I believe the original Halloween
should stand on its own. It's much more
effective that way and thematically self contained. No need for the sequels other than to pander
to the fans and the studios looking to capitalize of the original's
success.
With that said the de-masking scene fits brilliantly in the
film and serves many thematic purposes which I'd like to touch upon here. It was an act of subverting
expectations; this whole time the killer behind the mask was not a monster, but
a man, with a man's face, and it's non-distinctive to the point where it could
be anyone. Michael can take off his mask
and blend in with a crowd, like Jack the Ripper, or the Zodiac killer. It makes him more of a threat. It also fits in with the idea that evil can
exist anywhere; it was not an abstract idea floating out there, it was
HOME. Halloween takes the ordinary and
makes it sinister; so this normal looking boy is a killer, this normal looking
house is the Boogeyman's house, this normal man is really a super natural
killing machine.
The de-masking scene also shows how desperate Michael is to retain
the illusion that he is in fact the Boogeyman.
The de-masking temporarily shattered that illusion; it brought him back
down to earth, hence the desperate struggle to get the mask back on before
pursuing Laurie. If the mask was
meaningless to him he would have ignored the de-masking and finished choking
her to death, but to Michael the ritual of Halloween trumps all. He wanted to scare her THEN kill her. It was an important progression to him and
the mask was integral to making it happen.
Without the de-masking scene we don't get that urgency from
Michael. It's more alluded to, but that
is the only example of him pausing or stopping what he was doing. He was a force driving forward the entire
movie; outside of taking physical beating this is the only time I can think of
where he stops with his goal so close, literally in hand.
The vulnerability on his face is a 6 year olds expression,
harkening back to the opening sequence when he is de-masked after killing
Judith. If he is copying the ritual of
Halloween from 1963 it would be thematically fitting that somehow he was
de-masked at the end, tying together the movie.
But another thing to consider is that no matter how vulnerable or catatonic
Michael seems he is a veiled threat.
That was what Loomis was trying to get people to believe with little
success because of Michael's appearance, his feigned innocence and silent
retreat into himself, all of this is deceit.
That last shot drives home the idea that evil can exist anywhere, it was
hidden behind the common, the everyday; it was in suburbia, right under our
noses. If he was hideously deformed it
would not have carried forward the themes presented in the entire film, and not
de-masking him doesn’t bring much to the table either, it doesn’t make the
point that Michael can be anyone, anywhere; even an innocuous 6 year old child.
When I use the word "illusion" I am also referring
to the idea that Michael was performing a ritual. He wanted the mask, the tombstone, the
bodies, all in place for his impromptu haunted house; all part of the
illusion. He takes normal things and
puts a sinister spin on them. He couldn't
maintain that sinister illusion by running around without a mask. To his 6 year old mind the mask was
inseparable from the illusion that he is the Boogeyman, that's why it was so
important for him to put the mask back in place and complete the ritualistic
murder of Laurie, his new Judith.
Without the mask the re-enactment of his first murder is incomplete and
it seemed like an important point Carpenter wanted to drive home in a
simplistic yet brilliant way. Michael
really wanted to “get off” on killing Laurie on terrifying her, and the mask is
integral to that equation. It also
drives home the idea that Michael isn’t just out there killing people for
killings sake; he plays games with them.
Michael terrifies his victims; it’s a psychological as well as physical
assault. Without the de-masking moment
we don’t get the true importance of the mask, or the way it defines Michael
(Michael as himself is just an empty shape of a human).
I think Carpenter took pains to express the idea that evil
could exist anywhere, even in an idyllic mid-western town, even in a 6 year old
boy or young teen. I think that point is
more important to the overall plot of the film than Myers being more than
human, and is emphasized at the end by revisiting all the locations he touched
or tainted with his evil. These
non-sinister locations at day are suddenly foreboding fortresses of horror at
night; normal locations that could be in ANYTOWN, USA inverted and made evil.
Myers being more than human is only part of
what makes him the Shape; the tricks and the stalking, the emphasis on
re-enacting the death of Judith, the Halloween mask, all encapsulate what makes
him The Shape. Remove those aspects and
he is nothing. The nomenclature is meant
to convey the idea that he appears human (again, emphasis on appearances) but
is only defined by his actions and the ritual of Halloween. On the surface he is human but internally he
is missing any persona that would define him as a human being, so he is defined
by killing, by evil. The de-masking was
not meant to bring the idea that Myers was a normal man to light. The Shape has a foot
in both the physical and meta-physical realms.
It’s meant to re-emphasize the idea that he APPEARS normal. He could be anyone.
If
we are going to give Carpenter the credit he deserves we have to assume the
de-masking was a calculated decision. He
knew what the expectation of the audience was, and instead of catering to it he
fell back into the themes playing throughout the movie.
Michael's plain face; a true representative of evil,
and it looks like the next door neighbor, the high school quarterback, the lone
hobo on the side walk, the face of normality, of the common place, and that's
the snare that will trap you. He doesn't
look like a monster; it's a monster in THE SHAPE of a man. Both aspects of Michael are equally important
to realize. The sequels seemed only
focused on Michael as the MONSTER.
