John Carpenter
American filmmaker, composer and actor · United States · On the map · Directors · Born 1948 · age 78
He turned a low-budget slasher shot in 20 days into the template every horror film still copies, then spent the next two decades making movies studios dismissed and audiences now revere as holy text.
John Carpenter is read about 8,066 times a day, in 57 languages.
A typical day, 30 days to 2 November 2026
The middle day of the days counted, so one week of news cannot move it. The line under it is the last 401 days, one point a day.
Something wrong?A life in dates
John Mulaney Presents: Everybody's in L.A.Series2023
Amityville: An Origin StorySeries2022
Halloween EndsFilm, Producer2019
The Movies That Made UsSeries
In Search of DarknessFilm, 20192015
The Late Show with Stephen ColbertSeries2014“There were two times in my life that inspired me the most. The first was when I was a kid, probably the most emotionally influential time, when you’re naïve and innocent.”In their words31 October 2014John Carpenter Q&A: Why ‘Halloween’ Didn’t Need Sequels & What Scares The Master Of Horror2010
A History of HorrorSeries2008“I staggered through my career and came out the other end, alive. I made some films that meant something to me.”In their words3 June 2008The Den of Geek interview: John CarpenterTime Machine AwardAward2007Bram Stoker Award for Lifetime AchievementAward2006
Going to Pieces: The Rise and Fall of the Slasher FilmFilm2005
Masters of HorrorSeries, Director2003100 Greatest Scary MomentsSeries2002
Through the Night with...Series
Vampires: Los MuertosFilm, 2002Producer1998
VampiresFilm, Director1995
In the Mouth of MadnessFilm, Director1993
Body BagsFilm, Director, Producer1988
They LiveFilm, Director, Writer1987
CrossbowSeries1986
Big Trouble in Little ChinaFilm, Director1983
ChristineFilm, Director1981
Escape from New YorkFilm, Director, Writer1979
ElvisFilm, Director1976
Assault on Precinct 13Film, Director, Writer1969
Captain VoyeurFilm, Director, Writer1958
The RiflemanSeries1948Born16 January 1948People around John
Jamie Lee Curtis John directed Halloween and Escape from New York
Donald Pleasence John directed Halloween and Escape from New York
Kurt Russell John directed The Thing and Escape from New York
Nick Castle John directed Halloween and Escape from New York- Charles Cyphers John directed Halloween and Escape from New York
- Debra Hill Produced Halloween and The Fog
Nancy Kyes John directed Halloween and The Fog
George Buck Flower John directed Escape from New York and The Fog
Larry J. Franco Produced Escape from New York and Starman
Tommy Lee Wallace John produced Halloween III: Season of the Witch (1982)
Peter Jason Also in In the Mouth of Madness (1995)
Robert Carradine John directed Escape from L.A. (1996)
Kyle Richards John directed Halloween (1979)
Tom Atkins John directed Escape from New York and The Fog
Nancy Stephens John directed Halloween (1979)
Dick Warlock John produced Halloween II (1981)
Mark Hamill John directed Village of the Damned (1995)
Sam Neill John directed In the Mouth of Madness (1995)
Howard Hawks Influenced John
Harry Dean Stanton John directed Escape from New York (1981)
Stephen Tobolowsky John directed Memoirs of an Invisible Man (1992)- Moustapha Akkad Produced Halloween (1978)
David Gordon Green Directed Halloween (2018)
Dirk Blocker John directed Starman and Prince of Darkness
John CarpenterPartners
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Correct this familyKnown for
View all 40 titles
The Thing 1982
In Search of Darkness 2019
Cigarette Burns 2005
They Live 1988
Assault on Precinct 13 1976
Also in Deutsch
Filmography 40
256 credits on file
Television 17
Media & music
On YouTube
4.2K subscribersListen
SpotifyPhotos 8
Carpenter (center) with Adrienne Barbeau, Janet Leigh, and Jamie Lee Curtis during the filming of The Fog. 1979
Carpenter in September 2001
Carpenter in October 2023
Carpenter performing live in October 2016
Carpenter with his son Cody Carpenter (middle) and musician Bruce Robb (right) in November 2005
Carpenter at a signing in Chicago, 2014
Carpenter signing steel artwork for a fan in Philadelphia, 2018Awards
About this person
John Howard Carpenter was born January 16, 1948, and by 1978 had directed Halloween - a film that became both a commercial juggernaut and the blueprint for a generation of terror. The Fog, Escape from New York, and Starman followed as critical and commercial successes through the early 1980s, but the decade's second half delivered a string of films - The Thing, Christine, Big Trouble in Little China, Prince of Darkness, They Live - that flopped on arrival and later became cult classics, each one now studied and quoted. He composed or co-composed the music for nearly all of them, a parallel career that earned him a Saturn Award for Vampires in 1998 and led to five studio albums starting with Lost Themes in 2015. In 2018 he returned to Halloween as composer and executive producer for a new trilogy, and in 2019 the French Directors' Guild handed him the Golden Coach Award, calling him "a creative genius of raw, fantastic, and spectacular emotions." On April 3, 2025, he received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
