Opening Shots: 'Halloween' | Scanners

Thereafter, as in "Jaws," the shift to subjective camera often deliberately signals the presence, or possible presence, of the beast. In addition to imputing guilt to the audience, the subjective camera also serves the purpose of concealing the killer's identity in the crucial opening scene. The subjective camera technique was taken up by "Friday the 13th" and the raft of "Halloween" imitators that followed and became such a convention that it was parodied in the opening to Brian De Palma's "Blow Out" [1981]. But it became a convention for a purely utilitarian reason -- preventing us from seeing the killer's face -- and acquired the unfortunate side effect of creating a sadistic woman-killing persona as the point of audience identification, something many critics and viewers reacted against.

The teens have gone upstairs. Lights go out.

Around back, in through back door and into the kitchen, where The Intruder picks out a knife, then heads through dining room and into the parlor.

Loverboy puts his shirt back on, his task having been accomplished in record time.

Exit Loverboy.

Heading upstairs.

The Intruder picks up a clown mask and puts it on.

"Michael!!!"

Sis screams, collapses.

The "Psycho" knife movement.

Back down the stairs and out the front door, where a car is pulling up.

The first second of the reverse shot: Dad removes the mask and reveals the killer: "Michael?"

The long take that begins "Halloween" works for several reasons: First, the unmounted camera, steady though it is, wavers just enough to keep us unsettled, off balance, vulnerable to shock even if slightly prepared for it. Second, the shot establishes the motif of the subjective camera as the killer's point of view. Third, and most important, the shot draws us into the action by a point of view that is unedited. Had the opening sequence been presented conventionally, as a mounted sequence of shots, the viewer's mind would become an editor's mind, classifying, comparing, and relating the shots to assemble the story -- in other words, a mind participating in the creation of the work and therefore more conscious of it as a work. The single take suppresses the artistic detachment that comes from mental montage, creating instead a direct involvement that-like real life -- we are unable to edit. The impact, in other words, is visceral, not intellectual.