Movie: Trick 'r Treat (2007) Caution Spoiler Alert

 Trick 'r Treat

Came out; 2007

Time; 1 hours 22 minutes

Watched: Max

Rated: R for horror violence, some sexuality/nudity and language

IMDB Rating; 6.7/10

Caution; Spoiler Alert

Staring.

Anna Paquin as Laurie

Brian Cox as Mr. Kreeg

Dylan Baker as Steven

Rochelle Aytes as Maria

Quinn Lord as Sam

Lauren Lee Smith as Danielle

Moneca Delain as Janet

Tahmoh Penikett as Henry

Brett Kelly as Charlie

Britt McKillip as Macy

Story Line.

Five interwoven stories that occur on the same block, on the same night. A couple finds what happens when they blow a jack o' lantern out before midnight, a high school principal has a secret life as a serial killer, a college virgin might have met the right guy for her, a group of mean teens play a prank that they take too far, and a hermit is visited by a special trick or treater.

Thoughts:

This a B movie that I caught on TV one day. I wanted to watch it uncut. It really isn't that different uncut but it's so much fun!

All the stories come together in a way at the end and you sorta understand it.

It's actually put together very well for the B rating it deserves. Things aren't exactly explained, yet they are. Everything is exactly what it seems, yet they aren't. I enjoyed the cheesiness of this from beginning to end!

CAUTION; Major Spoiler Alert

The movie includes four interwoven tales:

Opening: A couple dressed as a robot and Flash Gordon return to their home, the front lawn decorated with numerous 'ghost-crows' (scarecrow-style ghosts) and lit pumpkins. The robot, Emma (Leslie Bibb), takes a jack-o'-lantern to blow out the light but her boyfriend, Henry (Tahmoh Penikett), tells her that it's against tradition to un-decorate before midnight. Emma asserts that she wants all the decorations gone before her mother visits the next morning, saying that the yard looks like a crime scene, and blows out the candle. Henry, a true fan of the holiday, promises to remove everything early the next morning and convinces Emma to meet him inside for some "alone time". While he goes in to "put on the tape", Emma starts to take down some of the decorations down, uttering the unforgivable "I hate Halloween". As she removes the sheets off one of the ghost-crows, it lunges at her, covering her in the white cloth. In the ensuing struggle, Emma tumbles onto the sidewalk where passing trick-or-treaters stop to investigate. Under the sheets, a figure takes a bitten pumpkin-shaped sucker and slits Emma's throat. Her blood stains through the sheets and the children run away. The hidden assailant drags Emma's body back to the yard as Henry lies upstairs, passed out and with the TV on high volume. Sometime later, he notices Emma has not come up and goes down to the yard where he notices that one of the ghost-crows now has lights attached to it. He removes the sheet and screams at the sight of Emma's disembodied head on a stake, the pumpkin sucker lodged in her mouth.

Meanwhile, the Halloween festivities and parties continue throughout the town and a parade march down the main street while the silhouette of a short figure walks through the crowd, dragging a burlap bag with a dark stain at the bottom.

1. The Principal - A portly boy walks through the neighborhood knocking over jack-o'-lanterns. He stops at one house and walks up to the porch where it appears no one is home. A bucket full of candy is set out with a sign saying, 'please take one!' The boy begins to put the entire contents of the bucket in his bag when someone startles him from behind. The boy recognizes the man as Principal Steven Wilkins (Dylan Baker) who addresses the boy as Charlie (Brett Kelly). Wilkins sits down on his porch, inviting Charlie to sit and talk with him as he offers him a chocolate bar. Wilkins explains rules of etiquette and how to properly respect Halloween. When Charlie begins to cough, Wilkins explains the most important rule of Halloween; "always check your candy". Charlie violently vomits blood and chocolate and passes out. Wilkins drags Charlie into the house, the blood and chocolate mixture oozing onto his shirt, just as his doorbell rings. Struggling with the body, he answers and sees three teenagers who ask if they can take his jack-o'-lantern. He agrees and gives them all some candy, including a small boy wearing orange, footed pajamas and a burlap hood with buttons for eyes and stitching for a mouth (known hereafter as Sam, Quinn Lord). Wilkins then dumps Charlie's body in a large hole dug in his back yard where another child's body already lies. As he tries to bury the bodies his small son, Billy (Connor Christopher Levins), appears in the upstairs window and shouts down to him repeatedly, asking for help on his jack-o'-lantern and if they'll hand out candy. Wilkins, frustrated, tells him each time to be quiet and wait for him inside. Meanwhile, the neighbor's dog (Zip) approaches the fence and starts barking as the first child in the grave begins to moan, reaching out from under dirty sheets with a clown-costumed arm. Wilkins stabs the boy's arm with his shovel and severs one of his fingers, throwing it over the fence and distracting the dog. However, its surly owner, Mr. Kreeg (Brian Cox) comes into the yard and peeks through a hole in the fence to speak to Wilkins, still struggling with the clown child. Wilkins passes off his activity and the smell as a septic tank leak and Mr. Kreeg goes back into his house, shouting back to Wilkins to "get his kid out of his yard". Wilkins finishes the clown child off with a blow from his shovel and completes burying the bodies. As he walks back into his house, he notices a frantic Kreeg motioning to him from his window across the way. Bitter Wilkins ignores him and goes into the house as Kreeg is tackled by something. In the kitchen, Billy jumps out from behind a counter, scaring Wilkins and asking for help on his jack-'o-lantern. Seemingly annoyed, Wilkins takes a butcher knife from the knife block and follows Billy to the basement. Billy runs ahead to a table covered in carving materials and Wilkins approaches behind him. Billy says "let's make a scary face this time" as Wilkins puts his hand on Billy's head and brings the knife down, blood glistening on the blade as he draws it back. But Billy smiles and says "don't forget to help me with the eyes" as they look together at the severed head of Charlie on a wooden turntable.

2. Surprise Party - Laurie (Anna Paquin) is a 22-year-old 'virgin' who is shy and self-conscious. Her older sister, Danielle (Lauren Lee Smith), tries to boost her confidence by taking her to a Halloween party with two of her friends (Moneca Delain and Rochelle Aytes). The girls all dress in fairy tale costumes while Laurie is stuck as Little Red Riding Hood, a choice she despises though her sister tells her "It's tradition". They walk through town on the way to the party picking up dates, but Laurie is discouraged. She opts to meet the girls at the party later.

Meanwhile, a young woman makes out with a masked man in an alley. He affectionately kisses her neck but, when she looks down, she sees blood running down her body. The man smiles, revealing blood on his fangs. The woman screams and makes her way to the street where the people are gathered for the parade. Emma and Henry walk by in costume, but ignore her, thinking she's just another drunk partygoer covered in make-up blood. The woman turns around to see the vampire standing behind her and screams as he swings his cloak around her. He leaves her dead body on the sidewalk leaning against a building, as if she's merely passed out, and walks away.

At the bonfire party in the woods, Danielle stands alone worrying about Laurie. The others assure her that Laurie's fine but Danielle wonders, saying that their mother "always said Laurie was the runt of the litter". As Laurie walks down a dimly lit path in the woods, she senses someone is following her and shouts out that she's not in the mood and they'd better come out. When no one responds, she turns and comes face to face with the vampire. He grabs her by the neck and holds her against a tree, saying, "My, my, what big eyes you have", before biting her neck. At the party, the girls are startled when a cloaked body falls out of a tree near the fire. Danielle nervously approaches the body and removes the cloak to see the vampire, bleeding and begging for help. His mask is removed and Principal Wilkins blinks in the fire light, whimpering. Laurie appears and assures everyone she's ok, despite the blood oozing from her neck. She approaches Wilkins and straddles him, telling him to bear with her since it's her first time. The other girls start to dance as Wilkins looks around in shock to see that all of their dates are dead. Laurie removes his fake fangs as the girls rip off their skin, revealing coarse fur and lupine fangs. Laurie begins to change herself and leans down to Wilkins to whisper "My, my, what big eyes you have" before lunging into Wilkins' neck. The other werewolves finish the remains of their dates, howling at the moon, as Sam looks on from a nearby log.

3. The Halloween School Bus Massacre Four costumed teenagers scour the neighborhood for jack-o-lanterns and stop at the home of a peer named Rhonda (Samm Todd), dressed as a witch, whose yard is decorated with dozens of them. Despite the fact that she's considered an idiot savant and nicknamed Rhonda the Retard by the leader of the group, Macy (Britt McKillip), dressed as an angel, Schrader (Jean-Luc Bilodeau) asks politely for one of her pumpkins and invites her to come with them, complimenting her on her costume. Macy leads them onward while Rhonda talks briefly with Chip (Alberto Ghisi), a pirate, about the origins of Halloween. They arrive at an abandoned rock quarry and Sara (Isabelle Deluce), an alien, asks why they're there and what the purpose of the jack-o-lanterns is. Macy explains that the quarry is the site of a fatal bus crash thirty years prior that has become the stuff of legend.

The bus was carrying eight mentally disturbed children, clad in freakish Halloween costumes and so troubled that they had to be chained to their seats. That fateful day, the driver (Gerald Paetz) deviated from his normal route while taking the kids home. Their parents, no longer able to stand the strain and humiliation of caring for them, paid the driver to put them out of their misery by driving the bus into the lake at the bottom of the rock quarry, intending to make it look like a horrible accident. However, while double checking the restraints on the kids, one of them, a masked vampire (Richard Harmon), is able to free himself and hijack the bus, repeating that he wants to go home. Disturbed and confused as he is, the boy accidentally puts the bus in gear and drives it over the edge of the cliffside into the lake before the driver can stop him. Macy says that the driver survived but was never heard from again and the bus was never recovered, possibly because the rest of the town just didn't want to bother.

The eight jack-o-lanterns collected represent the eight souls lost that day and are meant to be left at the lakeside as an offering. They walk to a rickety elevator and Macy, Sara, and Schrader get in with their pumpkins to go down to the lake. Since the elevator will only hold three at a time, Chip and Rhonda wait for it to come back for them. On their way down, they hear the panicked cries and screams of the other three and watch as the lights of their jack-o-lanterns go out in the mist. Rhonda tells Chip to stay in the elevator with the remaining pumpkins, saying that they will protect him, as she goes to investigate. Walking through the mist, she eventually comes to the wreckage of the half-submerged school bus and sees the masks of the others floating in the water. She is suddenly attacked by two water-drenched figures covered in chains and runs to see a third disemboweling Chip. As they chase her, Rhonda drops and steps on her glasses before tripping and hitting her head on a rock, blacking out. When she comes to, she sees the figures standing over her and screams in fear but one of them, actually Schrader in disguise, explains that it was just a cruel prank played by all of them and tries to apologize. Macy is unremorseful and kicks a still lit jack-o-lantern into the lake as whispers and giggles suddenly echo out of the mist. Schrader leads Rhonda to the elevator and, when he hears the others screaming, tells her to stay put while he goes to see what's wrong, though he suspects another ruse. But when he meets up with the others, they all see the figures of the eight dead children rise out of the lake, still tied in their chains. They run for the elevator though Sara is caught by a strand of chains and dragged away. The other three make it to the elevator to see Rhonda locked inside with the rest of the jack-o-lanterns, looking sullen but calm. They beg her to open the door but Rhonda, seemingly in a daze, presses the button to go up and leaves the others to their fate as the ghost children surround them. Rhonda exits the elevator and leaves the quarry, towing her pumpkins in her red wagon. She briefly looks at and passes Sam, sitting inside a cement pipe, as Macy, Schrader, and Chip scream and are ripped apart.

4. Meet Sam Three trick-or-treaters walk up the porch of a dark, old house with no Halloween decorations and nervously knock on the door. It opens to pitch darkness and they nervously hold out their bags, saying trick or treat. Two glowing eyes appear, and growling is heard. The children run away as the monster chases them across the yard and Mr. Kreeg appears in the doorway. He calls out to his dog, Spite, and picks him up to remove the monster costume and glowing head piece. He collects the children's dropped candy bags and retreats inside where he proceeds to burn old pictures in his fireplace before settling in his chair to watch TV. He takes a bite out of a candy bar but, disgusted with it, swaps it for a bottle of liquor. Since there is nothing on TV that doesnt have anything to do with Halloween, Kreeg turns it off and hears Spite barking outside before seeing an egg hit his window. He runs to the front door and opens it to see that his entire yard is decorated with dozens of jack-o-lanterns. Spite continues to bark in the back yard and Kreeg goes to investigate where he has his conversation with Wilkins. After finishing the finger that Wilkins threw over to him, Spite runs back inside and begins to bark upstairs. Kreeg follows him up and walks cautiously into his bedroom where he notices something moving under the covers. He pulls back the blanket to see a mechanized hand before a pumpkin, set on a table in the corner, suddenly starts spewing flames, bathing the room in orange light and revealing words scribbled all over the walls and ceiling: trick r treat, give me something good to eat. Kreeg then screams as something stabs him from under the bed. He falls to the ground and looks up to see Sam appear from the other side of the bed. Sam shows him a candy bar and peels back the wrapping to reveal a razor blade inside before attacking. Kreeg screams and manages to escape down the hallway but trips on the landing to the stairs and falls to the bottom. The staircase is covered in small pieces of candy and razor blades and Kreeg winces at his hands, covered in bloody cuts. Struggling as Sam attacks again, Kreeg makes it to the far window where he calls out to Wilkins just before being tackled. He tries to fight off Sam and manages to rip off his burlap mask. Instead of finding a human child's face underneath, Sam's face is a horribly deformed pumpkin with beady eyes and sharp teeth. Kreeg gains the upper hand and gets hold of his shotgun, shooting Sam across the room where he slumps against the front door. Kreeg shoots him again at close range, severing Sams hand, before dialing 9-1-1. But the line goes dead and Kreeg is stabbed in the leg again by Sam's severed hand. It crawls back to Sam and reattaches itself to the stump. Sam gets up and puts his mask back on as Kreeg backs up against the wall, knocking a table and its contents to the floor. Sam removes a pumpkin sucker from his pocket and takes a bite out of it, showing the sharp-edged bite marks. He approaches Kreeg, arm raised to stab him and bring the sucker down on Kreegs chest. Instead of stabbing him, however, Sam lodges the sucker in the discarded candy bar Kreeg had opened earlier, which had landed on his chest after he knocked the table over. Sam proceeds to chew on the candy bar and leaves the room, appearing satisfied. He looks back at Kreeg, who watches in puzzlement, before leaving the house. The door slams shut of its own accord. We then see one of the pictures that Kreeg had thrown into the fire. It shows the eight kids from the bus massacre, revealing that Kreeg was the driver.

Later, a heavily bandaged Kreeg answers the doorbell to give candy to some trick-or-treaters. From his porch, he sees Sam go towards Emma and Henrys house across the way just as she is blowing out the candle to one of her jack-o-lanterns. Rhonda then walks by along the street, pulling her wagon absent-mindedly, and is almost hit by a car carrying the werewolf girls, laughing in human form. Billy Wilkins sits on his porch handing out candy, wearing a costume to mimic his fathers appearance complete with glasses and bloody shirt, unaware that his father is dead. Kreeg walks back inside and the bell rings again. He opens it to see the children from the bus massacre standing on his porch. The boy with the vampire mask says trick r treat and extends his bag before the children leap forward and begin to rip Kreeg apart.