Halloween 3: Season of the Witch is the tag line for "Witchcraft enters the computer age, and a different terror begins."Most Halloween and Halloween 2 fanatics dislike Halloween III because Michael Myers is absent.
In Halloween III: Season of the Witch, executive producers Carpenter and Hill launched what was meant to be an annual anthology of sorts, with a new Halloween movie being released yearly around the holiday. It was a fantastic idea; I just wish they had the chance to take it further. Unfortunately, it wasn't to be.
At the days running up to Halloween, Dr. Daniel Challis (Tom Atkins) finds himself at the heart of a peculiar mystery after a patient he was caring for was killed in the hospital using a Halloween mask.
The Silver Shamrock Company is discovered by Dr. Challis, who is now accompanied by Ellie, the dead man's daughter (Stacey Nelkin). Silver Shamrock creates the world's most popular Halloween mask. There have been tens of millions of masks sold in the US owing to an effective marketing effort (which includes a catchy tune).
(The Silver Shamrock facility was housed in an ancient milk factory.)
Kids are even being instructed to watch a special Halloween night show while still dressed as their costumes! Dr. Challis and Ellie learn that the CEO of Silver Shamrock, Conal Cochran (Dan O'Herlihy), is scheming something that would result in thousands or possibly millions of innocent fatalities as they investigate more.
Aside from a few sequences in which the original Halloween is aired on tv, the Halloween 3 franchise has no connection to Myers, Dr. Loomis, Strode, or Haddonfield, IL. Despite its variations from the previous two films, Halloween III is still a good time.
A few things go wrong in the film, such as the confusion over whether or not the reference to Stonehenge was intended, but there are some memorable scenes. One such scene involves the villain Cochran testing his nefarious scheme out in the flesh on Buddy Kupfer (Ralph Strait), a salesman who was granted Halloween 3 Season of the Witch an exclusive tour of the production facility because he sold so many masks.
Little Buddy (Brad Schacter) and his father, Little Buddy, are confined in a tiny room. To watch the Halloween show, he wears his mask. Things quickly spiral out of control, and the ensuing carnage is a sight to see. Conal Cochran delivers a fascinating history lesson on the true origins of Halloween.
I like the Halloween series, and I'm not afraid to say it. I like the movies that came after Halloween III, all of which have Michael Myers in them again (Halloween IV: The Return of Michael Myers and Halloween V: The Revenge of Michel Myers). But I wonder what kinds of stories would have been told if John Carpenter and Debra Hill had been able to stick to their original plan for the show.
Most of the time, I am not to blame when fans don't like Halloween III. Whoever chose to put the number "3" in the movie title of the movie is to blame.
It's all over now, but the fact that I liked Halloween 3: Season of the Witch makes it more impossible for me to swallow John Carpenter's great shambling.
Tommy Lee Wallace flick.
Stacey Nelkin, Tom Atkins, and Dan O'Herlihy are among those included in the cast.