I have only ever known two types of Halloween. One is the commercial variety, where you are 12 years old and you haul around pillowcases full of potentially poisoned treats while being dressed in a homemade ghost costume that is partially obscured by a winter jacket. The second is where you pay $38 for a ‘Halloween Bash†at a nightclub you would normally never go to, surrounded by scantly dressed women that you remember seeing in your intro sociology class at university.
Recently, I have started to appreciate Halloween’s more morbid nature through classic gothic films and books. The genre owes its existence to the influences of greats like Tim Burton, Alfred Hitchcock, Edgar Allen Poe and Vincent Price. One of my favorite Halloween films is a short called “The Skeleton Dance” that was created in 1929 by Disney in their “Silly Symphonies†series. Some 80 years after it’s creation, it remains a timeless classic.
There is a creative freedom in exploring unpleasant subjects like death and Halloween provides a great excuse. Â I know that when I am experiencing occasional designers block, I find experimenting in different thematic styles of design gives me a new perspective and sparks my imagination. Halloween can be a theme rich in variety and depth beyond cartoon witches and pumpkins if you look for it in the right places.
Tags: Classic films, Halloween, The Skeleton Dance
Thanks for the entertaining Halloween themed blog. I agree, sometimes a shift in writing style helps the creative process. And for your information, the scantly clad women were from my Anthropology class…
I remember watching this animated short when I was a kid! Thanks for sharing it. I would agree with you that “the greats” do a good job of exploring the subject of death; today’s “hack n slash” fare just doesn’t compete.