4 Movies John Carpenter Hates (And 4 He Absolutely Loves)
In 2016, when the world was still young, I went to a music festival in Barcelona and splashed out on a night in a swanky hotel. Heading down to the lobby on the day I arrived, I managed to catch a departing elevator thanks to a hand that generously appeared, seemingly out of nowhere, and held the door open. As I turned the corner to enter, I recognised the owner of this hand to be none other than John Carpenter, the legendary composer and filmmaker behind Halloween, The Thing, and They Live, who had a slot on one of the main stages that evening.
In a state of mild shock, I sheepishly said “oh, thank you” and made my way to the back corner. I wish I’d thought of something else to say, but it was a really fast elevator.
I use this anecdote as a way of explaining that my respect for Carpenter is basically unassailable and always will be, regardless of whatever bozo takes he comes out with—and there have been a few that fit that description in recent years.
The following list—which I’ve arranged in alternating order—contains four films that the great man loves and four he’s said he’s not so fond of. Some takes I agree with, some not—what can I say? It’s a subjective artform. Read on to learn a little more and use the guide below to find these movies on services like AppleTV, Netflix, Prime Video and elsewhere.
Hates: Barbie (2023)
Anthony Lane once compared the opening half hour of Greta Gerwig’s Barbie to being waterboarded with Pepto-Bismol—a take that I’m still pretty sure was a kind of compliment. Either way, Carpenter was not quite as witty when, in an interview with the LA Times in 2023, he explained that the movie was “not” his “generation” and that the movie’s feminist subtext went “over” his “head.”
He did, however, compliment Robbie’s performance, saying that the I, Tonya and Birds of Prey actress (who also produced the movie) was fabulous. We are inclined to agree.
Loves: The Exorcist (1973)
It’s not surprising that Carpenter is often asked for his opinion on the world of horror cinema—a genre that certainly does not go “over” his “head”. The director basically helped revitalise the slasher genre with Halloween in 1978, so I wasn’t surprised to learn that Tobe Hooper’s Texas Chain Saw Massacre was on Carpenter’s top horror list—game does recognise game, after all.
Outside of similarly thrifty filmmakers, however, Carpenter has always shown an appreciation for the generation that blazed a trail before him in Hollywood during the early ‘70s – especially William Friedkin. The maverick director was responsible for classics like To Live and Die in LA and Sorcerer, but it’s his 1973 masterpiece The Exorcist—which is arguably the most successful horror movie of all time in terms of box office and awards—that Carpenter loves.
Hates: The Substance (2024)
You would think that the man behind movies like Christine and The Thing would have a natural appreciation for all things gooey and gruesome—but you would apparently be wrong. At a FanExpo in early 2025, Carpenter asked an audience member what she thought of The Substance, the Demi Moore-starring body horror about an ageing star. When the fan returned the question, Carpenter tersely remarked that he liked nothing about it.
This one feels especially unkind as Coralie Fargeat, the French director of The Substance (which was, lest we forget, a massively successful movie), had cited Carpenter as a major influence (alongside the more obvious David Cronenberg) in several interviews. It’s also awkward that Carpenter’s two most prominent recent disses are for movies directed by women. Let’s hope the director can discover a little more self-awareness in his 78th year.
Loves: Chinatown (1974)
In Carpenter’s submitted top 10 for Sight & Sound’s recent poll of the top 200 movies of all time, the director cited a number of classic crime films, including early Howard Hawks classics like Scarface (1932) and Only Angels Have Wings. He also noted Roman Polanski’s 1974 masterpiece, Chinatown—a film that reimagined the tropes of those earlier movies to express the anxieties of the present day.
If you can bring yourself to watch something by that disgraced director, I can’t recommend it enough—especially if you liked the recent LA epic One Battle After Another or the similarly slippery Under the Silver Lake.
Hates: Oppenheimer (2023)
As it turns out, Carpenter wasn’t hedging his bets regarding the biggest movie phenomenon of the last couple of years. In an interview with the music journalist Larry Fitzmaurice, the anti-Barbie director said that Oppenheimer, Cristopher Nolan’s biopic on the godfather of the atomic bomb, was merely “Okay” before going on to praise Bradley Cooper’s Maestro instead.
Granted, “hate” is probably a strong word for this one, but the director was certainly put off by the hype surrounding Nolan’s epic: “Everyone’s praising it as the movie of the century,” he went on, “I don’t know about that.”
To be honest, I probably wouldn’t go that far either, but if you liked Nolan’s Batman trilogy or his other war movie, Dunkirk, you definitely should see for yourself what all that fuss was about.
Loves: Rio Bravo (1959)
It’s probably no surprise that a master of genre like Carpenter would show so much love for Howard Hawks—Hollywood’s first great shapeshifter—in his top ten for S&S. Having a whopping four of the director’s movies is interesting, but it’s especially notable as Carpenter chose the best Hawks movie for each different style: Only Angels for noir, Scarface for crime, Bringing Up Baby for screwball comedy, and Rio Bravo for the western.
If you’re new to classic westerns in general, this is a great entry point for the genre, as it shows a passing of the torch from an older generation (personified by John Wayne's character) to the younger and more dynamic style of Montgomery Clift. The sequence when the men set off on their journey—with Hawks filming them in low-angle closeups as they whoop and holler—is one of the greatest moments in any western.
Hates: Every Halloween Sequel (1981-2022)
If you’re starting to think of Carpenter as a bit of a hater, at least you can rest assured that he’s just as scathing with his own body of work. The director has gone on the record calling The Thing a “failure”. He also famously took no pleasure or satisfaction from writing the sequel to his smash hit, Halloween. And when it comes to the later movies in the franchise, you won’t be surprised to hear that he’s not so keen on them, either—not least the two Rob Zombie movies from 2007 and 2009.
At the time, Carpenter complained that they were too much of a departure from the vibe of his movies (probably accurate), which led to Zombie complaining that the director had been “cold” to him from the get-go. Carpenter countered that by saying he had been “nothing but supportive”, but later called Zombie a “piece of shit.” The pair have apparently since buried the hatchet—whether that’s meant figuratively or in the more Myers-coded sense of the phrase, however, I am still not sure.
Loves: Vertigo (1958)
Horror fans might have been expecting at least one movie from the genre to make Carpenter’s S&S list, but it wasn’t to be. The closest is probably Alfred Hitchcock’s San Francisco-based, anxiety-fuelled masterpiece, Vertigo. This is a great one to watch if you appreciate that era of Hitch—movies like North By Northwest and Rear Window—when the gorgeous Technicolour images only seemed to make the mood more eerie.
The slippery tale follows a retired policeman (played, of course, by Jimmy Stewart) who is hired by an old friend to follow his wife. Carpenter was 10 years old when the movie was released, and while it may have taken a few years for him to see it, it’s clear that the movie’s style and score proved to be a huge influence on him as a filmmaker.
