Halloween Has Moviegoers Screaming in the Aisles
LAURIN SYDNEY, CO-HOST: Hi, everybody. I'm Laurin Sydney in New York. Jim Moret is in Hollywood. Country music is celebrating a man with friends in all kinds of places. Garth Brooks performed at a party in Nashville Thursday night, where he was honored for selling 100 million albums, the only solo artist to do that. He used the occasion to say that he plans to retire after his next album. Brooks says he wants to focus on raising his kids.</s>GARTH BROOKS, MUSICIAN: It's emotional to do, but it's not difficult to do. You should live your life in the passion of what comes first. And with the risk of offending my family, they knew that what came first for me for a long time was music and now something has taken that place. And God makes things happen when they're supposed to. And my first overall love is with those three children. And so, that's where my priorities lie.</s>SYDNEY: Looking good was the priority at "GQ"'s Men of the Year Awards in New York Thursday night. Michael J. Fox joined honoree Matthew Broderick and wife Sarah Jessica Parker at the festivities. Julia Roberts and beau Benjamin Bratt were also there. Elton John received the Humanitarian Award for his continued fight against AIDS. The pop star brought attention to how his work has raised awareness in places such as Africa.</s>ELTON JOHN, MUSICIAN: It's such an inspiring thing to see that people do have a little hope even though the situation is so horrible. And I'm going to go there next year and do something, maybe a concert, and make people more aware of AIDS in Third World countries. But, you know, to be honest, this is something I feel I should do anyway. I feel a bit humble.</s>JIM MORET, CO-HOST: Robin Williams could have passed for a "GQ" model last night. He was fashionably attired at a fund raiser for the Big Sisters Organization, which honored him as their Man of the Year. "Lion King" stage director Julie Taymor was also honored. Williams' buddies Pam Dawber and Eric Idle dropped by. At the Big Sisters bash, Robin shared something very personal about his Idle friendship.</s>ROBIN WILLIAMS, COMEDIAN: He's actually been my big sister for a long time. That's what I always thought. Eric's my big sister. And this is proof. It's always nice to have some proof to remind one. Never be afraid to dress up.</s>MORET: It's Halloween time. Time for Hollywood to lure moviegoers into theaters with spooky offerings. The "Blair Witch" folks are at it again with "Book of Shadows," while "The Exorcist" is turning heads its second time around. Bill Tush takes a look at why we like to scream at the movies.</s>BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "DRACULA") BELA LUGOSI, ACTOR: I am Dracula.</s>BILL TUSH, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Our parents, even our grandparents, would plop down the price of admission for the chance to jump out of their seats at the movies. Nothing was scarier in the 1930's than watching Bela Lugosi's "Dracula" search for another victim to join his cult of the undead.</s>UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR: It's alive!</s>TUSH: Then the walk home in the dark with the fear that the "Frankenstein" monster might not be far behind. We just love to be scared at the movies.</s>GLENN KENNY, SENIOR EDITOR, "PREMIER" MAGAZINE: It's the same reason you go on a roller coaster ride.</s>TUSH: The 30-year-old "Exorcist," with the help of some additional never-before-seen footage, found a whole new audience when it was re-released in the early fall.</s>KENNY: It sort of set the template for a lot of the stuff that came afterwards, so it is regarded, I think, as a modern classic.</s>TUSH: How it ever became a classic horror film is a mystery to William Peter Blatty, the man who wrote it.</s>WILLIAM PETER BLATTY, "THE EXORCIST": I haven't got a clue. When I wrote the novel and the script, my primary intention was never to frighten anyone, I promise you. I thought I was writing a psychological thriller, the supernatural detective story.</s>TUSH: "The Exorcist" had a fairly decent budget, but Hollywood loves horror films because they don't cost an arm and a leg, except maybe on screen. "Scream" 1, 2, and 3 -- pardon the pun -- scared almost $300 million. Freddy Kruger menaced his way through seven "Nightmare on Elm Street" pictures and picked up well over $200 million. There was nothing unlucky for the makers of "Friday the 13th." And "Halloween" turned out to be a real Hollywood treat.</s>GLENN KENNY, SENIOR EDITOR, "PREMIERE": You can make them without big stars. You can make them maybe without lavish technical effects, if they pack a punch.</s>TUSH: And while it might of caused a few nightmares, this film became a box-office dream. (</s>BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT") HEATHER DONAHUE, ACTRESS: I'm going to die out here.</s>TUSH: "The Blair Witch Project," made for practically nothing by first-time filmmakers, had a payday of more than $140 million and still counting. The sequel is now playing.</s>KIM DIRECTOR, ACTRESS: I think people are really going to love it. It's a lot scarier.</s>TUSH: "Blair Witch" was just one of the many spoofed in this year's No. 1 horror film: "Scary Movie." And it was a comedy. But don't fear: Real scary movies will always stay with us, because their creators love to hear us scream. Bill Tush, CNN Entertainment News, New York.</s>SYDNEY: Like Bill explained, "Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2" is hitting theaters this very weekend. But is the trip into the woods as good as the second time around? Peter Travers of "Rolling Stone" and Lisa Schwarzbaum of "Entertainment Weekly" let us know if you're in for a trick or a treat.</s>BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "BLAIR WITCH 2: BOOK OF SHADOWS")</s>UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR: You know, if you don't believe in the Blair Witch, then why the hell did you bother to come?</s>DIRECTOR: I thought the movie was cool.</s>LISA SCHWARZBAUM, "ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY": Oh my God, Peter, I've never been scared in my life.</s>PETER TRAVERS, "ROLLING STONE": Of what? What are you talking about?</s>SCHWARZBAUM: We are talking about "Book of Shadows." (</s>BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "BLAIR WITH 2: BOOK OF SHADOWS") UNIDENTIFIED ACTRESS: Here it comes!</s>UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR: Here it comes!</s>SCHWARZBAUM: We're talking about "Blair Witch 2." This is the follow-up to the big phenomenon last year's "The Blair Witch Project," where a bunch of kids took digital cameras, ran out into the woods, and scared us senseless, because we couldn't see what was going on. You know what happened? We see what is going on in this sequel, and it's not scary.</s>UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR: What are you talking about?</s>UNIDENTIFIED ACTRESS: I can sense it, like someone is choking me and squeezing the air out of me.</s>SCHWARZBAUM: What we have are five kids running out in the woods. They're looking back on what happened to the original kids, because if you remember, they vanished last time.</s>TRAVERS: Why did they go?</s>SCHWARZBAUM: I have no idea. But they're not in this movie. There are a whole bunch of new kinds in this movie. And what happens is, they run around and scary things happen. But it's not scary. What happened? Tell me, what happened, Peter, between...</s>TRAVERS: What happened? They tried to be funny. They tried to be "Scream." (</s>BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "BLAIR WITCH 2: BOOK OF SHADOWS") UNIDENTIFIED ACTRESS: Wait, how many Heather Donahues does it take to screw in a light bulb?</s>UNIDENTIFIED ACTRESS: How many?</s>UNIDENTIFIED ACTRESS: Just one. Just one of them.</s>TRAVERS: Try they tried to deal with the parody of the movie instead of just making something that is scary in its own right. So it's not scary. It's supposed to be scary. I am shouting. I can't stop shouting.</s>BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "BLAIR WITCH 2: BOOK OF SHADOWS") UNIDENTIFIED ACTRESS: If this is a joke, it ain't funny.</s>UNIDENTIFIED ACTRESS: No joke. It's serious, Erica.</s>TRAVERS: They used their own name, do you know that?</s>SCHWARZBAUM: Oh, boy.</s>TRAVERS: They're just five people using Jeff, Erica, Kim. Everybody is that. So we're supposed to think they're real. We're supposed to get a documentary feel in this.</s>TRAVERS: And you don't get the documentary feel. You get the feeling somebody is making a movie. And that kills everything that made the first "Blair Witch Project" work: $30,000 it cost, made $250 million, because imagination was here.</s>SCHWARZBAUM: So I know what happens is, the scary thing is, when you give people money and they don't know what to do with it. Oh, my God! What are we going to do? Here's what is going to happen. It's Halloween. You are going to see it. What you are going to really do is go on the Internet site. And that is really where the future of "Blair Witch" is. It's not in this movie. (</s>BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "BLAIR WITCH 2: BOOK OF SHADOWS") UNIDENTIFIED ACTRESS: It doesn't make any sense.</s>UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR: I know.</s>UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR: We were hoping you could explain things.</s>UNIDENTIFIED ACTRESS: I don't have a clue!</s>SCHWARZBAUM: This movie is bringing it back more to a "Scream," to a kind of parody of movies. And that is not what we want. We want fear when we're out here. Peter, is it scaring you?</s>TRAVERS: No, I wanted a treat and I got a trick. And I'm Peter Travers.</s>SCHWARZBAUM: Well, I am Lisa Schwarzbaum. And I saying: No! What happened to "Blair Witch"?</s>MORET: Find out what scares Winona Ryder and Linda Blair. Go to our Web site at cnn.com/showbiztoday. While there you will also find more on the rest of our stories.</s>SYDNEY: Stick around, as we go behind the scenes of the new show "Ed." And Lenny Kravitz performs some of his greatest hits in our SHOWBIZ "Sessions" segment.