Profile Of John Carpenter
Image Source: The Guardian
While many may think of John Carpenter as simply a horror director who brought us Halloween, they would be wrong. Not only is he an incredible horror director, but he is also a well-respected director in multiple different genres, a writer, and an incredible musician. His list of talents is practically endless, and this is what helped make Halloween such a massive success.
John Carpenter was born in Carthage, New York, but spent a portion of his life living in Bowling Green, Kentucky, where his father was a professor and head of the music department at Western Kentucky University. Carpenter would go on to attend that university and then USC’s film school in Los Angeles. While at USC, he began work on the sci-fi comedy short Dark Star that would eventually be made into a feature length film and released in theaters in 1975.
His next work, Assault on Precinct 13, was an homage to Howard Hawks and was a reimagining of Rio Bravo, but set in an urban setting. He would get his big break with 1978’s Halloween, which was not only a massive success but also a huge surprise for Carpenter. The film was meant to be a way for him to show his different skills in the hope that it would help him get offered jobs in the industry. The film was made using a budget of just $300,000 and brought in $47 million at the box office. Not only did he direct the horror classic, but he was also the co-writer and composer of the film. While he has brought horror fans other classics such as The Fog, They Live, Christine, In the Mouth of Madness, and The Thing, this isn’t the only genre he is known for. He is also a well-respected action director, and this is thanks to films like Escape from New York, Escape from L.A., and Big Trouble in Little China. He also directed Starman, a sci-fi love story that earned Jeff Bridges a Best Actor nomination at the Oscars.
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Image Source: IMDb
The big screen isn’t the only place you will see his name, though. He has directed the made-for-TV film Someone’s Watching Over Me, the biographical mini-series Elvis, and a Showtime horror trilogy, John Carpenter’s Body Bags. He is the co-creator of the comic book series, John Carpenter’s Asylum and John Carpenter’s Tales for a HalloweeNight, and he is currently releasing music. If this wasn’t enough, he also co-wrote Fear 3, a video game for Warner Bros. Interactive, and has a new video game coming out next year. John Carpenter’s Toxic Commandos is his newest project, and it is a video game for which he helped develop the story. According to the Steam Store, the game is set in the near future, where there has been a terrifying disaster that has released something called the “Sludge God.” This being turns the soil to sludge and living creatures into zombies. I personally cannot wait to try out this game!
Along with his countless projects, he has also won a slew of awards. In 1970, he won the Oscar for Best Short Subject (live action) for The Resurrection of Bronco Billy. In 1979, he won the Hugo New Generation Award for Halloween. He won ASCAP Screen Music Awards’ award for Top Television Series for Zoo in 2016, and their award for Top Box Office Film in 2019, 2022, and 2023 for Halloween (2018), Halloween Kills, and Halloween Ends. He also won countless lifetime achievement and film festival awards. While he will forever be synonymous with horror, we cannot ignore his other incredible projects!
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Source(s): IMDb, theofficialjohncarpenter.com, Steam Store
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