Trick ‘r Treat is a 2007 horror-comedy anthology movie written and directed by cult movie director Michael Dougherty and produced by X-men director Bryan Singer. It comprises five Halloween stories, completely unrelated except for the fact that a mysterious trick-or-treater named Sam appears in each story whenever someone breaks one of the “rules” of Halloween, whether inadvertently or otherwise.
Trick ‘r Treat 2007 cast
- Quinn Lord as Sam: a mysterious trick-or-treater in an orange onesie and a burlap sack, Sam appears frequently to punish those who break with Halloween tradition.
- Dylan Baker as Principal Steven Wilkins: a strict school principal with a longing for order and a very dark secret.
- Anna Paquin as Laurie: a prissy, old-fashioned college student who attends the Halloween festivities in a Little Red Riding Hood costume.
- Brian Cox as Mr. Kreeg: a cantankerous old man who despises the tradition of Halloween and refuses to take part.
- Brett Kelly as Charlie: an overweight child who incurs the wrath of Principal Wilkins when he steals Halloween candy from an unattended bowl.
Trick ‘r Treat synopsis
Trick ‘r Treat is an anthology, and as such tells several ostensibly unrelated stories except that Sam is appearing in nearly all the stories.
The Principal
Charlie, an overweight schoolboy who enjoys vandalizing pumpkins, is caught stealing candy from the school principal, Mr. Wilkins. Mr. Wilkins gives the boy some candy whilst lecturing him on the importance of following Halloween rules. During this monologue, Charlie begins to vomit blood. The principal is unperturbed by this, and it soon transpires that he poisoned the candy.
Mr. Wilkins goes to his backyard in order to bury both Charlie’s body and that of another unidentified victim. During this, he is, to his exasperation, repeatedly interrupted by his son – who wants to learn how to carve a pumpkin – and his curmudgeonly neighbor, Mr. Kreeg, who pesters him about what he’s doing in the yard at night. Mr. Kreeg is later seen signaling for help from his window, but Mr. Wilkins ignores him.
Mr. Wilkins eventually manages to finish burying the two bodies – having to finish off the second child, who wasn’t quite dead, in the process – and makes his way back to his son. Seemingly annoyed with his son’s constant pestering, it appears that Mr. Wilkins kills him. It soon turns out that this isn’t the case, however. Together they are going to carve a pumpkin – Charlie’s head…
Halloween School Bus Massacre
A group of teenage Halloween trick-or-treaters is going around the neighborhood looking for Jack O’ Lanterns. They stop at the house of a girl named Rhonda, who is something of a school pariah and considered an idiot.
Despite this, the group invites her to join them for the evening. She brings one of the many Jack O’ Lanterns from her yard and tags along.
Macy – who is very derisive towards Rhona – leads them to a flooded quarry. She explain that there was a bus crash at the quarry many years ago after the driver tried to kill the 8 mentally disabled children that were on board. After a brief struggle during which one of the children escaped and took control of the bus, it plunged into the water. All the children died and the driver, though he survived, was never seen again.
Macy reveals the reason for collecting 8 Jack O’ Lanterns: as a tribute to the deceased children. The group split up shortly thereafter, and Rhonda is pursued by ghostly figures who seem to be the dead children. Terrified and at her wits’ end, Rhonda is cornered and helpless. It is at this point that Macy and her friends reveal themselves; they had been pranking Rhonda.
After this revelation, the children are attacked by figures who turn out to actually be the ghosts of the dead children. Rhonda, in a position to help the others escape, chooses not to as punishment for their wicked prank. She leaves the quarry and spots Sam, nodding at him as the other children are torn apart.
Surprise Party
Laurie, a shy 22-year-old student, joins her older sister’s Halloween festivities in a bid to come out of her shell. Laurie gets stuck with a Little Red Riding Hood costume whilst her sister and friends have sexier fairy costumes, to Laurie’s consternation. She opts to meet up with them later as they go around town trying to pick up guys.
The girls are to meet later in the woods; unfortunately for Laurie, she is ambushed by a man dressed in a vampire costume. He looks at her Red Riding Hood costume and says “my, what big eyes you have” before leaning in to bite her.
Later, at the bonfire in the woods, Laurie’s older sister is worried about her, saying that she’s “always been the runt of the litter”. Suddenly someone falls out of a tree. It is the vampire that attacked Laurie; the girls remove his mask and he is revealed to be Principal Wilkins.
Laurie arrives, bleeding from the neck. She straddles Principal Wilkins and asks that he bear with her, as it’s her first time. Principal Wilkins realizes, with shock, that the girls’ dates are all dead.
Laurie begins to change into a werewolf. She looks down and remarks to Principal Wilkins “my, what big eyes you have.” Laurie devours him as the other girls transform into werewolves and eat their dates.
Meet Sam
Three trick-or-treaters nervously approach the door of Mr. Kreeg, Principal Wilkins’ grumpy old neighbor. They are scared away by what appears to be a monster but is really Mr. Kreeg’s dog in a Halloween mask.
Mr. Kreeg takes the children’s dropped candy and continues to drink liquor and burn old photos in the fireplace. Over the course of the night, however, it appears that Mr. Kreeg is being pranked: his house is egged, his lawn is covered with Jack O’ Lanterns and the interior of his house has Halloween-related graffiti scrawled around.
Eventually, Kreeg’s tormentor is revealed as Sam, the burlap-sacked trick-or-treater glimpsed in the other stories. Sam attempts to kill Kreeg, who repeatedly fights him off. Sam’s mask is pulled off, revealing his head to be a grotesquely distorted Jack O’ Lantern. Kreeg is eventually bested by Sam, despite shotgunning him. Sam appears to be readying to stab Kreeg, but instead stabs a bar of candy that has fallen on Kreeg’s chest. Sam exits, leaving a bemused Kreeg to wonder why he was spared.
In the fireplace, the burning pictures reveal Kreeg as the driver of the school bus in which the 8 children died. He is murdered by their ghosts shortly thereafter.
Trick ‘r Treat review
Dripping in the comedy of the very blackest variety, Trick ‘r Treat is a movie that manages to be both thoroughly unnerving and absolutely hilarious. Not many people would dare to make light of serial child murder, but Trick ‘r Treat writer/director Michael Dougherty pulls it off with aplomb. The scene in which Principal Wilkins (Dylan Baker) tries to bury the bodies of his two victims with increasing setbacks and frustrations, is a masterclass in dark humor.
The throughline which binds all four stories, the creepy trick-or-treater Sam, neatly ties everything together and makes sure that we’re not just watching completely disconnected Halloween vignettes. Indeed, there are a number of pleasing callbacks and pseudo-cameos as characters from one story pop up in others, and though this is ultimately an anthology, it’s also really the story of one man – the ill-tempered, bitter Kreeg (Brian Cox).
Trick ‘r Treat also does something that most purported Halloween films do not – it tells a story about Halloween. Sure, you may cite the movie that is quite literally called Halloween, but is that movie really about the holiday? It just happens to be set around the time of the holiday, much like Die Hard may be set at Christmas but is not about Christmas.
Trick ‘r Treat, then, is an oft-overlooked gem, and one that any serious horror aficionado owes it to themselves to get around to seeing.
