I went ahead and visited the Internet Movie Database (one of the first sites that was actually useful on the internet, and one that still is everything it used to be, and more) and worked up a filmography of Carpenter, plus a little more.

Here's a list of everything the man has directed, what year it was released, the ratings that the fans gave it, and what movie the IMDb recommends you see if you liked Carpenter's movie. Man, some of these recommendations are wack.

Carpenter Movie	Year	Rating	IMDb Recommendation
Ghosts of Mars	2001	5.0	Face/Off
Vampires	1998	5.6	The Rage: Carrie 2
Escape from L.A.	1996	4.7	Soldier
In the Mouth of Madness	1995	6.4	Event Horizon
Village of the Damned	1995	5.0	Village of the Damned (1960)
Body Bags	1993	5.4	A Nightmare on Elm Street
Memoirs of an Invisible Man	1992	5.4	Predator
They Live	1988	6.3	Total Recall
Prince of Darkness	1987	6.1	The Evil Dead
Big Trouble in Little China	1986	6.5	The Golden Child
Starman	1984	6.7	Midnight Run
Christine	1983	5.9	The Wraith
The Thing	1982	7.6	Predator
Escape from New York	1981	6.7	Escape from L.A.
Fog	1980	6.2	Dark Night of the Scarecrow
Elvis	1979	6.9	Incendiary Blonde
Someone's Watching Me!	1978	6.8	Eyes of Laura Mars
Halloween	1978	7.5	Halloween H20: 20 Years Later
Assault on Precinct 13	1976	7.3	Fresh
Dark Star	1973	6.6	Star Trek: The Motion Picture
Warrior and the Demon	1969	?	?

(Now, I can't get much information on Warrior and the Demon, if you can, please tell me...)

(Bold movies are one's I've seen, bold ratings are those that are above his average rating of 6.23)

Now, I won't agree with the IMDb's ratings of these movies. Frankly they don't rate Memoirs, Vampires or Big Trouble high enough, and they certainly over-rate In the Mouth of Madness and Starman.

But the thing (no pun intended) that really gets me is their database's co-recommendations. I realize these are all just based on a computer's heuristic of pouring over thousands upon thousands of ratings for various internet visitors, and cross-referencing them... but seriously -- Memoirs and Predator? I can see The Thing and Predator, sort of... And what sort of racial stereotyping managed to get the computer to glom Big Trouble and The Golden Child together?

What I most want to say about Carpenter is that his best skill is the way he works with paranoia. The way the lead character can't trust those around him, how the lead character can't be trusted by the rest of the cast, or even how the lead can't even trust themselves. Ever since The Thing (arguably his masterpiece when working with paranoia) you can see this thread in all his movies.

Unfortunately Carpenter believes he is a master of so much more; such as action, or gruesome effects, and in his quest for these elements everything goes to pot.

The action in the Escape movies is never very interesting, and the ending of They Live is just ho-hum. Heck, the action climax of The Thing is probably the worst 2 minutes of the movie. Action just isn't his forte.

And it's certainly not love stories... We follow Jack Burton and Chevy Chase's characters around faithfully because they're bumbling nebbishes, rather than romantic heroes.

Let's be certain that it isn't special effects wizardry that makes Carpenter what he is. Sure, The Thing had some neat effects and all, but we haven't seen it's like in a long time. Capenter's scariest stuff comes from his cheapest effects. Look at the jar in Prince of Darkness, look at the fog in The Fog, or the Michel in Holloween. None of these were high budget... why blow your cash on effects that will just take the movie down a notch? We didn't have to see the shapes at the end of In the Mouth of Madness, nor did we need the cheesy intergalactic do-dads in They Live. Sure, sometimes expensive effect pay off, like when Christine rebuilds herself... but good lord, man, use some sense.

I will grant that he does do decent theater of the absurd, which is what I believe makes Big Trouble and They Live so popular. It's nice -- but it's when he uses that absurdness against the growing miasma of distrust in his movies that you see him work his brilliance; "Getting a little wood, Padre?", "You've got to be fucking kidding.", "Put on the damn glasses!"... all wonderful counter-points to a horrible situations where the characters realize they don't know what the hell is going on.

In any case, my work is done -- I'll go pick up Holloween and Assault of Precinct 13 and enjoy some nice, classic Carpenter. I'll even pick up Ghosts of Mars when it comes out on DVD (bastard left the theater too fast) and hope against hope that there is some of that classic Carpenter magic left. I can't really see me wanting to pick up any of the co-recommendations.