Draft:Hack-O-Lantern

Hack-O-Lantern is a 1988 American independent horror film, directed by Jag Mundhra. It stars Hy Pyke as a Satanic cult member who tries to recruit his grandson, Tommy (Gregory Scott Cummins), into the cult, which commits sacrifices on Halloween. It was issued on home video in various territories throughout the world, often under alternate titles. Through its various home releases and a resurgence of interest in the 2010s, the film has attained a cult following.

Plot
On Halloween eve, young Tommy Drindle is visited by his pumpkin-farming grandfather, who brings a wrapped gift and a pumpkin. Tommy cuts himself carving it but sucks the wound and tells his mother, Amanda, that he likes the taste, and that Grandpa said blood was good for him. Later, his father, Bill, confronts Grandpa in a farmhouse, where Grandpa is participating in a Satanic ritual. Bill threatens him but is immolated by one of the Satanists. At home, Tommy unwraps the gift, finding a medallion.

On Halloween thirteen years later, we see an adult Tommy swinging the same medallion, emblazoned with a pentagram. Grandpa visits and tells Tommy that tonight he will finally learn the extent of his powers. A flashback reveals that Grandpa raped Amanda on her wedding night, insinuating that Grandpa is Tommy's biological father.

Tommy's brother Roger, a rookie deputy assigned to the town's Halloween party, is instructed to monitor the local cemetery, plagued by grave robberies. Back at home, Tommy has a daydream in which he performs in a heavy metal band and is decapitated by a demonic woman.

Tommy and his girlfriend Nora are picking up beer for the party when he is visited by Grandpa, who reminds Tommy to remain pure for tonight's ceremony. Amanda tells Roger she's worried that his sister Vera will find love and leave the family, and Tommy shows Roger a Satanic shrine he's built in his basement. Nora, swimming alone, is confronted by a cloaked, masked figure, which she assumes is Tommy in costume. When she disrobes for him, he kills her with a pitchfork.

Grandpa arrives at the party location, where townsfolk are decorating, and Vera believes he's only there to keep tabs on Tommy. As Grandpa attempts to embrace her, he's confronted by her boyfriend, Brian, but Vera clarifies that the man is her grandfather.

After Tommy discovers Vera and Brian making out in her bedroom, he throws Brian out of the house. Tommy heads off to the ritual while Brian walks home through a cemetery and is pursued by the same figure who killed Nora. As Brian retreats, he falls into an open grave and is killed with a shovel. Amanda returns home and Vera tells her that Tommy assaulted Brian.

Grandpa participates in another ritual at the farmhouse, ordaining a new female member into the coven. Roger, who is surveilling the cemetery with Vera's friend Beth, hears a disturbance but only finds a group of young trick-or-treaters. After sending them away, Roger and Beth have sex on a gravesite, after which he drops Beth off at Vera's house.

Heading to the party, Beth shows Vera where she and Roger had sex in the cemetery, but they find a hand protruding from the grave. Thinking it's a prank, Vera uncovers the grave and finds Brian's corpse, assuming Tommy has killed him. Vera leads Beth to the farmhouse to confront Grandpa, who tells Vera she has "intruded upon the ceremony of blood" and must now be sacrificed, binding her arms and commanding Tommy to murder her. Tommy raises a dagger but instead cuts the ropes, freeing her, and she and Beth escape.

The cloaked killer arrives at the party, just before Vera and Beth arrive and tell Roger about Brian's murder. One of the partygoers, Carrie, is followed into the restroom by the killer and murdered. When Vera and Beth find her corpse, they think she's drunk. As Beth heads to the closet to hang up her coat, the killer emerges and strangles her to death, then hangs her in the closet.

Another cloaked figure arrives. Vera, thinking it's Tommy in costume, tells them the killer is at the party, but they remove their mask, revealing Grandpa. The killer exits the restroom and gets into a fight with Grandpa, ending with the killer knocking Grandpa off a staircase. Vera and Roger rush to Grandpa, who anoints Roger's forehead with a devil sign and dies. The killer attempts to escape the party but is shot in the back by Roger. Hobbling to the orchard, the killer collapses and removes their mask, revealing Amanda. Tommy finds her and she tells him, "I only wanted to keep my family", before dying.

In the farmhouse, we see another Satanic ritual and find that Roger has now become the new leader of the coven.

Production
Filming for Hack-O-Lantern began in November of 1986. Director Jag Mundhra fell and broke his left leg five days into filming, during a nighttime graveyard shoot in Ventura, California, but was able to return to the film seven days later, albeit confined to a wheelchair and a cast.

Actor Gregory Scott Cummins stated that the film shoot took approximately four to five weeks, with filming happening every day for 20 hours a day, with no breaks. He added that no one on the shoot was paid, and that the film went through three different crews. Cummins also stated that Mundhra did not speak English and "was just assuming that we said the lines correctly", adding that "there were no notes, there was nothing, because he really did not understand English."

According to producer Raj Mehrotra, the film did not see a proper theatrical run in the United States, receiving only a few test screenings in the Los Angeles area.

In addition to the score by Gregory T. Haggard, the film also features the song "Devil's Son" by D.C. La Croix and several songs by the Mercenaries.

Home media
Hack-O-Lantern was issued on home video in various territories throughout the world, often under alternate titles, including Halloween Night, Death Mask and The Damning.

Hack-O-Lantern was reissued by Massacre Video in 2017, as both a Blu-ray/DVD combo pack and a limited edition VHS tape. Initial releases of the Blu-ray/DVD also included a limited edition slipcase, and a bundle was available that included a theatrical poster. The Blu-ray release features a 2K restoration of the film from the original camera negative, as well as a commentary track by producer Raj Mehrotra and several other special features. The Blu-ray was eventually released without the DVD and slipcase and with color variations on the artwork.

On December 14, 2020, Louis Justin of Massacre Video appeared on an episode of The People's Court as the Plaintiff against a YouTuber who had bootlegged Hack-O-Lantern on their YouTube channel.

Retrospective critical reception
In Bleeding Skull: A 1980s Trash-Horror Odyssey (2013), Joseph A. Ziemba stated that the film involved "a steady stream of gold-plated bullshit. No plot. No rules. No need for either. ... It's the Halloween-themed trash film that destroys me, in a good way, more than any other."

Red Letter Media reviewed Hack-O-Lantern (along with Vampire Assassin and Cathy's Curse) in episode 58 of their series Best of the Worst, released on October 26, 2017. Jay Bauman concluded that the film was "odd" but had "a wonderful, spooky Halloween atmosphere to it", and observed that the movie was held together by "unique", "weird" and "interesting" performances from stars Pyke, Cummins and Garner. Jack Packard called Pyke the "hallmark" of the film, but bemoaned the movie's low kill count.

Meagan Navarro of Bloody Disgusting rated Hack-O-Lantern as one of the 10 goriest slasher films of the 1980s, stating, "this low budget slasher takes a sort of kitchen sink approach", adding that it was a "cheese fest" that "delivers on the blood and gore."

Jason Shawhan of Nashville Scene opined that Pyke's performance was akin to "Divine playing Emperor Palpatine", and added that the film has "nudity so gratuitous that it loops around and becomes Roxy Music-album-cover iconic."

Legacy
On March 13, 2015, Exhumed Films hosted the film's first-ever official theatrical screening in the U.S. at the International House in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, shown in a triple feature with Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers (1988) and Don't Go in the Woods (1981).

On October 28 of that year, the film had another screening in 35 mm at the annual "Dusk to Dawn Horrorthon" at the Aero Theatre in Santa Monica, California. According to Horrorthon curator Grant Moninger, "Every year ... we spend a year looking for prints that no one has seen yet. Hack-O-Lantern has not been shown in years." Ziemba has stated that only one 35 mm print of the film is known to exist.

On October 23, 2020, Hack-O-Lantern was screened on Shudder's The Last Drive-in with Joe Bob Briggs as part of "Joe Bob's Halloween Hideaway", appearing as the second film in a double feature with Haunt (2019).

On October 28, 2022, Rifftrax released a comedic commentary track for the film.