To begin my month long marathon of horror movie viewing, I chose "Meet Me In St. Louis" (1944). Yes, this is the movie starring Judy Garland best known for introducing the song "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" to the world. So why this movie?
Towards the middle of this movie there's a short, but terrific Halloween sequence, which is entertaining but also fascinating as it shows just how different Halloween was in 1903 versus how we think of it now. There is no trick-or-treating, instead the children dress up in costumes, and take bags of flour out to commit acts of ritual murder on adults, throwing a handful of the flour in their victim's face to kill them. When not doing this, the kids are out burning piles of discarded furniture and wagon wheels in huge bonfires on the street, and with no adult superstition to boot. This was great stuff.
The rest of the movie's really good, too, but since it doesn't have anything to do with the holiday we're celebrating, I won't go into it here.
This is a favorite movie at our house, even with my 12 year old son. Don't forget about the scenes the bonfire in which the 2 'sweet' little girls tell of the prank they played. They admit to stuffing a dress to look like a live body and placing it on the trolley tracks in hopes of the derailing the trolley car full of people. I think I prefer trick-or-treating!
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