Halloween Flick Picks

I have actually been quite aware that Halloween is fast approaching. We got Loretta’s costume, a witch, weeks ago, and we’ve been going through the orange and black M&Ms like mad. Where I have been less diligent is in making a filmography of the best kids’ Halloween videos available. I hope that what follows therefore still proves useful, but I just wish I could have done more investigation into unknown diamonds of cinematic Halloweens past. I suppose that leaves me something to do for next year...

So here, in what is for the most part random order, are some of my top picks for your Halloween season:

Mad Monster Party (1969)


Jules Bass and Arthur Rankin, Jr. are not household names akin to Walt Disney or Charles Schultz, but their work is universally recognized in the United States. They’re best known for their Christmas film, the 1964 Rupolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, but for my money their Halloween classic Mad Monster Party, a follow-up holiday special from 1969, is just as wonderful, perhaps more so; it is certainly more delightful in its subversion than Rudolph, although even that film quietly turned some Christmas conventions soundly on their heads. But think of Mad Monster Party as a kid-friendly Young Frankenstein. The action follows the title well enough—there is a party and it turns out to be pretty crazy, pretty madcap—and though kids won’t recognize the celebrity impersonations of Boris Karloff, Phyllis Diller, and, my favorite, Peter Lorre, they’ll still appreciate the monster mayhem and rolling heads, although those younger than three might be apprehensive rather than amused. It seems, by the way, that there is virtually no way to understand the ending unless you have seen Some Like It Hot, which everyone in 1969 had (...and folks in 2008 could do worse)—at least that’s how I viewed it. At any rate, I firmly think everyone should see this little gem of a film, which is why I’m ranking it Number One on my Halloween Flick Picks List.


It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown! (1966)


Bill Melendez is another filmmaker who followed up one of the world’s best Christmas television specials, 1965’s A Charlie Brown Christmas, with one of the best Halloween television specials. I assume that Linus, Charlie Brown, and the mystical Great Pumpkin require very little introduction. This is the kind of film that I remember fondly from my own childhood but have not yet shown to my child; since we watched Mad Monster Party for a previous Halloween, It’s the Great Pumpkin is going to be this seasons’ film of choice.


Wallace and Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit (2005)


Again, since this film is so new I suspect that a great many adults have seen it. Nick Park, Peter Lord, and the folks at Aardman showed once again why they’re the premiere animation studio in the world with this one. It’s for a slightly older set, perhaps ages five and up, what with some scary moments and some unfortunate sexual humor that has no place in a PG film. But it’s delightfully funny, witty, clever, and visually astounding. It’s also a great tie-in, for older kids, with the Bunnicula book series.


The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993)


I’ll be including this near the top of my list of Christmas films in two months, but I recognize that the majority of the film is more Halloweeny than yuletide. We own both this DVD and soundtrack and I’ve found that while some of the images still scare Loretta she can handle all of the music—Danny Elfman at the top of his game—just fine. Also look for the short cartoon Vincent on the DVD, and the half-hour Frankenweenie (now being remade as a feature) for kids with longer attention spans and some knowledge of Frankenstein’s monster.


Corpse Bride (2005)


If one is going to see The Nightmare Before Christmas, then one should also see Corpse Bride. I, however, have not seen Corpse Bride, which is simply mortifying.


Others


Kids absolutely must see the Disney The Legend of Sleepy Hollow at some point in their childhoods. This was released in 1949 as half of The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad and is available today on video under that title. Speaking of Disney, if you have access to a collection of Silly Symphonies, look at the very first of the bunch, Ub Iwerks’ masterful animation study Skeleton Dance (1929; shown at the bottom of this post). 

There are plenty of live-action films that are wonderful treats for the older kids and tweens; Richard Donner’s The Goonies (1985) is right near the top of that list. Tim Burton is another draw, with Beetlejuice and especially Edward Scissorhands. Ghostbusters is superlative. And don’t rule out certain pictures because of the release date; Halloween in particular may be an opportunity to get kids to try black and white fare. Starting with Abbott and Costello Meet… films can be a good way to go, but mature kids can also handle the original old classics, mostly from Universal, like The Mummy, Frankenstein, Dracula, The Invisible Man, and so forth. (Of course, Abbott and Costello were also at Universal; hence the synergy.)


All of the foregoing have been stand-alone films, but there has also been a slew of DVD releases of Halloween episodes of kids’ television shows. This blog by Carey Bryson lists Halloween DVDs from preschool TV shows, and these, from the same site, are new in 2008. If scariness is an issue in your house, you can be sure that preschool series like Diego, Little Bill, and Clifford, also seen below, have been thoroughly vetted to remove any threat.