The Midnight Hour

Rating:
Summary: A Halloween classic!
Review: Part of the appeal of "Midnight Hour" is that it's a good, fun Halloween film for the entire family but also enjoys an almost cult status among the adult set. Though not ultimately destined for a place in the Horror Hall of Fame I look at it like this: "Midnight Hour" is like that baseball player who's a hometown hero but never achieves recognition outside those who grew up watching him. Hope that makes sense.

The story is pretty cliche. A bunch of teenagers find a scroll in a museum that will raise the dead when read aloud in a cemetary on Halloween night. They do and hilarity ensues. I hung out with a pretty diverse bunch in high school but I never knew anyone who's idea of fun was getting together to read musty old incantations. Anyway, what follows next is B-movie actors getting zombified for the duration of the movie until the curse can be broken.

What I love most about this movie, though, is its encompassing of age old tradition and classic seasonal imagery. This is partly why it has become inextricably linked with my memories of Halloween.

If you're looking for an enjoyable movie with a fun, if a bit formula plot, for your Halloween party then it doesn't get much better than "Midnight Hour". Thank Anchor Bay for bringing this rare Halloween gem back to prominence.

Rating:
Summary: A Halloween classic!
Review: Part of the appeal of "Midnight Hour" is that it's a good, fun Halloween film for the entire family but also enjoys an almost cult status among the adult set. Though not ultimately destined for a place in the Horror Hall of Fame I look at it like this: "Midnight Hour" is like that baseball player who's a hometown hero but never achieves recognition outside those who grew up watching him. Hope that makes sense.

The story is pretty cliche. A bunch of teenagers find a scroll in a museum that will raise the dead when read aloud in a cemetary on Halloween night. They do and hilarity ensues. I hung out with a pretty diverse bunch in high school but I never knew anyone who's idea of fun was getting together to read musty old incantations. Anyway, what follows next is B-movie actors getting zombified for the duration of the movie until the curse can be broken.

What I love most about this movie, though, is its encompassing of age old tradition and classic seasonal imagery. This is partly why it has become inextricably linked with my memories of Halloween.

If you're looking for an enjoyable movie with a fun, if a bit formula plot, for your Halloween party then it doesn't get much better than "Midnight Hour". Thank Anchor Bay for bringing this rare Halloween gem back to prominence.

Rating:
Summary: Best Movie Ever
Review: The Midnight Hour was the best movie i have ever seen.Many people say they dont like it because its not exciting enough or gory enough. I first watched this movie when it originally aired on ABC in 1985 and i was 11 years old.I loved the movie and never did think much about it until i saw it in the video rental store i rented it and fell in love with it again. This movie has an underlying love story and its great for Halloween night or any other night. I very highly recommend this movie. The actors are great which make the movie great. This is an excellent movie for kids or adults. Buy it you won't be sorry.

Rating:
Summary: Where is...
Review: the soundtrack?! If whoever owns the rights to this fantastic movie would put out the soundtrack, I would love to have it!

Rating:
Summary: The Midnight Hour
Review: They thought vampires were a joke! One eerie Halloween night, a group of spirited teenagers recreate an ancient curse that almost destroyed their sleepy New England town many years before. The teens' direct descendants of those who lived through that night of horror, decide to reenact the ghoulish night for their own Halloween. In the process, they unleash the dreaded curse. A group of uninvited guests...ghouls, ghosts, vampires and angry zombies, leave the graveyard to join in the Halloween celebration. The result is a menacing blend of horror and humour. As the town is turned topsy-turvey by a batallion of spirit-spooks, all hell breaks loose, literally! The teens must reverse the curse by THE MIDNIGHT HOUR to prevent the triumph of evil. "Why Midnight? Because if we don't do it while it's still Halloween and the night the evil was created, everyone who dies this night will walk again and all who is touched this night by evil will become evil forever." The MIDNIGHT HOUR moves as fast as a ghost in a strong wind, and the result is constant entertainment...a bewitching tale of the witching hour played by an attractive cast including Shari Belafonte-Harper, LeVar Burton and Kevin McCarthy.

Rating:
Summary: Pure Halloween Fun!
Review: This 1980's made for TV movie opens on Halloween morning, with a paper boy preparing to go out on his route. Adding a baseball card to his bicycle spokes, he accidentally cuts his finger, and with that first tiny drawing of blood (the goriest moment in the film actually), the title "The Midnight Hour" flashes on the screen with "Wolfman" Jack's voice over, "Lookout, it's the midnight hour! Owwwooooooooooo!!!"
Our story begins here in Pitchford Cove, or "Pitchfork Cove" as the residents sometimes jokingly call it. As Phil Grenville reads his report on local Halloween history to the rest of his High School class, we are told that a witch named Lucinda placed a Halloween curse on the town hundreds of years ago, and that it was HIS ancestor who stopped it from coming true. Suddenly, Phil's friend Mitch gets the bright idea to sneak into the local witch museum to borrow costumes for tonight's Halloween party, and with his friends eager to do it, Phil reluctantly comes along. In the museum, the group of teens find an old scroll, break the seal, and find an old curse written on it. Off to the graveyard to read it allowed, just for kicks! Unfortunately, their friend Melissa is the descendant of witch Lucinda, and she reads the incantation. Thinking it did not work, the frieds head home to prepare for the party. Meanwhile, all manor of evil creatures, from werewolves, to vampires, to witches, to the bodies in the graveyard, come to life to wreak vengeance on Pitchford Cove. Many comic moments arise from seeing the regular townsfolk interact with zombies they believe to merely be people in costumes, especially at the Halloween party, but some terrifying moments occur too, because while some creatures seem to just be hanging out, the rest came to kill and spread their evil!
Amongst the horrific creatures however, a beautiful 50's era cheerleader named Sandy has also come to life, looking as cute as ever for some reason. Phil and Sandy meet on the way to the party, and while they fall in love, they also discover the evil that has the town in its clutches, and do their best to stop it before The Midnight Hour, when it will be too late!
The Midnight Hour is a wonderful TV movie from the mid 80's. I remember seeing it the first time it aired. It's corny, naturally, it's a cheezy 80's move. There are bad lines, the High School Students look like College Graduates, and Shari Belafonte, who plays Melissa, breaks out into a song and dance number at the party for no concievable reason. But in that cheezy, non-gory style of Halloween horror, it is great fun! The love story is sweet and sincere, the constant "Wolfman" Jack radio program playing spooky oldies in the background is wonderful, and the monsters are just great! Sure, the fangs look fake, you can see where the "fog" is being released from in the cemetary, and the first werewolf looks more like a guy in a bigfoot suit, but if you lose yourself in the story it's really fun and exciting and even can give you chills in some moments, when watched in the proper atmosphere of course. That's why I can't help but give this incredibly fun movie 5 stars, and rank it with my Halloween must watch films like Hocus Pocus, It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown, Sleepy Hollow, Harry Potter, Ichabod and Mr. Toad, and the original The Worst Witch, among others!

Rating:
Summary: Fine Halloween fun and fright.
Review: This 1985 t.v. movie is filled with great oldies, a solid cast, all things considered, and a decent and involving plot. The monsters are all "Thriller" era and are great fun. A really enjoyable movie.

Rating:
Summary: Demons arise
Review: This movie takes place in a small town in Pennsylvania on Halloween. A group of kids decide to break in to a museum to steal costumes for a party one of them is throwing. They go to the cemetery to try them on and find an old parchment in one of the chests. They recite the chant written on it not knowing what they have unleashed. After they leave zombies, werewolves, vampires, and a large serial killer are revived and come out of their graves to wreck havoc. The party is at the vampire witch Lucinda's old house, and she comes home. Before long the party is full of dancing zombies & vampires. One of the friends meets up with a cheerleader (that is not a zombie) back from the grave and they have to try and end the curse by midnight. It is a hard task because the items they need are scattered amongst the other friends. This is a great halloween movie that also has some laughs in it.

Rating:
Summary: Demons arise
Review: This movie takes place in a small town in Pennsylvania on Halloween. A group of kids decide to break in to a museum to steal costumes for a party one of them is throwing. They go to the cemetery to try them on and find an old parchment in one of the chests. They recite the chant written on it not knowing what they have unleashed. After they leave zombies, werewolves, vampires, and a large serial killer are revived and come out of their graves to wreck havoc. The party is at the vampire witch Lucinda's old house, and she comes home. Before long the party is full of dancing zombies & vampires. One of the friends meets up with a cheerleader (that is not a zombie) back from the grave and they have to try and end the curse by midnight. It is a hard task because the items they need are scattered amongst the other friends. This is a great halloween movie that also has some laughs in it.

Rating:
Summary: THE MIDNIGHT HOUR is perfect for a Halloween night!
Review: This was the first horror movie I ever saw and I love it. It's blend of comedy, horror, and shock/atmosphere creates enormously scary fun. A group of kids accidentally release a witch's curse on the town of Pitchford/Pitchfork Cove. Soon vampires, werewolves, zombies, and maniic killers are loose. Some are frightening, like the Vernon Nester zombie and the Judge monster, and others are humorous like the midget werewolf and the alcoholic ghoul. It's Halloween night, and the ghosts and ghouls decide to create a party of their own! First rate fun with scares and laughs.

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