Without question, one of the stupidest; dullest, weirdest movies i’ve had the misfortune to sit through. ‘Trick or Treats’ is perfect viewing for the individual who likes their films surface level and stuck in a single gear for the entire runtime.

I wish I was kidding when I say that the film is just over 80 minutes long and consists of 70 minutes of a babysitter being repeatedly pranked by an obnoxious little runt of a kid who’s into magic and joke shop gags, intercut with footage of a guy escaping an insane asylum and S L O W L Y making his way to the kids house. with 10 minutes essentially amounting to the most half hearted slasher movie i’ve seen in a good while.

That’s it. That’s the whole plot, they detour occasionally the asylum where the guy escaped from…but it doesnt lead anywhere. For a brief window they cut to an editing room to watch to editors cut a film together…that adds nothing to the film. This things a time sink. a way to effectively kill 82 minutes and LITERALLY have nothing to show for it.

The scripts locked in that single gear of:

*Babysitter goes looking for kid.
*Kid pranks Babysitter with very dull gag.
*Babysitter gets mad and asks kid politely to stop
*Kid runs off and goes quiet for a bit, leading to Babysitter looking for him.

Repeat that about 8 or 9 times and you’ve got this movie to a tee. tonally its got a bit of a campy streak running through it which is quite welcome, the dialogues atrocious to the point I actually kind of find it mesmorising and the characters themselves are all either fairly air headed or just dreary and unlikable. The pacing is one not across the runtime right up until the final 10 minutes when it suddenly ups the ante a little bit (but not enough to make it worth your time) and the extended sequences of our Babysitter wandering around the house, occasionally answering the door to trick or treaters is mind numbing to say the least.

the directions not *too* bad. they have managed to get camera and lighting to work together fairly well, the cast are a little stiff in front of the camera and dont utilise their set space as much as I’d have personally liked. But it looks professional enough and the distinct 80’s ness of the whole thing kind fo endeared me a little bit too it. The director here clearly had a specific vibe in mind for how this was going to look and feel and It made me oddly nostalgic to see these early 80s setups, colour schemes and lighting choices in action here.

The cine too isnt too bad either, shots are a bit on the basic side, but they’re composed pretty solidly, have a good amount of moody or semi interesting lighting and its got a good amount of B-roll under its belt which really helps bring the sequences together.

While the edit isnt the greatest in the world (I personally felt it was a little bit slack with some scenes rolling on a bit too long and some cuts being a little too soon) the B-roll doesn significantly help smooth the sequences over and the use of oranges and blues in the colour sceme choices does help give it a bit of a boost in terms of quality output. Its not winning any awards any time soon. But for a vibe; it’s on the right track.

Our cast, if anything, deliver EXACTLY what the director had in mind. It’s just a shame that what he had in mind were extreme personalities that clash like lemon juice and milk. Our Babysitter here is WAY too meak and mild in allowing Chistopher (our kid for this feature) to get away with the pranks he does. and that performance, while on point for what the script is trying to convey, is TERRIBLY irritating when you actually have to sit through it.

Christopher is annoying in the script and is played perfectly here, giving Alan from ‘Return to Sleepaway Camp’ a run for his money in terms of ‘Annoying characters I wish I wasnt aware of’. I dont often comment on child actors, but the kid playing christopher here really does go above and beyond in portraying christopher as rambunctious and SO annoying in equal measure. I think he nailed the brief. Even if i am suffering for it.

throw in…what im guessing is a half hearted attempt at a score (its tinny synth pangs intermixed with some gentle 80’s reimagining of 50’s rock and roll style twanging) and you have a film that…as a work of cinema, is downright abominable. with an irritating cast, weird visuals and a script that would test the patience of most, its up there; not as a bad movie, but as a pointless one. It neither gives nor takes away. it just exists.

In that sense its a FANTASTIC ‘head empty’ movie. The kind of thing you put on when your doing other things and just need some background noise you occasionally check into. In THAT sense this is good fun! Because realistically, what you have here is about 25 minutes worth of story stretched out to 82 minutes and if you DO decide to drift in and out of it, you’ll absolutely still know whats going on, but you wont have to worry about missing any crucial plot points…BECAUSE THERE ARNT ANY!

In short, one I cant recommend in good faith. But if your looking for TV noise. absolutely give it a check in, in that sense its great fun.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/trick-or-treats/