By Todd Garbarini
Rarely has distributor exploitation been as blatant as in the
case of Simon Wincer’s The Day After
Halloween (1980), a ludicrously-named Australian outing originally optioned
under the name of Centerfold, then
changed to Snapshot after the
producers were unable to secure that title, and was eventually released as One More Minute. It appeared on video shelves here in the U.S.
on VHS both in 1983 from Catalina Home Video under the title of The Day After Halloween and in 1985 as The Night After Halloween on Magnum Home
Entertainment. The film came on the
heels of the John Carpenter-scripted Eyes
of Laura Mars (1978) which was set against the milieu of the fashion
industry. Filmed in 1978 and released in
Australia the following year, The Day
After Halloween has absolutely nothing to do with John Carpenter’s seminal holiday
suspense yarn, and isn’t even a slasher film. It isn’t even a thriller. At
best, it can be considered a mystery that concerns a young woman named Angela (Sigrid
Thornton) who lives with her wretched, belittling mother and is trying to fend
off the unwanted affections of her obsessed and emotionally unstable ex-boyfriend
Daryl (Vincent Gil) who drives an ice cream truck (think Phantasm!). She’s late for
work which earns her the condemnation of her hairstylist boss but garners the
affections of Madeline (Chantal Contouri), a sophisticate who dresses like Joan
Collins who encourages Angela to parlay her natural good looks into a modeling
career which lands her topless in Cleo, the Australian equivalent of
Cosmopolitan Magazine, in an ad for Bermuda Cool cologne. The ad proves lucrative but also draws the unsolicited
attention of lots of tongue-wagging men twice her age in an effort to score
with her. A photographer sets up a
meeting with her and uses an innocent photo session as a ruse to get her drunk
and undressed, but she bails, which leads to a frightening confrontation later
on.
Given the cookie-cutter nature of films
from this era, it isn’t difficult to realize who really idolizes Angela and
wants her the most. The Bermuda Cool
photographing sequence goes on much longer than it should (remember that long,
wordless sequence in Play Misty for Me
set to a Roberta Flack song? That was
shorter!). Lacking a cinematic style,
the film for the most part is shot in masters and throws lots of red herrings
at the audience, but it makes for an entertaining film. The acting is impressive for this sort of story. The score is by the late Australian composer Brian
May whose music to George Miller’s The
Road Warrior (1981) is one of the best action film scores ever. Prior to this, Mr. May scored Patrick (1978) which was produced by Anthony
Ginnane who also acts as producer on this film as well (if you have seen the
Italian cut of Patrick, Mr. May’s
score was replaced by Goblin’s). Director
Wincer has gone on to director more notable and successful films: Phar Lap (1983), D.A.R.Y.L. (1985), Quigley
Down Under (1990), Free Willy
(1993), and The Phantom (1996).
The film has been released on Scorpion
Releasing’s Katarina's Nightmare Theater line, hosted by Katarina Leigh Waters.
Ms. Waters proves to be a charming and
knowledgeable emcee and provides an amusing introduction to the film. She
points out that this is the first time the film is being presented on home
video in its original 2.35:1 anamorphic Panavision aspect ratio. The film is transferred from a theatrical
print, but it is free of dirt and scratches. The sound is in mono and is passable.
The DVD contains the entire, uncut
version of the film with Snapshot on
the title card, however there is an extra that contains a portion of the
opening credits with The Day After
Halloween as the title (the fuzziness of the image and overall lack of quality
appears to be sourced from VHS). There
is also an extremely informative running commentary with producer Anthony Ginnane
moderated by Ms. Waters. A veteran of
over fifty films, Mr. Ginnane is a fountain of knowledge and remembers quite a
bit about the making of this film which had a very tight production schedule on
the order of three weeks shooting time. The
DVD cover replicates the original American one-sheet which is a nicely-designed
image but is completely misleading – it is simply the wrong cover for this
movie.
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