The Night He Jumped the Shark (Halloween Resurrection, 2002)

So, if Halloween H20 tied everything up nicely and gave closure for the character of Laurie Strode, what did they do for number eight? Why completely undo it of course! No doubt, H20 was a strong enough success that they decided to take a couple years to create the next installment of the series.

They brought back a director from a previous film (Rick Rosenthal, who has racked up quite a decent career in directing genre shows like Buffy, Smallville and Veronica Marsas well as director of Halloween 2), which might seem like a decent start. Then they announced that it was a Michael Myers installment and Jamie Lee Curtis was returning. That good and bad news. Then there was the title…”Halloween: Resurrection”.

Michael has long been lumped in with the “undead slasher” group of Freddy and Jason. This is not accurate, as Michael Myers never died. So he never came back from the dead. Unkill-able slasher? That’s accurate. Undead? Inaccurate. Michael always manages to survive. Now, truth be told, I wish they would have just brought Michael back from the dead. He could have been like the headless horseman and carried his head in his arms.

But nooooooooooooo. They have to undo the end of H20… (spoilers beyond this point)

In doing so, they wreck the closure the last film gave the series. So, Laurie did not seperate Michael’s head from his body. What actually happened was that Michael grabbed a rescue worker, crushed his windpipe and switched places. So Laurie killed an innocent man and it made her crazy. Laurie spends her days in an institution now. And so the movie kicks off with the reveal that she has been waiting for Michael to return. And being the caring big brother he is, he shows up a few nights before Halloween. In a fight, Laurie loses.

That is the extent of it. No one from the institution is connected to the story. Instead, it focuses on a bunch of college kids doing a web broadcast from the Myer’s household. Yes, web broadcasts is how they show that Halloween in moving forward. It’s the reality programming trap, which has rarely been effective. Outside of Series 7, it really has not worked. It often feels like an absurd and preachy device.

So, with Jamie Lee dead…what’s our big hook to draw the audience in? The reality show is run by Busta Rhymes and Tyra Banks! As an aside, this Halloween film has more black people than the other sequels combined. I am actually not joking. The Halloween series is whiter than Michael Myer’s mask. Anyways, the other big name of the film is Thomas Ian Nicholas of the American Pie movies. None of these are the priary characters, of course.

Our leads are Sarah (Bianca Kajlich, currently of Undateable), Rudy (Sean Patrick Thomas) and Jen (Future Geek crush Girl Katee Sackhoff), all who have won a part in a reality web cast where they search the old Myers homestead. The house is rigged with “scary” stuff that is supposed to be from lil’ Mike’s childhood-stuff that explain why he went off the deep end and killed his sister. People die on camera, but never when anyone is looking. Luckily, Sarah has been chatting online with a buddy Deckard (Ryan Merriman) who goes to a Halloween party and watches the show. So, using text messaging (uh, yeah, I can’t fathom how Busta didn’t have a “no cell phone” rule or his show) Deckard helps the survivors avoid Michael.

In the end, though, there can be only one survivor. So Sarah, being the plucky heroine is it. Tyra does not even get the dignity of an on screen death (see, in horror, it’s more insulting to die off screen). But everyone else gets to die gruesome deaths… impalings, beheadings, all that jazz. And I lied…Busta makes it out alive, allowing his character to learn a valuable moral lesson. Because that’s what Halloween movies are really all about. But seriously, between the weak story, run of the mill bland characters and destroying the ending of the previous film (taking away Laurie Strode’s triumph)? This is a lackluster followup. It’s not exciting, it does not draw you in to root for any of the characters. While H20 was two steps forward, Halloween Resurrection is four steps back. It’s barely better than the Curse of Michael Myers.

Lucky for all involved, this was not a career killer (pretty much everyone involved has kept trucking on). It’s just a real step down from the heights they had achieved for the franchise a few years earlier.

Hell, maybe for # 9 we can see the return of Conal Cochran.

October 30, 2015 0

The Night He Goes to School (Halloween H20, 1998)

By 1997, slashers had almost seemed like a dead genre. Frankly, Halloween 6 could have been the death bell. Yet, 1996 was also the year that slasher pics got a shot in the arm. A little movie called Scream-a satirical look at the genre was a major hit that had people talking. It seemed to poke fun at the conventions of the slasher film, while following them quite a bite (though taking opportunity to turn some of them on their head). Scream proclaimed Halloween the grand-daddy of them all. And that got producers talking.

There were, as I recall, talks to bring back Carpenter (which I thought was exciting). Then there came talk of involvement from Kevin Williamson, writer of Scream (both one and two). This also excited fans. But the thing that really got people talking? Jamie Lee Curtis was back in the game. This brought about an interesting turn.

A few facts. Donald Pleasence was dead by the time they were writing this. Laurie Strode was dead according to previous films. So what did they do?

Spoilers ensue…

The filmmakers took an approach that both wiped the slate clean and yet adhered to some film continuity. It’s clear that none of the events in 4-6 happened now. As far as H2O is concerned? The series started with Halloween and the story had ended in Halloween 2. And now, the story was continuing 20 years later. For some this was upsetting, to others? It was a bit of relief.

The director Steve Miner (a veteran of the Friday the 13th series) had taken quite a task. Dimension was giving a big push to this new film. The end result is satisfying. I would say that it is one of the best of the sequels. The story is told at a fast pace, and they make sure not to confuse the audience. It’s clear from the start that Dr. Loomis has passed. And we rapidly learn Michael is still alive and still obsessed with his sister…a woman the world thought dead. But it turns out she has gone underground to avoid the pressures of the fame. And to avoid Michael. She’s now pretty much a functional alcoholic single mom. She is the head of a prestiges private school in the middle of nowhere. She is haunted by images of Michael.

Her life of paranoia is driving an ongoing wedge between her and son John (Josh Hartnett) -What? Not the family name?! At first she is prohibiting him from going on the school camping which aggravates him as he was looking forward to being with his girlfriend Molly (Michelle Williams). But as slasher films tend to go, Jon and Molly slip aside and stay at the school with their rebel friends Sarah (Jodi Lyn O’Keefe) and Charlie (Adam Hann-Byrd, whose career pretty much halted after this film-apparently to go to college).

So this leaves the school empty, except for Laurie, her boyfriend (and fellow faculty member) Will (Adam Arkin) and the security guard Ronny (LL Cool J) . The kids, of course are hiding out and decide to have a night of romantic fun and reckless sex (or reckless fun and romantic sex, I don’t know). Michael is quietly stalking the grounds by this time, not quite as carefree in his slashing as the earlier films. Sarah and Charlie are clearly knife fodder and Michael dispatches them quite ruthlessly. These are some of the most intense sequences the franchise has seen in a long time, with some genuine discomfort and suspense.

John and Molly seek out Laurie, who is not to excited at the sight of her big brother. Getting John and Molly off the campus, she turns back and decides this must end. Grabbing an ax she starts to stalk Michael. We get a very solid cat and mouse sequence that finally appears to result in Michael’s death. But Laurie is no idiot, after Michael’s body is loaded into an ambulance in a body bag, she steals the vehicle, waiting for what she knows is going to happen.

Michael rises from the body bag, so Laurie intentionally crashes the ambulance. Michael is pinned between a branch and the ambulance. There is a somewhat touching moment, where Michael reaches out to Laurie in an almost child like fashion. And for a moment? Laurie hesitates, ax in hand. Then she swings the ax and takes Michael’s head off.

All in all, Halloween:H20 works extremely well. Easily the best of the sequels. And as sequels go, it makes sense without having seen the original-without relying heavily on “plot exposition” guy. The actors all do fine jobs and the direction and cinematography is good, with a great use of shadow. Really, this film works well. And had this been the last movie? It would have ended the series on a high note. Of course, it was not the last, so the really high note they could have ended on? Squandered. But I still like this one. It offers closure to the story, and Laurie comes out heroic and on top.

October 29, 2015 0

The Night He Came Home (With Reinforcements) Redux (Halloween 6 Curse of Michael Myers: Producer’s Cut,2014)

Halloween 6: The Curse of Michael Myers was terrible. It was Plodding, confusing and a genuine mess. I went back and revisited it and even realized I had filled in the blanks. The cult that oversees Michael is barely seen. Oh, we meet some of the characters, but it is unclear why or how they know stuff. Instead, I was filling in my memory with stuff I had heard about the ideas behind the film.

After almost two decades, we have finally gotten a legit copy of the often bootlegged Producer’s Cut. This is the film the producers wanted to release. And you know, had the succeeded? Part 6 might have had a better reputation.

Oh, yeah, there is still creepy stuff like Jamie being impregnated by her uncle Michael Myers. But other things are more explicit, like the cult that has overseen Michael. It makes the talk of the voice that called to Michael to kill his family make a bit more sense. And the ending is far better.

In a lot of ways, this is a very different film. Far superior to the theatrical release. Of course, it still falls short of being a great film. Frankly, I still do not find the “Michael is controlled by a Cult” storyline particularly compelling. And considering the seventh film ignored this plot point entirely… I am not alone in such a feeling.

But it is a lot of fun seeing the new footage of Donald Pleasence. The ending was chopped short, with Sam Loomis bidding farewell to Tommy, Kara and her little brother. We just see Michael’s mask on the floor and a distance scream from Loomis suggesting Michael killed him offscreen. In the version, Loomis walks back into the hospital they had the showdown with Michael in and sees Michael still standing…joined by Dr. Wynn (Mitchell Ryan)… Sam Loomis is not killed in the producer’s cut…but rather faces a cruel fate worse than death. It is actually pretty inspired and ties back to the original in a ironic way. If you have not seen it and are a fan of the franchise, I recommend this one. The blu-ray also includes some great featurettes exploring the history of this film.

October 28, 2015 0

The Night He Came Home (With Reinforcements) (Halloween 6: the Curse of Michael Myers, 1996)

I think it would have been cooler if it had been Halloween:the Musical!!! Seriously, whose heart would be untouched at the sight of Michael Myers dancing across the stage, knife in hand? But alas, that was not to be. The biggest surprise for me in re-watching number six recently? Paul Rudd. Or as the movie says: Introducing Paul STEPHEN Rudd. But yeah. It’s this Paul Rudd. I’ve been a fan of Rudd’s for years, but I somehow forgot he was in this…uh…poor showing.

He plays a grown up Tommy Doyle (the kid Jamie Lee was babysitting in the original). The sixth film tries to ties all the films together. Except three. So follow along for spoilers.

This movie picks up some vague and indiscriminate time after # 5. Some girl is giving birth, surrounded by a bunch of people in robes. Shortly after she is helped by one of the cult members (you got that the people in robes were a cult-right???) to get away. after her escape with her baby, the woman who helped her escape hears a noise and gets scare. She backs away…right into Michael Myers who kills her.

Yes, Michael is part of a cult in this film. Not really a member, more a product of their evil deeds. In every generation there is one and all that jazz. And so we discover that the girl who gave birth is Jamie-Michael’s Niece from 4 & 5. She is trying to save her newborn kid from Michael. And for reasons…that make no sense? Said baby is Michael Myers child. Yes. Apparently he impregnated his young niece. Ew. The film quickly introduces Rudd as Tommy Doyle (who ends up being a somewhat creepy version of his nice guy persona) and the return of Dr. Sam Loomis (Again played by Donald Pleasence-who passed on shortly after the film finished). Another old character is introduced…that of Dr. Wynn, who was last seen in the first Halloween.

This is how it all gets messy. They are trying to tie up loose plot lines from a series that had been off the market for about six years. And some of these questions they try and answer are intriguing. But back to the plot. Michael succeeds in killing his niece, but only she manages to hide the baby and call a radio show talking about Michael Myers. Thank God Tommy Doyle is obsessive and records the show, because he manages to figure out where the baby is hidden.

In the meantime the audience also meets another young woman with a kid. She is part of the Strode family, which apparently all deal in Real Estate, just like Laurie’s dad in the original. And of course, it’s revealed that they all live in Michael’s old house, because in 20 odd years they could not sell the home. None of the Strode family is aware of this. They have no clue they are living in Michael Myer’s childhood home. A girl springs it on one of the Strode family members…and I have to ask… HOW DO YOU NOT KNOW YOU LIVE IN THE MOST FAMOUS HOUSE IN YOUR TOWN’S ENTIRE HISTORY?!

None of the characters draw you in, so each death lacks fear or suspense. n top of that, the film is rather confusing. The cult’s motives seem foggy and there is some hokey stuff suggesting that Michael was a generational thing passed through the centuries. I don’t know, it was a real mess.

Mind you, the producers seem to agree. Apparently, they had meant for something a little tighter for the continuity of the series. It was going to be revealed that the shadowy guy from # 5 who set Michael free was Dr. Wynn. It was supposed reveal that Dr. Wynn had trained Michael the years he was growing up. Afterall, Wynn is a member of an evil cult that…well, has something to do with Michael Myers.

So, in the sixth movie, they seem to have gone down a path that is unalterable. Unchangeable. Myers is not the boogey man. He’s the servant to a cult. Sounds like they are stuck now….right? Why look…a seventh film came along three years later…surely it addressed these things….right?

October 28, 2015 0

The Night He Came Home (Yet Again) (Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers, 1989)

So, in Halloween 4, the franchise returned to Michael Myers. And it was a somewhat decent return. And apparently did well enough that Halloween 5 was trotted out before the masses a short year later.

The surviving cast from the previous film are back to run an obstacle course of Michael related terrors. Spoilers are on their way…

As with the last movie, the film doesn’t resurrect Michael. Instead it shows us that he never actually died at the end of the previous film. When Myers was shot up and fell down a hole he crawled off right before they dropped explosives down after him. I supposed this is why no one thought it was important to go down and get Myer’s body. Myers is found by an old bum before going comatose. So the old bum keeps Michael alive (never removing his mask, apparently).

The film jumps forward a year to re-introduce us to little Jamie (Danielle Harris), Michael’s niece from the previous film. Remember how she had killed her step mother with a scissors? Apparently that was all just a tragic dream. The events of the previous year were so traumatic that Jamie no longer speaks and is being kept in a children’s hospital.

Her step sister Rachel (Ellie Cornell) visits with a friend Tina (Wendy Kaplan) who was not in the previous film, but apparently was close to Jamie for quite some time. Apparently, Dr. Loomis (Donald Pleasence) shows up from time to time, being creepy and intense. He does not believe Myers is dead. Afterall, he’s been in, like, three sequels now. He knows better. And so does Jamie. See, now she has a psychic connection to Michael. Poor kid.

So, of course, as Halloween nears, Michael Myers suddenly wakes up from his hibernation and kills the man who nursed him to health from all those bullet wounds. Gee, Michael has bad manners. But then, Michael has work to do, such as killing off survivors from the previous film. So, I guess you can’t blame him to just saying thanks to the old guy.

And yes, by survivors we primarily mean Rachel. DUH. Loomis and Jamie can’t die yet. Michael cuts through a ton of towns people after killing Rachel and managing to stay one step ahead of the police (The sheriff dealt with Michael in the previous film…so he is not a dummy who ignores the reckless teens and crazy doctors). At some point, we meet a guy in a pair of steel tipped boots and a trench coat (that’s all we really see of him). He doesn’t say anything, he just steps off a bus and we don’t ever see him for the rest of the film.

Loomis decides to use Jamie as bait and brings her to Michael’s old house (which, for having never been owned by new residents since the first movie? Looks like a completely different house). He sets a trap for Michael. Michael, of course is not so easily duped and gets past Loomis. But Loomis manages to lure Michael back out and drop a big metal net on him. Then Loomis appears to have a heart attack and dies.

Michael is taken into custody. As he sits alone in his cell there is the sound of gunfire and…OH YEAAAAAAH…it’s the guy who stepped off the bus, here to break Michael out of Jail. HOLY CRAP! Did not see that coming! WHAT’S NEXT?! The credits? Are you kidding me?

Now, it’s one thing to end on a cliffhanger when your next film comes out the following year-like say, the Lord of the Rings Films. But Halloween 6 didn’t get released until 1995. That’s a long time to make your fans wait for resolution. Okay, they probably did not intend for that long of a wait. But seriously, the ending is totally out of left field, especially for a slasher film.

This was a definite decline. Jamie is a more annoying character as a mute than as a screaming or crying child. Loomis is now obsessed with Michael in a really creepy fashion. Yeah, in the fourth one he was intense, but I never really saw Loomis as the time to put a child at risk. I did feel there was one really strong moment in the film. Myers has Jamie cornered in the attic and she asks him to take off his mask. And he does. It is bizarrely touching as the audience does not get a look at Michael, but his niece sees her uncle’s face for the first time ever. There is also a creepy moment where Michael is wearing a different mask (one that belonged to a guy he’s killed-Tina’s boyfriend) and driving a car with Tina believing it’s her boyfriend (this seems to happen a lot, women thinking Michael is their boyfriend). It’s one of the few really tense moments of the entire film.

On the other hand? It’s still better than Halloween 3.

October 28, 2015 0

The Night He Came Home (Again) (Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers, 1988)

I doubt most people cared, outside of the producers…but the failure of Halloween 3: Season of the Witch (a movie without a single witch) certainly killed interest in another Halloween film. It certainly killed the plan to make each film a separate entity.

In 1987 or so, the producers decided it was safe or a good idea or something to revive Halloween. And they apparently felt that # 3 was far enough away that they could try it again. But this time, they returned to the well that started it all. They got the future director of Free Willy 2, Dwight H. Little, to direct.

Jason had been brought back from the dead already, and Freddy was enjoying success. And yet, the producers decided not to bring Michael Myers back from the dead. Spa-lars follow.

Instead of returning Michael from the dead, they simply had him in a coma in the ten years since the end of Halloween 2(which, although it was released in 1981, took place in 1978). They were not likely to get Jamie Lee Curtis back, as she had become a household name, and in the 80’s, horror was something you did at the start of your career and then disavowed later. But since Halloween 2 had created the importance of family ties for Michael, they felt they had to have a relative. So the writers and producers came up with Laurie Strode’s daughter Jamie and killed Laurie off in a car crash.

Like her mother, Jamie was growing up with an adoptive family, none of whom seemed aware of the dark family member from her past. They did get Donald Pleasence back as Dr. Loomis. This gave the film some legitimacy. Sure, the cynical part of me presumes Pleasence was collecting a check. But honestly, he seemed to genuinely want to be a part of the series. And he certainly tried. Loomis came off creepier and more devoted than ever.

When Loomis learns Michael has awakened from his ten year coma, he knows what this means and heads for Haddonfield. He ends up walking most of the way, as he catches up to Michael at a gas station. Michael blows it up and leaves Loomis stranded.

Michael gets to town and starts stalking his niece as she gets ready for the Halloween festivities. She keeps seeing the boogey man, but no one really believes her until it is to late. Loomis gets to town and convinces the Sheriff that Myers is back. The town goes on high alert (people were skittish, as the power has gone out) and a posse forms to hunt Michael down.

They end up chasing him to a school, and then the posse take Jamie and her older adopted sister Rachel (Ellie Cornell) with them to keep the girls safe from Michael. But if it were that easy, well, it would not be a Halloween movie, silly duck. No, Michael manages to kill every member of the posse. Rachel takes over the truck and crashes it, launching Michael a few hundred feet. The police arrive just in time. as Michael lumbers closer The cops unload a hail of bullets into him and he falls down an abandoned mine shaft to his death (who am I kiddin’?).

Probably one of the strongest moments of the film is at the end, when the camera gives us a “killer’s eye view”-reminiscent of the original Halloween in which we see a person getting stabbed, everyone runs over to the stairs when they hear the scream, and Donald Pleasence just starts screaming “NO! NO! NO!” over and over, finally the camera pans to the top of the stairs where Jamie stands, a blank look on her face and a bloody pair of scissors in her hand. It evokes this idea that Michael lives on, that Loomis cannot beat the evil that resides in Myers. It’s particularly effective. There are also some really nice visual uses of shadow and reveals of Michael that cause genuine jump moments.

Director Dwight H. Little shows a lot of promise, and this was his fourth feature. He has gone on to direct a lot of action/suspense based television. The dialog is a bit stiff, but the characters over come it for the most part. The character of Rachel is especially pleasing, because she is confident and strong. It’s interesting that the Halloween films seemed devoted to a small town look and aesthetic. The prettiest girl in town doesn’t look like a California blond pin-up. While attractive, Rachel seems real, both in personality and appearance.

October 27, 2015 0

The Night He (Never) Came Home (Halloween 3: Season of the Witch, 1982)

As I noted on Monday, Halloween 2 was supposed to be the end of Michael Myers. Halloween 3 was to signal a new era for the franchise. Each movie would have a different cast of characters, story and be unconnected to the previous film. The only connection is that they would generally take place around Halloween. I think the producers believed this would give the franchise a long, long life and keep it from getting stale.

Lo and behold, they were wrong. Very wrong. See, the theory might have worked. If, you know, 1982’s Halloween 3 had been…you know…good. But as anyone who has seen it can attest to? It is…well…not good.

This was the directorial debut for Tommy Lee Wallace, who had gained a lot of experience working behind the scenes with John Carpenter on all his late 70’s work. As debuts go, it’s not very strong, and it’s plot is very…odd.

Spoilers are coming your way…

So, as I noted, Halloween 3 bears no relation to the Michael Myers mythology. Instead it follows down on his luck Doctor Dan Challis (the very great character actor Tom Atkins), who is working the night a crazy man with a mask clutched in his hands drives his car into the hospital apparently killing another man. However, while sifting through the remains of the car, he discovers strange items that do not appear human. The items appear mechanical, but do not appear to be car parts.

While Dan speaks to the old man’s daughter a stranger in a suit walks in and kills the old man. This all leads Dan and the daughter on a chase. They end up in a small town where the Silver Shamrock Corporation manufactures and distributes it variety of Halloween masks (by variety I mean three). The company is run by the Old Man from Robocop (Dan O’Herlihy), named Conal Cochran. Oh sure, he seems like a kindly old man, but this is a horror movie, and if he was truly just a kindly old man? It would be a short and pointless film (instead of a pointless average length film).

No, Mr. Cochran has a devious plan. He has added computer chips to the base pf each mask. At the appointed time, the mask will fire a laser and bugs and snakes will pour out of the head of the wearer. Really. Apparently, this plan involves a commercial that will air simultaneously on every channel. Why the kids are supposed to be excited to watch this commercial flew past me. But when they watch the commercial, along with a big chunk of rock from Stonehenge make the kids heads collapse and spew out snakes and spiders and other unpleasant creatures that will apparently eat the parents. There is even a scene where Cochran shows Dr. Challis the plan by having the top seller of the masks sit with his family in a small room and he kills them. This all apparently has something to druids and and ancient druid worship.

And all his employees are robots, by the way. And this all leads to Challis starting the commercial and then dumping a bunch of the laser micro chips down and they zap all the robots and the Old M-sorry, Cochran gets hit with a pure white beam of light and is…vaporized? We do not really know. Not sure I really care.

After they drive away, the daughter of the old guy from the beginning attacks Dr. Challis in the car. This causes an accident and we discover that she is a robot. Now, has she been a robot since we met her at the start of the film? Since Cochran kidnapped her and Challis? If it was later in the film, what happened to the real her? Is she dead? This is one of the many unanswered questions the film raises. Finally, Challis comes upon a gas station and begs the attendant to use the phone. Just like any other American, he clearly has the phone numbers for every local network memorized as he calls one network, actually, come to think of it, apparently there is just one office for every channel. He only talks to one person and gets multiple channels to stop airing the Silver Shamrock Commercial of Death. All but ONE.

I’ve heard claims from some fans (and the film crew behind the movie) that it just gets an unfair rap, and that if it had not had the heavy burden of Halloween in the title, somehow, people would not think it was a bad movie.

Do not believe it. At all. This would be a bad movie if the title was Evil Old Druids. Or Killer Shamrocks. The story makes no sense, the entire film is incoherent and full of plot holes. Many questions are left unanswered. It lacks suspense or even real scares. Druids, robots, laser beams… where are the leprechauns?! No, this movie is probably the reason that there was not another Halloween film until 1988.

October 27, 2015 0

(Still) The Night He Came Home (Halloween II,1981)

Halloween 2 is guilty of kicking off a lot of horror sequel trends. You remember that kid Randy from the Scream movies? The one who explained all the rules of the slasher genre? Halloween 2 pretty much nailed every one of the rules of a sequel that Randy talks about in Scream 2.

Halloween 2 does not suck. On the other hand, it is not quite as good as the first film. Carpenter and Hill are producers and helped with the script, but the film was directed by first time film director Rick Rosenthal (who has gone on to direct a lot of television, especially in the horror/fantasy genre such as Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Smallville) who returned to the last film before Rob Zombie’s reboot. So, as with many sequels, this was someone cutting their teeth.

Spoilers are cutting up next. Ouch. Sorry about the pun.

The part of this film that works is we have our main cast returning and it continues on the same night as the original film. This one picks up as Dr. Loomis believes he shot Michael dead, only, of course to look over the edge and see Michael is gone.

The story continues Michael’s unrelenting attack, though it becomes more refined. People often forget, it was Halloween 2 that introduced the idea that Michael and Laurie were siblings (It was also the second film that first used the song Mr. Sandman to creepy effect). Nearly the entire second film takes place in a hospital, with the majority of film’s victims being hospital employees.

As the film starts, Laurie Strode is taken to the local hospital, which is pretty sparcely populated at the time, we see no patients (other than some newborns in the nursery at one point), only a skeletal staff of nurses and ambulance drivers. Of the two drivers, we have the kind hearted Jimmy Lloyd (played by Last Starfighter Lance Guest) and the sex obsessed, crass Graham (played by Jeffrey Kramer). Graham is constantly trying to get some alone time with his girlfriend, Nurse Bailey (Pamela Susan Shoop). Jimmy on the other hand keeps trying to sneak in to talk to Laurie, though head nurse Mrs. Alves (Gloria Gifford) keeps interfering, insisting Jimmy let Laurie rest.

Dr. Loomis is still working with police to try and catch Michael, but that relationship becomes increasingly strained as the sheriff discovers that one of the dead teens is his own daughter. It is when Marion Chambers (who we saw in the first film) comes to tell Loomis he must leave with her under state orders that they discover a truth that was hidden from even Loomis. Michael had another sister, little Laurie Strode. Loomis, being the determined guy he is, will not go down without a fight and demands to be taken to the hospital.

Of course, in the meantime, hospital staff have dropped like flies. Laurie has been sedated, but she refuses to give up and stumbles through the hospital trying to escape the ever present Michael Myers. If it sounds familiar, this is because many films have duplicated this cat and mouse since in the slasher and horror genre. But Halloween 2 pulls it off well, it is one of the film’s strong points.

Loomis arrives at the hospital for a final showdown with Michael. In one of the less plausible moments, Laurie manages to shoot both Michael’s eyes out with a gun…which only blinds him. Holding a scalpel, he swings wildly as Laurie and Dr. Loomis turn on the various gas tanks in the room. Loomis sends Laurie out of the room and then flicks a Bic lighter (okay, maybe it was some generic brand of lighter) blowing himself and Michael up.

This film ups the killings, using various implements found in the hospital (such as needles). The kills are more gruesome and elaborate, the characters less dimensional (hardly a shock as there are more characters introduced). It carries through pretty seamlessly from the first. But it lacks something without Carpenter’s skilled eye for the use of shadows and light to obscure Michael. So it has a different feel.

They do try and advance the story, rather than re-hash it (which is where we get the family connection exploited both well and poorly in later films). It is notable that they killed Michael off believing that they were done with stories about Myers. I mean, where else could they go? The idea was that now they could make other movies with the Halloween title, but all new stories and characters. And then they made Halloween 3.

October 26, 2015 0

The (First) Night He Came Home (Halloween, 1977)

The late 70’s and early 80’s were pretty good to the horror genre. Plenty of long running series were kicked off then. Halloween was the start of a really strong run for John Carpenter as well. He produced some of his finest work between about 1978 and 1987.

Halloween was actually just started as an idea of a psycho stalking babysitters. This is not entirely new, and it played off various urban legends that started in the preceding decades about stalkers and babysitters as their prey. At some point, they came up with the idea of setting it on Halloween, hence the name. Halloween caused a lot of “holiday” themed imitators not long after, such as a little film called Friday the 13th.

By today’s standards, Halloween is remarkably tame. It’s body count is small, it is not overly graphic in it’s deaths and it focuses more on it’s characters than it’s monster. The movie is not about “Michael Myers, Serial Killer.” Oh sure, it’s tag line is “The Night HE Came Home,” but do not be fooled. Instead, it is about young Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis-at that time an unknown to the public) and her efforts to protect herself and the kid she is babysitting.

Spoilers follow…

The story is pretty simple to follow. As a young by, Michael Myers inexplicably murders his sister and is institutionalized. It’s made creepy by the fact that we see Michael coming from a fairly average family and home. There seems to be no obvious trigger. That’s what makes Michael scary. His motives are unknown. Freddy is a sadistic murderer getting revenge on the parents who killed him. Jason is killing careless camp counselors. But Michael? Michael does not seem to have a reason for what he does.

The film’s opening is masterfully creepy, as we see everything from a stalker’s point of view. Carpenter deftly walks through the opening entirely through Michael’s eyes, allowing the viewer to make their own conclusions about who the killer might be. The killer puts on a clown mask, and even then the camera continues to see through Michael’s eyes, now peering through the eye slits of a mask. The camera enters the room of a young attractive woman who clearly recognizes our stalker. It is not until moments later, as we go outside that the camera steps from behind Michaels eyes and his parents get out of their car do we discover that Michael is but a young child.

Carpenter quickly introduced us to Dr. Loomis (played by the ever entertaining Donald Pleasence) who is a passionate and seemingly caring doctor trying to get through to Michael, at least for a time. The films makes a leap of about fifteen years, where we discover Loomis has had a change of heart. He determined Michael is unreachable and simply needs to be locked away forever.

Loomis is on his way to the institution to plead against Michael’s being moved on a dark and stormy night, and is surprised to see patients wandering in the rain. While Loomisleaves the car, a nurse sits patiently. She is startled by the noise of someone on top of the car, the person scares the nurse out of the car and then steals it, leaving the nurse and Loomis behind. Dr. Loomis is no fool and realizes it was Myers.

We are then introduced to Laurie Strode with her family. Clearly, this is a loving family that has strong ties, and Carpenter manages to establish this in less than five minutes at the breakfast table. Laurie is asked by her real estate agent father to drop a key off at the old Myers house for a showing. his sequence sets a lot of information before us. First, Myers is a bit of a local legend. Something has happened to Michael’s parents, and judging from the home, it has been vacant for years. in fact, it has a reputation of the local haunted house, with a young local boy Tommy Doyle (Brian Andrews) begging Laurie not to go up to the house.

The story snowballs from there as Laurie and her friends notice both an unfamiliar car and stranger showing up near by. Laurie keeps thinking she sees Michael behind trees or in the back yard. In the script Michael is described, quite reasonably as the shape. Michael is not defined at all, other than he appears large. Even his mask, iconic as it is, has no real features to it. It’s lifeless, as is his jumpsuit.

Laurie and her friend Annie (Nancy Loomis) both go to babysit some kids, while another friend, Lynda (P.J. Soles) hooks up with her boyfriend. This all leads to the inevitable series of deaths that culminate in Laurie trying to protect Tommy, Lindsey (Kyle Richards) and herself from the “boogey man”.

All the while Dr. Loomis is running around town with the local sheriff trying to locate and capture Michael. Attracted by screaming kids (Lindsey and Tommy, who Laurie sent out of the house) Loomis runs into the house and saves Laurie, shooting Michael multiple times. Michael falls out of a window and hits the ground below. But when Dr. Loomis looks out the window he sees Michael is gone. It’s a classic ending, and one that now we all recognize as an opening for a sequel (though Carpenter states that this was not the plan, it was simply meant to be a creepy ending-the sequel was a total afterthought).

What makes Halloween work is it’s use of shadows to obscure Myers, and it’s skillful use of POV shots. Many moments are shown from Michael’s perspective, keeping him mysterious, even as we see things through his eyes. Then there are the musical stings. Much like Psycho, the stings hit at the exact right moments. And that creepy theme!

Halloween is a definite classic, and though it’s unfortunate that it paved a way for cheap slashers, it is noteworthy for it’s focus on the characters. The fact is, most of the copycats missed what made Halloween work and created a genre almost unrecognizable as being compatible with Halloween. Modern slashers create such unlikable characters you quickly start to root for the killer. Carpenter never confuses the audience. Dr. Loomis and Laurie Strode are our heroes, Michael Myers is the villain. The film is a great example of film making with limited resources as well.

October 26, 2015 0

Deadly Night At the Museum (The Outing, 1987)

Well before the Wishmaster series, films were trying to mine horror the concepts of genies. The Outing (originally released as the Lamp) was one of the attempts of the 80’s.

It begins with a break in of an old woman’s house. She is some sort of hoarder of ancient artifacts. The three thugs discover a magical lamp and are promptly dispatched by an unseen force. But not before the female thug strips.

Anyways, a bunch of artifacts, including the lamp are sent to a local museum. There we meet Alex Wallace and her father Dr. Wallace, the curator. They have a decent but stressed relationship due to the death of Alex’s mother.

But the real problems start when Alex finds a bracelet among the old woman’s things. Soon the lamp is opened, on the very night she in her friends hide out in the museum to party overnight.

The film is pretty mediocre, never rising to the level of “So Awful it is good”. The acting is pedestrian, giving little life to the characters. There are a variety of supernatural deaths using zombie snakes, ceiling fans and masks.

The genie monster looks decent enough when we see it by the end, but as monsters go, it lacks personality. It does not appear on screen or say a word until the end of the film. Which makes the genie rather underwhelming.

Ultimately, this is a rather underwhelming film as a whole. It has a decent core concept

October 25, 2015 0