10 Fun Facts about TRICK 'R TREAT
Trick 'r Treat is my number one favorite Halloween movie of all time, as it perfectly captures the spirit of the holiday in every aspect. Unfortunately, it never got an official theatrical release because it famously got screwed over by Warner Bros. Regardless of that, the movie generated a huge cult following, one large enough that Legendary Pictures officially greenlit a sequel that writer and director Michael Dougherty is currently developing. This is a more recent Halloween film, but it's an instant classic to anyone who has seen it. If you're a true fan of the film, and you were following its story, then you might know most of these, but here are ten fun facts about the movie that you might want to go through just in case.
- Many of the kids trick or treating in the film were actually Little people. They were used since the movie was shot mainly at night and real kids could not work these hours.
- Most of the Jack O' Lanterns in the movie were made out of foam or ceramic. There was an on-set joke that no pumpkins were harmed during the making of this movie.
- The werewolves that we saw in the movie were created by Tatopoulos Studios, which is the same studio that created the Lycans in the Underworld trilogy.
- The name of the character Sam is derived from Samhain, which is the ancient Celtic festival of the dead from which modern-day Halloween is derived. "Despite having been portrayed as such in this film and several other works, Samhain is not a deity or other personage of ancient Celtic polytheism; it is only the name of the celebration. However, the idea of being either a deity or other personage dates back to at least the late first century, largely thanks to an Irish bishop named Cormac mac Cuilennàin and his book "Sanas Cormaic" (Irish Gaelic for "Cormac's Narrative"), which had identified Samhain as such."
- The Rock Quarry was originally conceived as a pumpkin patch, which would have been pretty awesome.
- The film had several title changes before filming began. It was originally called Season's Greetings, like the short film it was based on. It was changed because it sounded too much like a Christmas film. Other titles it went through included Halloween Terrors, Jack O' Lantern Tales, October the 31st, and then finally eded up using Trick or Treat. There was already a movie of the same name, though, so they changed the spelling to Trick 'r Treat.
- The look of Brian Cox's character, Mr. Kreeg, was based on John Carpenter, the director of horror classics Halloween and The Thing.
- Mr. Kreeg says, "You gotta be fuckin' kidding," while Sam's severed hand runs across the floor. In 1982's The Thing, Palmer said the exact same line while Norris' head ran around the lab on spider legs, and Cox says the line exactly the same way.
- Mrs. Henderson, who is the drunk teacher dressed as a cat, is a werewolf. She can be seen during the transformation scene and is also in the background with the group of werewolf girls in one scene.
- The serial killer in the story, Steven Wilkins, seems to specialize in murdering children. This is actually one of the few horror movies where young children are shown being killed off in the story for real.
I also included the 1996 animated short film that Dougherty made that served as the inspiration of the movie. It also debuted the character of Sam. You can also watch the trailer for the movie below.
Thanks to Imdb for the info.