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An audience reacts to John Carpenter's Halloween

In an era when most people don't venture out of their homes to watch movies, it's nice to be reminded of the communal experience of seeing a movie in a crowded theatre.

I've become one of those people who rarely hits up the local cinema anymore, mostly because of the crowds. The current movie-going public doesn't respect the "process" of watching a movie. They talk, text and tweet their way through the film, almost like the film itself is an afterthought.

But when a movie works and the audience is engaged, catching a flick in a theatre can be a transcending experience. And few genres work a crowd like the horror genre. When horror clicks, it works over its audience, as the example below testifies to.

I never got to watch John Carpenter's Halloween in a theatre. I was far too young. But when people who saw it during its theatrical run are interviewed, they say it played like gangbusters. Well, someone found an audio track of an audience reaction to the film while it screened in a theatre in October 1979 and mixed a segment to the appropriate video. The end result is below, and it's awesome! If more movie-going experiences were like this, I'd plant my ass in a theatre seat all the time.

Maybe we need to bring Carpenter's film to Kamloops for our upcoming Basement Film Fest?

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