Every year the month of October means it's Halloween time in the Tidmore household. We love Halloween, we decorate, we watch supernatural movies of varying degrees of Scare-itude. (I like a bit more frightening than the wife. So this month I thought I'd bring you a new feature: "What I'm Watching This Halloween"
First up a modern classic that both Jeri and I have loved for years. It's a movie that I loved as a kid and that I still love today. So it's become a tradition to watch Hocus Pocus every year before Halloween.

Hocus Pocus is the story of three witches, played by Bette Midler, Sarah Jessica Parker, and Kathy Najimy, who were burned at the stake in Salem, Mass. Now it's modern day (early 90s) and they get set free one Halloween night by the new kid, Max ("Eerie, Indiana's" Omri Katz) and his sister, Dani (Thora Birch) who have just moved from LA. Along with Max's crush Allison (Vinessa Shaw) and a cat who can talk (voiced by Jason Marsden) they must spend Halloween trying to stop the Witches from gaining full power and coming back to life for good.

Now I'll be the first to admit it's a cheesey movie, but it's fun and it's got a great mix of supernatural and laughs for kids. So it's one I'm sure Jeri and I will be sharing with our kids when they are old enough to watch. I remember watching as a kid and wanting to be Max and have this fun adventure (that could totally happen in my 12 year old mind) plus I remember thinking that Allison was hot and so any adventure with her would be fun.

Now it's a little slice of nostalgia with the perfect amoung of cheese on the side. Plue it's always fun to go back and see how little Thora Birch was in this movie. Long before she showed her darker side in America Beauty. It also features nice smaller roles and cameos from people like Doug Jones, now known for his make-up covered roles in Pan's Labrynth and the Hellboy films, NCIS' Sean Murray, Larry Bagby, who you'd recognize if you saw him from things ranging from Buffy The Vampire Slayer to Walk the Line, and Gary and Penny Marshall.

So if you're looking for a fun Halloween film, especially one to watch with your younger kids, there's not one I can recommend more than Hocus Pocus. So go out grab a copy and enjoy it this Halloween.

Labels: Halloween, Hocus Pocus