions of the speech, each one delivered by different actors in different films in different circumstances.
IT'S HALLOWEEN! And for this week’s monologue, I’m doing something slightly different. Today, I’m focusing on the brief monologue first delivered by the character of Dr. Samuel Loomis in the original film in the Halloween series. However, I’m going to be highlighting two different versions of the speech, each one delivered by different actors in different films in different circumstances.
The first is the one spoken by Donald Pleasance in the original 1978 slasher flick. Pleasance was an integral part of creating some level of legitimacy on the project, which would go on to have the arguable distinction of kicking off the whole Slasher Horror genre. As an established character actor of some note, particularly of sinister types (see Dr Crippen or The Flesh and The Fiends for examples of that), Pleasance offered audiences a familiar, authoritative face that could imbue the role of Loomis with the required gravitas. It's funny that Pleasance originally didn’t think much of the script, calling the dialogue "melodramatic." He even turned down the role at first. However, after watching Carpenter’s previous effort, Assault on Precinct 13, he thankfully reconsidered.
He’s not wrong. The dialogue is rather melodramatic, but in the world of the film, it works just fine. The slightly higher pitched sensibility of Loomis’s words are necessary to get across the fearful, elemental nature of The Shape, better known as Michael Myers. And it’s a trope of the genre that’s been pretty much required ever since.
He’s not wrong. The dialogue is rather melodramatic, but in the world of the film, it works just fine. The slightly higher pitched sensibility of Loomis’s words are necessary to get across the fearful, elemental nature of The Shape, better known as Michael Myers. And it’s a trope of the genre that’s been pretty much required ever since.
Setting the scene: After escaping the hospital, Michael Myers has returned to Haddonfield where he has begun to stalk Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis). Expressing her concerns to her friends just falls on deaf ears, but the town Sheriff receives a visit from a psychiatrist looking to impress upon him the danger that has entered their midst. Who, or what, is Michael Myers?...
Now, here’s that same speech again, but slightly different. This version appears in Halloween H20: 20 Years Later, the seventh film in the franchise. Whilst delivered effectively by the same character, Dr. Samuel Loomis, this isn’t actually Donald Pleasance.
Although directed and meant to sound as close to the Pleasance version as possible, the words here are actually spoken by voice-artist Tom Kane (seriously, check out that guy’s IMDb page, it’s incredible). And Kane does a great job, managing to make it sound so close to Pleasance's delivery, but subtly playing to the moment, emphasising where necessary, driving home the key phrases of the speech.
The rest of the film never really measures up as well, ultimately trying to get a bit too clever for itself (this was post-Scream, so had a vaguely ironic tone at various moments), but I genuinely think that Halloween H20 has one of the great opening credit sequences. Utilising pictures, newspapers cuttings, slow camera drifts, that very recognisable theme and that superbly delivered monologue, it does a great job of establishing tone, character and the history of the series.
Setting the scene: An old colleague of Dr. Loomis has returned home to find it has clearly been burglarised. After enlisting a young neighbour to ensure the premises is safe, she discovers that an old file is missing from her records. And very soon after, she realises that the premises actually isn't that safe after all...
Although directed and meant to sound as close to the Pleasance version as possible, the words here are actually spoken by voice-artist Tom Kane (seriously, check out that guy’s IMDb page, it’s incredible). And Kane does a great job, managing to make it sound so close to Pleasance's delivery, but subtly playing to the moment, emphasising where necessary, driving home the key phrases of the speech.
The rest of the film never really measures up as well, ultimately trying to get a bit too clever for itself (this was post-Scream, so had a vaguely ironic tone at various moments), but I genuinely think that Halloween H20 has one of the great opening credit sequences. Utilising pictures, newspapers cuttings, slow camera drifts, that very recognisable theme and that superbly delivered monologue, it does a great job of establishing tone, character and the history of the series.
Setting the scene: An old colleague of Dr. Loomis has returned home to find it has clearly been burglarised. After enlisting a young neighbour to ensure the premises is safe, she discovers that an old file is missing from her records. And very soon after, she realises that the premises actually isn't that safe after all...
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