Rating: NR | Runtime: 83 minutes
Release Date: October 29th, 2013 (USA)
Studio: Image Entertainment
Director(s): Damien Leone
Writer(s): Damien Leone

See, it’s just a scary movie.

You have to give writer/director Damien Leone credit. After one of his two short films centering on a demented clown named Art (Mike Giannelli) was seen on YouTube by producer Jesse Baget, an offer to include it in an anthology with other filmmakers was presented.

Where most would blindly jump at the chance, Leone declined before pitching a feature length film of his own design that would feature both shorts (The Ninth Circle and Terrifier) as well as a third. He would write and direct everything as a vehicle specifically manufactured to get Art out into the world and garner the cult following he would subsequently earn. Unfortunately, however, the result proves exactly that: a shallow calling card that’s all style and no substance.

While this isn’t a problem insofar as creating a disturbing work of horror, it is when you step back and acknowledge what All Hallows’ Eve provides instead of a sufficient story. First glance says an introduction to a supernatural maniac who manifests whenever an unsuspecting victim finds him lodged within their subconscious.

Young Timmy (Cole Mathewson) finds an unmarked VHS tape in his candy bag on Halloween and, with the help of his sister Tia (Sydney Freihofer), cajoles their babysitter (Katie Maguire’s Sarah) into watching what’s on it. On comes the systematic murders of women by demons, witches, and Art himself—frightening and exciting the children in equal measure before Sarah sends them to bed.

It’s an effective device to put Art the Clown in their minds and, inexplicably, in their house even though he’s barely in the first vignette and not at all relevant to the second beyond peripheral atmosphere (its alien invasion thriller is pedestrian at best). But who is he? Where does he come from? Leone provides no context or motivation and thus forces us to draw our own.

My conclusion is pure misogyny since he kills men swiftly (and mostly off-screen) while torturing women. The film is literally just depictions of violence against women on repeat without cause beyond sadism. Is Art a captivating baddie worth his pop culture appeal? Aesthetically, yes. Is Leone’s make-up and special effects work legit? For sure. I only hope his follow-ups at least try to give us more than one-dimensional brutality.

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Katie Maguire in ALL HALLOWS’ EVE.