Prior to the start of October, FreeForm has released its 31 Days of Halloween movie list to get viewers in the Halloween spirit. These are just a few movies from this list and other movies to enjoy with friends and family, eating popcorn and drinking hot chocolate and pumpkin spice lattes.
1. Hocus Pocus
Released in 1993, the movie is still a fan favorite Halloween movie. Currently, this film is in theaters, such as AMC and Regal. This movie is about a teenager who explores an abandoned house with his sister and friend after moving to Salem, Massachusetts. The teenager, Max, “accidentally frees a coven of evil witches who used to live in the house. Now, with the help of a magical cat, the kids must steal the witches’ book of spells to stop them from becoming immortal.”
While watching this movie, enjoy the new Starbucks drink inspired by the three witches in Hocus Pocus.
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Kelly Sweeney, junior education major, said, “Hocus Pocus is my favorite Halloween because I like how they made the cat talk like a real human.”
2. Halloweentown
Halloweentown is another fan-favorite movie during the Halloween season. This movie is about daughter Marnie and her children following their grandmother back home to Halloweentown where they find out that they come from a family of witches. This town is where these witches reside to live a normal life, until Marnie finds out on her 13th birthday that she, too, is a witch. She also finds out that her family is involved in a fight against people trying to take over the world. However, it does not stop at just one film. Halloweentown is a series of four movies where each movie continues from the previous one.
3. The Nightmare Before Christmas
Also released in 1993, this movie is currently in Regal movie theaters for a limited time. As described by Rotten Tomatoes, this film is about Jack Skellington, a pumpkin-headed skellington, whose become bored with the yearly routine of frightening real world people. However, “When Jack accidentally stumbles on Christmastown, all bright colors and warm spirits, he gets a new lease on life. He plots to bring Christmas under his control by kidnapping Santa Claus and taking over the role, where he later learns his plan doesn’t go as planned.”
4. Beetlejuice
A Warner Bros. production, Beetlejuice is a comedic Halloween movie about a married couple who die in a car accident when “they find themselves stuck haunting their country residence, unable to leave the house.” Later, a mother and daughter move into the haunted home where the dead couple try their best to scare them away, but fail to do so. “Their efforts attract Beetlejuice, a rambunctious spirit whose “help” quickly becomes dangerous for the Maitlands (the dead couple) and innocent Lydia (the teenage daughter).
5. Casper
A childhood favorite, Casper was made in 1995 by director Brad Silberling. This film is about a young ghost, Casper, who haunts a Maine house, but does it peacefully. The specialist in the movie comes to speak to Casper and his ghost friends, he brings along his teenage daughter. When Casper sees her, he “quickly falls in love. Their budding relationship is complicated because of his transparent state, as well as his troublemaking uncles and their mischievous antics.”
6. IT
In the 2017 remake film of Stephen King’s 1990 original IT movie, this making of IT is about seven young children who face Pennywise, an evil clown who “emerges from the sewer every 27 hours to prey on the town’s children.” Overcoming their fears, these children must come together to battle this clown. This film is rated R for “language, bloody images, violence/horror” and is a mystery/thriller. For anyone who likes this genre, it is definitely for them.
7. Scream
Some love to mix gore and humor in their Halloween movies. Made in 1996, this film features gore and violence. This movie is about many citizens seeing a killer in the small town of Woodsboro. “Suddenly nobody is safe, as the psychopath stalks victims, taunts them with trivia questions, then rips them to bloody shreds.”
8. Coraline
Another childhood movie, Coraline was a fan-favorite till today among many viewers. This 2009 film is about a young girl named Coraline, played by Dakota Fanning. She finds a secret door while exploring her new home. Behind that door lies “an alternate world that closely mirrors her own but, in many ways, is better. She rejoices in her discovery, until Other Mother and the rest of her parallel family try to keep her there forever.” However, Coraline must try every way possible to get back to her original life and family.
9. A Nightmare on Elm Street
Many love horror movies at Halloween. This 2010 Rated R film features graphic scenes, such as terror, strong bloody scenes, violence, disturbing images and language. A Nightmare on Elm Street is about five teenage neighborhood friends, who all coincidentally have the same nightmare. That nightmare consists “of a horribly disfigured man who wears a tattered sweater and a glove made of knives.” The man in their dreams ” terrorizes them in their dreams, and the only escape is to wake up. But when one of their number dies violently, the friends realize that what happens in the dream world is real. The only way to stay alive is to stay awake.”
10. Monster House
Released in 2006, another classic and childhood favorite Halloween movie is Monster House. This film is about three neighborhood children, two of which are friends. They try to convince the adults that “a neighboring residence is a living creature that means them harm. With Halloween approaching, the trio must find a way to destroy the structure before innocent trick-or-treaters meet ghastly ends.”
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