ACW1987: Prince of Darkness

John Carpenter. Prince of Darkness. 1987.

After the unpleasant experience with releasing Big Trouble in Little China (the studio wanted Indiana Jones, which that film definitely wasn’t, so they made him recut the film a couple of times before spiking the release), Carpenter swore off studios. (Or perhaps it was the other way around, because Big Trouble flopped seriously.)

So we’re back to indie film-making on a pretty small budget. (A tenth of the previous film.) Carpenter re-uses some of the actors from Big Trouble, though, and Donald Pleasance from his earlier low-budget films.

It’s pretty scary; perhaps Carpenter’s spookiest horror film so far. But it could have done with a bit of editing. Not a lot, but some of the scenes are just a smidge too long.

This post is part of the A Carpenter Winter series.

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