Where else can you get Stephen King, Cannibal Holocaust, giallo, Possession, and eldritch nightmares all rolled into one?

Besides the occasional shadow person who creeps into my room once a fortnight, nothing paralyzes me quite like deciding what to watch on Oct. 31. In my mind, Halloween is a horror movie marathon month where veering in and out of subgenres and quality metrics is highly encouraged. So how do you close it out on actual Halloween?

I’ve come to think the answer might always be Messiah of Evil. Where else can you get Stephen King, Cannibal Holocaust, giallo, Possession, and eldritch nightmares all rolled into one? More than 50 years after its feeble release, when it was overlooked by audiences and eye-rolled at by critics, the film looks like a major synthesis of everything happening in horror up to the 1970s and a predecessor to everything else that would come.

Written and directed by married couple Gloria Katz and Willard Huyck (significantly better known for writing American Graffiti , Temple of Doom , Howard the Duck , and doing punch-ups on Star Wars ) Messiah of Evil doesn’t feel too far off from George Lucas’ own exploration and remixing of genre tropes. But instead of 1930s sci-fi serials, Katz and Huyck set out to sew together the ultimate Frankenstein’s monster of literary and cinematic horror. The plot does not reinvent the wheel: When Arletty visits a small coastal town to reconnect with her estranged father Joseph, she becomes embroiled in the exploits of Thom, a mythology buff whose digging into a local cannibalism legend will get most of them killed.

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