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Released by: Synapse Films
Released on: March 11th, 2025.
Director: Charles Martin Smith
Cast: Marc Price, Tony Fields, Glen Morgan, Lisa Orgolini, Ozzy Osbourne, Gene Simmons
Year: 1986
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Trick Or Treat – Movie Review:
It might not, on paper at least, make a whole lot of sense to cast Skippy from Family Ties in a heavy metal themed horror film featuring cameos from Ozzy Osbourne and The God Of Thunder himself, Gene Simmons from Kiss, but don’t let that dissuade you from watching director Charles Martin Smith 1986 film, Trick Or Treat, because this one is a whole lot of fun.
Set in the era in which it was made, essentially the peak of the Satanic Panic movement where, for those too young to have lived through it, parents were convinced that things like heavy metal music and Dungeons & Dragons would turn their children into hardcore devil worshippers, the movie introduces us to a high school aged outsider named Eddie Weinbauer (Marc Price, the aforementioned Skippy). He’s picked on by the asshole jocks at his school on a regular basis but takes solace in the music of Sammi Curr (the late Tony Fields), a heavy metal superstar who just so happens to be from the same town. Just before Sammi is set to play a homecoming show, he turns up dead, shattering Eddie’s hopes of seeing the man do his thing live on stage.
Luckily, or may not so luckily, for Eddie, local radio station disc jockey Nuke (Gene Simmons) hands over a record containing Sammi’s unreleased music. Of course, being the super fan that he is, Eddie puts it on and quickly comes to the conclusion that the music is speaking to him, giving him ideas on how to get even with those asshole jocks mentioned just a brief paragraph prior. Eddie takes the advice to mind, and before you know it, is dishing out revenge and soon finds himself cool enough to get the attention of pretty classmate Leslie Graham (Lisa Orgolini).
Just as things start looking up for poor Eddie, however, his obsession with Sammi’s album starts to take a dark turn and Sammi’s restless spirit starts becoming increasingly demanding. With the big Halloween dance coming up, and some of Eddie’s enemies turning out dead, will our dorky hero be able to free himself from the evil grasp of Curr’s restless spirit or while the entire school populace pay the price?
Featuring Ozzy Osbourne in the role of anti-heavy metal crusader Reverend Aaron Gilstrom, Trick Or Treat may not always make sense and it may be painfully obvious how much a product of its time it is, but as mentioned, this movie is just a whole lot of fun. Set to a soundtrack from Fastway, featuring Motorhead’s guitarist "Fast" Eddie Clarke, the movie features some pretty memorable scenes of over-the-top heavy metal insanity in its finale, quirky characters, eighties metal museum artifacts (you’ll have a blast pouring over all of the posters on Eddie’s wall!) and some surprisingly good acting from most of the principal players.
The pacing is decent and Eddie makes for a sympathetic enough character that we don’t mind seeing what happens to him as the story plays out. Aspects of it are a bit on the predictable side, but there’s good character development here and the rivalry with the jock characters is established well enough that the feel like a real enough threat to Eddie for it to all work. Tony Fields, who did most of his work in television (he was a Solid Gold dancer!) before passing away, is perfect as the film’s main villain, going just far enough over the top to make a great impression on the audience.
Trick Or Treat – UHD Review:
Trick Or Treat arrives on UHD from Synapse Films in an HEVC encoded 2160p transfer taken from a new "4K restoration from the original 35mm camera negative mastered in Dolby Vision (HDR10 compatible) and approved by Director of Photography Robert Elswit.” The transfer quality on this release is excellent, with the picture boasting gorgeous color reproduction, deep black levels and accurate looking skin tones throughout the duration of the movie. There’s impressive depth and texture throughout and the image is free of any noticeable damage, all while retaining the natural film grain that you’d expect it to. There aren’t any issues with noise reduction, edge enhancement or compression artifacts. All in all, the picture quality here is very impressive – no complaints!
Audio options include the lossless English DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 theatrical mix and an all-new DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 surround sound mix. The 5.1 mix does a nice job of spreading around the score and the sound effects while keeping most of the dialogue up front while the 2.0 mix is, obviously, the more authentic of the two tracks. Both options are clean, clear and properly balanced and play through without any hiss or distortion. Dialogue remains perfectly audible throughout and the score sounds great, those classic (and not so classic) metal tracks really coming through with a nice kick.
Extra features start off with an audio commentary with director Charles Martin Smith, moderated by filmmaker Mark Savage that does a great job of exploring the history of the film and Smith’s involvement in it. He covers his background a bit, how he came to work on the picture, dealing with the cast and crew, the effects work, locations and more. We also get some audio interviews with writer/producer Michael S. Murphey and writer Rhet Topham, moderated by film historian Michael Felsher, that play out as a commentary of sorts. Lots of great stories here about getting the movie made, coming up with ideas for the plot and influences that worked their way into the finished product. A third track, billed as an audio conversation with Paul Corupe and Allison Lang, authors of Satanic Panic: Pop-Cultural Paranoia in the 1980s, does a nice job of analyzing the film and going over what works in the movie, how it compares to other heavy metal horror efforts, the score, the performances and plenty of other details.
Rock & Shock: The Making Of “Trick Or Treat” is a feature length making of documentary that gathers up most of the available cast and crew to go over their experiences making the film. Here, over eighty-one minutes, we hear from Charles Martin Smith, producer/co-writer Joel Soisson, music supervisor Stephen E. Smith, construction foreman Tom Jones, Jr., assistant set costumer Francine Decoursey, costume designer Jill Ohanneson, special makeup effects artist Everett Burrell, composer Christopher Young and cast members Marc Price, Elise Richards, Glen Morgan, Gene Simmons and Larry Sprinkle. It’s a very thorough piece that goes over the evolution of the movie from start to finish, covering the pre-production process, putting together the cast and crew, the effects work, the score, the political climate in which the movie was made, the film’s distribution and loads more.
In The Spotlight: A Tribute to Tony Fields is a fifteen-minute piece made up of interviews with the late actor’s family and friends that offers up a nice selection of biographical information about the man's life and work, his popularity and his eventual death in 1995.
Horror’s Hallowed Grounds: The Filming Locations Of “Trick or Treat” is a great twenty-seven-minute segment hosted by Sean Clark that, if you're familiar with the series, compares the locations used in the movie to how they appear in the modern day.
Finishing up the extras on the disc is an “After Midnight” music video featuring Sammi Curr and Fastway, a vintage EPK that runs five minutes, a still gallery, three radio spots, two theatrical trailers, and two TV spots for the feature. This release comes with a limited-edition O-Card slipcover (included only with the first pressing) as well as some nice reversible cover sleeve art.
Trick Or Treat – The Final Word:
Trick Or Treat will give eighties metal heads a massive nostalgia rush to be sure, but even if you’re not part of that demographic, there’s a lot of fun to be had here. If the movie won’t necessarily send shivers down your spine, it’s a fantastic time capsule of the era in which it was made and just a whole lot of good, goofy fun. The UHD release from Synapse Films is, in a word, excellent, offering up a gorgeous presentation and a load of extras that cover the movie’s history and impact. Highly recommended!
Please note that the Trick Or Treat screen caps below are not taken from the UHD and are intended only to illustrate the film and not the quality of the UHD transfer.
