Movie 74: Night Of The Demons 3

Starring: Amelia Kinkade, Vlasta Vrana, Larry Day, Kris Holden-Reid, Gregory Calpakis, Tara Slone, Patricia Rodriguez, Stephanie Bauder.

Director: Jim Kaufman.

Original director Kevin S. Tenney returns to the misguided franchise as the screenwriter, cribbing some dialogue and concepts from his other film Witchboard, and tries really hard to make this seriously unnecessary franchise float.  Diminishing returns are a thing, though, and hit this film awfully hard and fast.

The first of the series to use some digital effects-the weird rippling portal when crossing through the gates of Hull House actually looks kinda okay-is somewhat diminished by the film obviously being shot on some pretty cheap digital video.  There's some okay continuity going on with the opening sequence referencing part 2, followed by another fun animated credits sequence and a new version of the originals' theme music.  None of it looks as good as the originals but there is still a sense of fun.  

It's a little jarring to see what is basically an entirely new Hull House.  The second film had done a good job of maintaining a pretty strong imitation of the original set piece, but considering this movie is ten years removed from the original film it was almost certainly necessary to re-tool everything.  

Well, full-on nudity right out of the gate.  At least they're mostly discussing their futures and...oh, well, okay now it's boys and their bodies. Disappointing. 

Tenney does have a way with naturalistic witty dialogue.  The cast doesn't have much skill with it, unfortunately, for all of their enthusiasm.  It's not all good writing, though...some of it really doesn't work.  

While slightly egregious, the gunfight at the convenience store(called the Kwik-E-Mart because ha ha) is actually kind of exciting even if it did occur due to characters acting really dumb...why would the cop actually fire at a girl who was crouched down off to the side?  But, okay, it happened, it's our hook and that's pretty much fine.  It gives our characters a reason to go to Hull House, even if it is a flimsy one.

I said it in the write-up for the second film, but I'm glad to see Amelia Kinkade getting more of an opportunity to strut her stuff(and she has way more here than in part 2).  Kinkade is a strong actress and does a lot with the character of Angela.  While this movie is certainly not good enough to warrant more franchise installments, I do wish she was given more accolades and respect for the role.   She's a lovely Woman and actually pretty talented, and the character is really fun.

The new direction of Angela-that of a temptress who offers people what they want-is a pretty okay story addition.  It's a little cliche but it does work pretty well as a direction, especially since an attempt was made at giving these characters base weaknesses, which is an ambitious change to the series formula.  If only it occurred in a better film with stronger actors.

The series isn't super well known for good scares, but this one really doesn't elicit much thrills or chills.  It all feels very distant and remote.  The make-up effects are still good, but are still a step below previous entries.  It seems like the effects were altered for convenience, which is understandable, but really doesn't help the cheaper feel of the whole affair.

Tenney copied a few lines from Full Metal Jacket, too, which kind of bums me out.  It just feels so cheap and awkward.  That brings up something I mentioned at the very beginning of the write-up, that Tenney had cribbed lines from Witchboard.  The small town Detective obsessed with magic is ripped right from that film.  It's not a bad character-actually, a gimmick detective is often a lot of fun under the right circumstances...this isn't really one of them, but it's a thing-or anything, it just feels hackneyed.  I've seen Witchboard and, while it isn't a great film by any stretch of the imagination, the gimmick detective feels more earned there than here...and it's still super lazy for Tenney to basically copy and paste.

The romance between Nick and whatever-her-name isn't particularly earned.  It's not unexpected-in fact, it was obviously going to be a thing-but the characters and actors just don't really have the chemistry.  I'm not sure where they fell in love: was it when she called him a jerk or when he gave her the last Mountain Dew?

Wait, Angela destroyed the handcuffs, so why did Detective Magic have to unlock them?  They were literally just shown far apart from one another.  Also, it's way too neat: "You weren't caught on the surveillance camera so you can just go home."  Great use of a stock footage shot of a sunrise, too....wow, this movie is really lazy.

Final Thoughts: I keep coming back around to "Well-Intentioned but Ill-conceived and misguided" when it comes to these sequels.  Amelia Kinkade is probably the only one to get out of this film with any dignity intact.  It's heart was in the right place, but it really never got itself off the ground floor.

Final Rating: Two Stars.

Movie 73: Night Of The Demons 2

Starring: Amelia Kinkade, Merle Kennedy, Cristi Harris, Jennifer Rhodes, Christine Taylor, Johnny Moran, Robert Jayne.

Director: Brian Trenchard-Smith.

A well-intentioned but mostly misguided desire to create a franchise resulted in two sequels(and a remake) being produced and not really going anywhere good.  Not that Night Of The Demons 2 is really a bad film, it just isn't great or live up to its predecessor.  The formula is still pretty much in place but the spirit of subversion is pretty much missing.  Good kids make it through, bad kids get possessed.  The characters are even more wooden but are still mostly charming.

If nothing else, Amelia Kinkade is given a lot more to do in an effort to push her into Freddy Krueger territory.  This has its ups and downs, but Kinkade clearly has a lot of fun with it.  Actually, Angel The Devils Bride might be the only Female horror franchise monster...well, okay, there's also Angela The Happy Camper of Sleepaway Camp but still...Kinkade offers a fun supernatural monster.

Sister Gloria is a fun subversion, possibly the only one in this film, and actually provides some silly fun as things go forward.  Maybe a little too much in the end, but it is something of a rarity for a Nun(who is established as being incredibly strict and maybe a little mean) to end up being the hero and a sympathetic character.  Outside of Exorcism films-and sometimes not even then-it's really quite rare for the Church to actually be the good guys.  Hell, even in this film Father Bob is kinda useless and actually a jerk in the guise of being hip and cool.

Fun exchange: "He says I took his book."

"So?"
"So what would I want with a book?"
"You're right.  He doesn't have your book. He can barely read a clock."

"Thank you."

"Sure!"

Perry, the nerdy demonology expert('cause that's a thing), actually says "You guys think you're so much better because you're bigger, stronger, and better looking than everyone else!"  Well, sure, you kind of just described "better" Perry.  There is a nice Lovecraft reference in the scene where Perry attempts to conjure a demon.

The Halloween Dance does look kinda lame.  I'd rather go to the spooky old murder house.  Of course, if I knew there were actually demons inside looking to kill me I'd probably prefer the Manilow.

I suppose I should mention the Christine Taylor appearance.  She gives a decent performance as the kinda/sorta ditzy best friend of Bibi, who is the nice girl who is capable of being a little naughty. They call Taylor "Marcia" which is cute...she does look like Marcia Brady(and played her in the film remake, right?).  There's not much to Teri, though...luckily, Taylor is made of charisma, so it's not a total loss.

The conceit of young Mouse/Melissa as Angela's orphaned sister is a pretty okay one.  It gives the movie a bit of a hook and a sense of history, both of which were absolutely needed but aren't entirely effective.  It's not ineffective, though, so...I guess it evens itself out.  The character is very basic: shy, frightened, and a bit of a load.  Merle Kennedy gives a good performance, though, even if she isn't given a lot to do.  Most of the actors give okay performances, actually.

There is a LOT of denim in this movie.  Like, an absurd amount of denim.  Ads for jeans don't have this much denim in them.

The two less moral friends-the best friends of the two nice kids-at least attempt to come to Melissas' aid when the trashy metal kids try to "sacrifice" her.  It's a nice bit of characterization, especially since the scene could have easily been Bibi and Johnny instead.  But by choosing the other pair they give them a bit of a character moment.

I would have to assume that Z-Boy had some sort of head injury that makes him talk like that?  Not sure why the movie felt it necessary to have Angela rape him, though...just seems kinda weird.  Not that the film is without a sexuality motif: the very phallic lipstick demon worm thingy first trying to force itself down Shirley's throat, and then crawling up her leg and into her hoo-hah and her subsequent writhing and moaning is obviously meant to evoke that underlying mentality.  Follow that up with Angela dancing on a table and pouring punch onto her breasts...well, yeah, lots of sexuality. Hell, Shirley's breasts kill the big Stooge fill-in.  Not sure if the motif continues throughout the third act, though, which kind of makes the sexuality more of a departure than a focus.

The preparing for battle montage is cute.  Sister Gloria going from oppressive antagonist to heroic warrior is refreshingly fun if not a little unearned.  It works well enough.  The holy water super soakers are also brought in to play for laughs.  It makes for an interesting juxtaposition to the very good make-up effects, which are suitably scary.

I'd forgotten how much this movie kind of collapses in on itself in the third act.  It's not entirely the movies fault, though: it's kind of an unwieldy premise and difficult to hold together.  Horror has always had some difficulty with climaxes, the build has always been a bit more important.  Some movies are able to kind of hide those negatives, but the supernatural sub-genre has a tendency to really lose steam during the second act and finally collapse halfway through the third.  It's not without it's moments, though: Perry's death is pretty effective, as is the death of Father Bob.  Kurt playing basketball with his own head doesn't do anybody any favors, though.

Jennifer Rhodes clearly has a blast playing Sister Gloria, especially as she makes Bruce Lee noises while swinging a rosarie at demon Z-Boy.  Rhodes has an excellent amount of conviction to the role, too.  She really is the movie MVP, narrowly edging out Amelia Kinkade, mostly due to how well she can deliver religious statements or cliches as action movie one-liners and not seem overly ridiculous.  Her growing a new head or whatever doesn't really make much sense but...okay.

Oh, right, giant snake beast thing.  It looks great, it really does, it just is kinda silly.  Okay, VERY silly.  Angela's defeat is also a bit random, but I suppose they opened the religious door from the get-go, so adding a little Dues Ex Machina does make a sort of reasonable sense.  

Final Thoughts: As I said at the start, it's very well-meaning but mostly misguided.  It certainly has its moments but mostly suffers from very uneven and confused second and third acts.  The heroes are more capable than Judy and Roger in the original, which is both a blessing and a curse, but have less personality and genre commentary than their predecessors.  It's a nice try, maybe even slightly successful, but mostly it just feels very mundane.  

Final Rating: Two and a Half Stars.

Movie 72: Night Of The Demons(1988)

Starring: Amelia Kinkade, Cathy Podewell, Linnea Quigley, Billy Gallo, Alvin Alexis, Hal Halvins, Lance Fenton, Jill Tershita, Philip Tanzini.

Director: Kevin S. Tenney.

This is, without a doubt, my favorite Halloween movie.  It's something of a cult classic, usually beloved by a great many horror fans and is basically a quintessential horror flick in general.  It has the simplest, most basic plot ever: dumb teenagers hold a halloween party at an old funeral parlor and wake up horrible demons who proceed to kill everybody.  There's not an ounce of subtlety to any of it, and that is totally okay, because it wants to be a fun supernatural horror romp.

Plus, there is a sense of wit and humor to the whole thing, perfectly embodied by Stooge, an overweight punk rocker with a mohawk and a pig-nose mask.  Stooge is, quite simply, hilarious and one of my favorite horror movie characters ever.

The amount that I love this movie cannot be overstated.  Sweet-natured Judy is going on a date with generic douchey Jay(whose name Judy whines dozens of times) and is lusted after by Italian stereotype Sal.  They decide to skip the dance and go to a party at local legend Hull House, thrown by goth queen Angela and slutty vixen Suzanne, two characters who really don't look like they would really be friends but apparently are.  Suzanne is played by scream queen Linnea Quigley, a legend in her own right.

There's no way I can keep up with the quips and one-liners...Judy's brother has a couple good lines at Jay's expense.  Stooge has a LOT, but most of them are yelling BITCH at people.  His comments about having "good karma" and how he always carries a spare but never promised a tire iron...that's all kind of brilliant.

While they're aren't super developed, and really don't need to be, we do get a pretty good idea of who these kids are and are able to indentify with them well enough.  Judy is nice, Jay is a jerk, Sal is rude, Stooge is even ruder...so on and so forth.  They're also interesting, at least to the point where we care what happens to them...I'd actually be somewhat interested in spending more time with them.  It may not be brought up at all, but there is a sense of social hierarchy.  The idea that they have a life outside of this one night is pretty present. 

I've always loved the broken mirror shot...

But the seance has been performed and the demons are now loose and most of our cast is doomed.  Writer/Director Kevin S. Tenney plays with the stereotypes of horror movies in a really self-aware, jovial way.  Other than a few fairly dark comments, the whole thing is made with a real desire to be fun, to the point of being a near spoof.  

EAT A BOWL OF FUCK!

But back to what I was saying: there's a lot of invoking stereotypes while gleefully subverting them.  Roger, for example: Roger is the token black character.  In any other film, this would make him an extreme stereotype and utterly doomed to die, probably first.  In Night Of The Demons, however, Roger is actually probably the smartest guy in the room.  Roger immediately smells danger and wants to GTFO.  While the house does not allow this to happen, Roger spend the rest of the film doing the most reasonable thing in the world: runs like hell. From everything.  It's successful, too.  Roger actually makes it out alive!

Judy, as this films' final girl, is very square.  Other than one moment of rejecting Jay, she's almost entirely without edge.  She's almost a cardboard cut out.  It's another brilliant deliberate invoking of tropes.  Tenney understands the almost boring nature of the "good girl" and decides to play it to the absolute hilt.  Judy is "nice" and "innocent"(not a virgin, though, as the film is quick to point out) and dull.  So, of course, she's the heroine.  While her demon fighting skills are mostly similar to Rogers (run like hell), she proves herself a mostly capable survivor. But she's so specifically mundane.

When Possessed!Angela does her weird dance number to Bauhaus...it's just a really gorgeous scene.  Amelia Kinkade does an excellent job with the movements, and Sal plays the bemused observer role really well.  Sal is another subversion as well: he's presented very much as something of a dirtbag and bully, but when push comes to shove he's actually somewhat selfless and brave.  He ends up being the opposite of Jay, who looks more like a dashing hero but is ultimately not a nice guy at all.  He's also kind of stupid: he seems pretty okay with Suzanne's incredibly strange behavior as soon as she starts touching his penis.

I'm not sure there's a weirder horror scene than Suzanne's fun game of "hide the lipstick."  Her hiding spot is, of course, her left boob.  It needs to seen to be believed.

Once this movie fires it's starting pistol, it just goes off at break-neck speed.  I didn't mean that to be a pun, but considering what happens to Franny it kind of ends up that way.  That pace becomes very interesting, considering that almost the entire cast is wiped out awfully fast, basically leaving three non-possessed victims to be inevitably separated and run around screaming.  Again, Tenney wants to play with standard elements: good kids hang around, bad kids get killed and possessed.  It somehow manages to be somewhat surprising though, probably because Sal and Roger are so against the horror movie grain.

Hull House is so unbelievably huge.  It's an excellent set-piece and looks great.  Dirty, dark, derelict with maze-like hallways, boards on the windows to make all light filtering in to be in slivers...it's really good, simple set design.

The makeup effects on the possessed people are really very good.  It looks restrictive to the actors-I think some of the best looking uses is actually the actors struggling with moving their facial muscles-but it looks pretty demonic and scary.  I'm not sure they can even see, though, so kudos to those actors.

Roger is only half interested in being of any assistance to Judy.  Half the time he just runs away and leaves her behind.  It's fascinating strategy. So is "You won't get me" and throwing himself out a window.  He also doesn't care that there is barbed wire.  He hears the demons roar and just starts climbing, even as it cuts his hands.  Roger is a survivor, through and through, and totally earns his happy ending (so to speak).  He attempts to leave Judy...he falls off the wall and then covers his ears so he doesn't have to hear her screams.  It's a pragmatic and difficult decision...and one he ultimately decides against anyway, since he comes back and saves Judy anyway.  

Final Thoughts: Like I said at the start, it's my favorite Halloween horror film ever and is one of my all-time favorite movies.  It's simple, silly, but undeniably fun and loves to play with genre conventions and stereotypes.  Director Kevin S. Tenney is certainly not interested in re-inventing the wheel, opting to have some wacky fun instead.  Good effects work, decent and occasionally deliberately wooden, and a sense of fun throughout.  If you don't agree, EAT A BOWL OF FUCK.

Final Rating: Three and a Half Stars.

Movie 71: Trick R Treat

Starring: Brian Cox, Anna Paquin, Leslie Bibb, Quinn Lord, Dylan Baker, Rochelle Aytes.

Director:Michael Dougherty.

We're gonna do Halloween right here on "My Year of Horror" with the rather extraordinary Trick 'r Treat.  It's not the greatest film ever made, but it's basically pure fun and has a lot of affection for the holiday.  

It's an anthology film, so it's scattered by it's very nature, but the stories are pretty fun and entertaining.  Its staccato narrative style is going to make it a bit difficult for me to write about it in any organized way, but I'll do the best I can.  It should be noted once again that this is not a spoiler free space.  I will be discussing plot details, so please proceed at your own peril.

Every single moment of this film is designed with a great deal of whimsy and fun, from its jolting opening sequence, to its comic book style credits...it's clear that the film wants to have a good time with not only horror conventions but also with popular culture in general.  There's nothing super complicated about any of it: the basic set-ups are all very standard but interesting and ultimately rather subversive.  

A helpful news report at the beginning clears up a particularly glaring plot problem (why would all of this things be happening in the same place at the same time) even for those who were good at suspending disbelief.  But the report just establishes that this town is particularly big on Halloween and the traditions of the holiday.  

Dylan Baker is excellent as a murderous high school principle who, for reasons unknown, decides to murder an overweight kid and bury him in the backyard...only to have frequent interruptions by his angry neighbor(an excellently cast Brian Cox, whose story ties in later) and his incredibly loud son.  Anna Paquin is a young lady looking to lose her virginity wearing a Red Riding Hood costume who is stalked by a killer...and she has a dark secret of her own.  Things tie together quite nicely, as Baker IS the killer stalking Paquin and gets his just deserts in what may be one of my favorite twists in horror history: when our innocent Riding Hood turns out to be the big bad wolf in disguise.

The most ominous and stylish of the segments is the teenagers who journey to an old rock quarry to "make an offering" to some apparent ghosts from the town's dirty little secret: the flashback of how a group of mentally disturbed children died in a bus "accident" and now haunt the quarry where they died is particularly creepy.  The strange sighs and sounds that the kids make, along with the absurd, dark-eyed masks they wear...it's all very surreal and off-putting.  It's a strong sequence.  The continuing story in the present day: the teens have set up "Rhonda The Retard" for what is most certainly a mean-spirited scare prank.  Most of the kids are scum except for the one nice guy who, while he goes along the prank, knows when things go too far and is sympathetic to poor Rhonda.  It doesn't help him in the end, though: Rhonda leaves her tormentors to their fates.

The whole film has a nice concept of karmic justice.  People who do morally questionable things are punished for their transgressions while the innocent and nice people end up fine...there just aren't many of the latter in this film.  

The sequence where Anna and friends transform...it's easily one of my favorite transformation sequences in film.  How effective is it to see a Woman unzip her own back like a dress?!  I love the twist in general: instead of being a victim, they are aggressors.  The make-up effects are excellent...the full-on Werewolves don't look super great but I suspect this movie didn't have a considerably huge amount of money to work with.  It's my favorite of the stories told within this film, and has some of the best camerawork and staging featured.  The quick cuts, the sweeping camera moves around the fire, the sudden slamming of boots against logs, the sound of tearing flesh, moans and growls...it's an excellent sequence and a great piece of film-making.

Brian Cox shows up to Brian Cox all over the place and I couldn't be happier.  I have a habit of using "Brian Coxing" as a verb.  His story is probably the most generic of the piece but it does feature the adorable little burlap sack wearing pumpkin creature Sam, who has been seen witnessing other things throughout the proceedings.  It ties in well with the rest of the film: he was the aforementioned bus driver who, if nothing else, witnessed (caused?) the deaths of those children many years ago and the cranky neighbor giving Dylan Baker a hard time.  

Everything ties together nicely: Sam teaches Cox about the value of Halloween, and then witnesses Rhonda arrive home safely, Paquin and her fellow Werewolves drive by, and Baker's Son is handing out what is most assuredly more death candy...and then Sam goes off to punish the Woman in the robot costume for disrespecting Halloween.  

Final Thoughts: For what it is, which is pure unadulterated fun, Trick 'r Treat works really well.  While there isn't much in the way of depth or character, the film manages to keep things moving along with a deliberately scattered narrative style that doesn't necessarily tell a real story but instead concerns itself with a series of events.  It's an ambitious approach to an anthology film and, while there are some cracks in the facade, it mostly pays off.  It's kind of a tragedy that a sequel hasn't managed to get itself made yet-last I had read it was still stuck in development hell as a result of the film's low box office yield-but maybe someday we'll get more of it.  I really feel that it's a strong enough film and has the perfect style to make a sequel worthwhile.

Final Rating: Four Stars.

Movie 70: Halloween II(2009)

Starring: Scout Taylor-Compton, Tyler Man, Malcolm McDowell, Brad Dourif, Danielle Harris, Caroline Williams.

Director: Rob Zombie.

Finally, in two hours, I will blissfully be done with the Halloween franchise and can breathe a sigh of relief...and set them all on fire in some sort of Pagan entreaty to some horrible elder god in hopes of preventing another from ever being made.  

I'm sorry, that was way more bitter than I meant to be.  It's just tough.  I'm in a bad mood(now, after watching nine of these things) and I just don't know how well I'm going to be able to deal with this film and remain in any way objective.  

Well, Zombie learned about a new filter: now everything is blue like every other mainstream horror film developed over the past decade.  Film-making!  

At least this opening sequence is a good use of Brad Dourif's time: the juxtaposition between his overseeing the scene of the carnage at the Myers house with the surgery being performed on his Daughter is actually smartly handled.  Dourif is giving some great expressions as it goes on.  The close-ups of Annie's wounds are tonally interesting, even if the quick cuts and muddled art effects make what we're looking at difficult to make out.  We understand what we're looking at through context clues, but the actual presentation is lacking.

Then the ambulance hits a cow and we get ten minutes of the ambulance drive shouting "fuck" over and over again, because writing is hard.  This kills any and all good will that spirited opener managed to engender.  

I know Rob Zombie loves his Wife but...seriously, can we politely ask them to stop?  The egregious shots of her in a white dress with a white horse...it's not interesting, or pretty, or even positive, it's just an irritating example of poor narrative skills.  

Oscar winner Octavia Spencer, ladies and gentlemen! Being sassy and then getting killed by a white man in an even whiter mask.  

Good lord, it's just an extension of the previous film's shrill, flailing third act.  It's just shrieking and no real sense of physical geography.  At least Zombie is playing more with color.  I assume he got to that chapter in his "how to make a movie" book that he had only read the first couple of chapters of when he made his previous films.

Buddy the security guard might be the only real sympathetic character in these films.  At least he shows some sort of basic kindness.  Also, I like the song "Nights in White Satin" but...I'm worried that it's just going to play seventeen times in this film and then I'll hate it forever.  Could be worse, though: it could be a cover of "Nights in White Satin" by Rob Zombie and his shitty band.

In the previous film, Zombie couldn't hold a scene for more than a minute or two.  In this movie, the scenes seem to be lasting forty-five minutes....god damn it, movie, the first twenty minutes was a DREAM SEQUENCE?!  

Wait, is the movie actually allowing Laurie to play the victim card against Danielle Harris?  Is this your key to making her sympathetic and relatable?  Our lead is yelling at her best friend who was torn apart by Myers as if her experiences trump the horrible violence committed on said best friend?  Really, movie?

Margot Kidder, you deserve better than this.

Brad Dourif is easily this movies biggest strength.  He's channeling the likability of his Deadwood character in a big way, and it's making this movie almost tolerable when he's on screen.  Harris has an easy likability to her, too.

I hate these overly stylized dream sequences.  Hate, hate, hate them.  It feels like Zombie just throws whatever thought stomps through his brain on screen.  Weird for the sake of being weird isn't artsy or surreal, it's not thought provoking, it's not interesting, it's just a bunch of stuff that happens.

Shut up, Scout Taylor-Compton.

I think that's enough of the Sheri Moon Zombie and Little Boy ghost appearances.  This movie is literally just the ghosts, trashy people getting killed by Michael after doing trashy things, and Scout Taylor-Compton shrieking at the top of her lungs.  

Oh hell, there's another whole act to go.  This movie just won't end.

This Loomis arc isn't going anywhere.  It's just a distraction.  You probably could have cut him.  It has no purpose within the narrative besides the book, and the book could have just showed up.

So we just randomly introduced some new friends for Laurie in the third act?  Then they go to a party and get killed...Zombie attempts some interesting visuals with the party and kinda/sorta succeeds on occasion....oh, for heaven's sake...

I just...I have no more insights to offer.  No more barbs, witty or angry.  I just have nothing.  

Nothing.

Final Thoughts: There is no God.

Final Rating: There is only pain.

Movie 69: Halloween(2007)

Starring: Scout Taylor-Compton, Tyler Mane, Malcolm McDowell, Brad Dourif, Daeg Faerch. Sheri Moon Zombie, William Forsythe.

Director: Rob Zombie.

The time has come for me to revisit these dreaded films.  The true reality is that, every so often, I wonder if my hatred for Rob Zombie films is born out of some sort of honest desire to hate Rob Zombie.  Like, I don't hate the works because they're bad but because I want to hate them.  Usually I end up hating the work anyway when I do give it another try, but the worry that I'm not being honest or academic about inevitably makes it's way inside my head and I come back to it like an abused spouse.  

On that note, I would be remiss in adding the caveat(as I try to do anytime I watch a remake) that I also do my damnedest to keep my affections and opinions on the original out of mind and take this remake for what it is: an adaptation(no different than more versions of Dracula), and its own movie.

So that's the goal: I'm going to try to give Rob Zombie an honest and fair shake.  I'm not saying this will be easy or effective, but I'm going to work real hard at it.

Real, real hard, as it turns out.  There's a scene where Sheri Moon Zombie does a stripper dance to "Love Hurts" and I couldn't help but think "This film hurts."  Zombie's dialogue style shows it's inherent weakness by being seventy-five-percent made up of the word "Fuck."  You might argue "But that's how these characters would talk" but I would argue "It's just bad writing."  Profanity, while sometimes needed or effectively used, generally is the mark of a writer trying to kill time or generally being ignorant.  

The funny thing is, at least compared to his previous works (the dreadful House of a 1,000 Corpses in particular), Zombie is developing a half-way decent visual eye, actually utilizing some interesting camera angles and editing choices that do show that he, at the very least, has learned something.  The real essential problem is that he is not, and probably never will be, much of a writer.  His affection for the source material is incredibly present, though, even if his own indulgences actually do more to undermine Carpenter's classic than honor it.  

Zombie's influences are far more exploitation slasher than suspense-thriller, which makes him an odd choice for Halloween, and it shows with Young Michael's aggressive but mostly emotionless and flat butchering of three people.  There's no shortage of blood and carnage, but considering the general lack of sympathy for Zombie's cast (a problem that has plagued all of Zombie's productions: Zombie being another modern director who seems to find the "it's fun to watch people we don't like die" school of thought) there isn't an awful lot of weight to any of it.

The decision to focus a large amount of story on Michael's childhood is an incredibly odd choice, and probably not a good one.  Many other critics have accused it of attempting to create "a sympathetic backstory and a reason for Micheal Myers." The latter is certainly true, I just don't know if I agree with sympathy.  While Zombie's strange obsession with "poor white trash" archetypes are incredibly present, that alone doesn't entirely engender sympathy, neither does his being bullied by kids at school.  While his relationship with his Mother offers an attempt at sympathy, it's not pronounced enough to be effective: there are shots of her smiling at him, visiting him at the hospital, and the like but none of it is lingered on for more than a few seconds.  It's another odd and detrimental choice, almost as if Zombie wanted to rush through all of the character-building to get to the "good stuff." What is particularly odd about this is that Zombie opened that door when he probably didn't have to.

That leads me to the former part of the usual criticisms: the "reason."  Zombie clearly wants us to somehow have an understanding of Myers, which runs counter to anything that was ever needed.  It doesn't make a lot of sense.  I'm not sure if it occurred to Zombie (but I think it probably did) that all it really does is make Michael into an ordinary serial killer instead of the strange, unexplained force of nature he was designed to be.  In fact, the story mimics the story of real-life serial killer Ed Gein almost exactly, except for maybe the using human skin to make stuff.

Y'know, I'm glad Zombie chose to include a graphic rape scene.  It was certainly needed, right?  Couldn't have just been the guys going in to mess with Myers, it had to involve a Woman being raped by rednecks.  Terrible, unnecessary writing.

Also, Myers is seven feet tall and obviously made of bricks. Why would a couple of idiot rednecks even ATTEMPT to fuck with this guy?!  It makes absolutely no sense.

I think I really hate the rendition of Dr.Sam Loomis.  I know that Zombie obviously wants to portray a world with no good guys or even any hope of a better life for anyone, but do we need the Psychiatrist to be a smug, self-serving dickhole?  McDowell really seems to be doing very little with it, any rate...pretty much like every other actor in this film.  I'm not sure it's McDowell's fault, really, due to this story giving each character little more than a few seconds at a time to present themselves to the audience in any significant way.

Oh, lord, I had forgotten Scout Taylor-Compton.  Shrill, obnoxious, marginally talented Scout Taylor-Compton.  She can't seem to deliver a line without over-doing it.

Why are Udo Kier and Dee Wallace here?  Did they not have a real movie to do that week?
I'm sorry...I think my bitterness and hatred for this movie is kicking in.  I'm really trying to be objective.

Ha ha, I get it, he cast Danielle Harris as Annie.  Get it?  'Cause she was Jamie Lloyd in the original franchise?  GET IT.  But, seriously, she's a fine actress and doesn't get enough to do in this film.  With perhaps the notable exception of Brad Dourif(who is doing a great job playing against type, even though he falls victim to the same exact "no time for love, Dr.Jones" approach to every single actor in this film), she might be the best actress in this thing.

McDowell's Loomis rants are not Donald Pleasence.  Not even close.  They also seem out of character for this approach to the character.  His sudden feelings of alarm seem to come out of left field-or, perhaps more specifically, because it was a big part of the original film-and feels dishonest.

The film has now just become a complete imitation of the original film, which feels like pandering a bit, except with a considerable more trashy behavior from the ladies.  Because reasons.  Zombie has no ability for character, or even tone.  This film has one mode, pretty much chugging along in first gear for an impossibly long two-hours.  He uses the same grainy lighting for a nice walk along a pretty suburban street that he does for a horrible murder in an asylum.  Shouldn't Laurie's happy life, about to be sundered by the arrival of her brother, at least look happy?  Does Zombie really not understand mood, dramatic tension, visual metaphor or narrative dissonance?  I'm not sure why I thought he might: he was a musician, and he wasn't even terribly good at that, either.

Shit...I'm actively TRYING not to hate this film.  Really, really hard.

What was the point of developing Myers as a character(so to speak) when you were just going to literally copy the original film beat-by-beat?  You could have spent that time making these victims have a personality instead of "sex."  I mean....JUST ONE CHARACTER ZOMBIE!  DEVELOP ONE CHARACTER!

The murder sequence of Laurie's adopted parents has a raw sense of home invasion tropes.  It's actually a decent sequence. Unfortunately, like every other scene in this movie, it lasts all of a minute before the film barrels onto the next thing that happens with no sense of logical and thematic transition or cohesion.  It's like a movie made by a guy who only heard about film-making by vague description.

Zombie seems to have no other move than to push ahead with exploitation values.  More boobs.  Don't get me wrong-I like boobs as much as the next cis gender male- but I also like good taste and storytelling.  It's just trashy here.  

There are some interesting subversive choices made when it comes to deviating from the source material-the survival of Annie, for instance, assuming you've a meta-understanding of the original film and the character of Annie-that shows at least a little creativity on Zombie's part.  

Shut up, Scout Taylor-Compton.

I feel like I've zoned out entirely in this last act...it's devoid of value.  It's Compton shrieking, messy blocking, and confusing camera work.  Meh.

Final Thoughts: It's not a completely terrible film.  Early on there is some halfway decent camerawork and creative displays...it's just that Zombie is a terrible writer, obsessed with trashy and exploitative imagery and values and generally not much of a film-maker.  There are some so-so performances that are obviously hampered by the baffling decision to give them a few seconds at a time to actually present themselves in any meaningful way..

Final rating: Two Stars.

Movie 68: Halloween Resurrection

Starring: Jamie Lee Curtis, Brad Loree, Busta Rhymes, Bianca Kajlich, Sean Patrick Thomas, Daisy McCrackin, Katee Sackhoff(!), Tyra Banks.

Director: Rick Rosenthal.

And now we've come to the end of Laurie's narrative and to the absolute lowest point of the entire franchise that necessitated a Rob Zombie remake, so...we can just blame it all on this film.  Somehow this was made by the same director as Halloween II which just seems impossible.  That movie was pretty good.  This is shit.

I touched on it briefly at the end of my write up on the mediocre H2O but the concept that Michael tricking Laurie into killing some other guy makes so little sense that it makes me want to cry.  It's literally one of the worst sequel justifications I have ever come across in the thousands of horror films I've watched.  Also, "writers", why would Michael wait three more years to kill Laurie if she was just hanging out at a mental institution?  Why is this mental institution so grungy and dark?  Did they lose federal funding?

 I'd rather watch the movie where Laurie fights against the evil corporate conspiracy to get funding back to the asylum, maybe with lovable loser co-patients who just need some love to get over thier various homicidal urges.

Actually, the mindscrew that Michael pulls on Laurie might be the only sign of any intelligence Myers ever showed in this series.  It's still stupid, given the circumstances, but it's there.  In addition, he hands the knife off to the lunatic in the clown mask.

Probably the only interesting conceit here(if that), is that Michael is successful in both narratives at killing his enemies.  Loomis's narrative ends with his death, and so does Laurie's.  Michael continues to survive.

I find the idea that this film was clearly seen as a literal resurrection for the franchise: that opening sequence was literally designed as a way to say goodbye to the old franchise and move forward with something new and exciting and then...jesus, I hate this movie so much.

What the hell is Katee Sackoff doing here and why does her make-up look like a clowns?  Why is she the annoying ditzy friend?  Why have these boring, irritating people been chosen for a reality...oh, wait, nevermind.  I get it now.  Irritating people are the only ones chosen for reality television.

When Busta Rhymes, giving looks of irritation and annoyance, is the closest thing to reality in the whole film, you know you're in trouble.  I'm not sure why Sarah's scream can shatter glass, or why the light crashing behind her even caused that level of alarm.

So the camera lingers on Tyra Bank's ass as she dances around for no reason.  Stay classy, movie.

The central plot: Obnoxious wannabe stars participate in a reality show where they explore Michael Myers's house.  It's aired on the internet.  Not sure what they would expect to find.  But, okay.  I'm strongly considering the use of the fast forward button.  There's really nothing to actually comment on: the dialogue is just terrible(most of it is these idiots discussing why they think Michael killed people), the characters nonexistent, and this is all actually pretty sexist: comments on flashing breasts to get viewership, close-ups of butts and breasts, and "When are you gonna get out of your head, and starting thinking with your body" which might be one of the worst things I've ever heard a character say.

I didn't think it was possible for Myers to look embarrassed, what with the mask and all but...somehow he manages to do it.  The scene where Busta is dressed as Myers and the real Myers shows up is clearly supposed to be funny or suspenseful or something but it's just ridiculous.  Painful, even.  Busta clearly believes himself funny.  He isn't.

Did Busta need to continue to bribe the characters?  Did they not establish that they are receiving scholarships?  The so-called "writers" of this film really did not do a fantastic job. I think the cutaways to the kids watching at the other college or whatever is really unnecessary, not that there's really any tension or story to actually derail.  The device of the kid trying to help the heroine escape by using the cameras to keep tabs on Michael's location isn't the worst thing in the world, but the concerned observers in the room with him actually tend to seem idiotic, mostly because it pre-supposes that the audience is doing the same thing at home.  We're not.

Oh, for fuck's sake.  Busta Rhymes using Kung Fu against Michael Myers.  I'd almost forgotten about this nonsense.  Michael is defeated by Kung Fu and Electricity.  Ugh.

Final Thoughts: Easily the lowest point of the whole series.  Listing the reasons why would likely take twice as long as actually watching this garbage did.

Final Rating: One Stars.

Movie 67: Halloween H2O

Starring: Jamie Lee Curtis, Josh Hartnett, Michelle Williams, Adam Arkin, Adam Hann-Byrd, Jodi Lyn O'Keefe, Janet Leigh, LL Cool J.

Director: Steve Miner.

I dislike LL Cool J.  In everything he's ever done.  As such, I feel like I may have had a knee-jerk reaction to this post-Scream, Kevin Williamson-penned(which are two attributes that really never make me feel very good about life) reboot of the Halloween franchise, and may not have given it a fair shake.  So, here I am trying to do exactly that.  

The commercial telling me to "stay tuned after the feature" for an exclusive look at a Creed music video also does not fill me with confidence.

So, this is where the Laurie Strode narrative picks back up.  After being written out of the original franchise storyline (or the Loomis narrative, as I call it), Jamie Lee Curtis makes a return to the franchise as Laurie.  The unfortunate (or fortunate, depending on your general views of the sequels) part is that in order for Laurie to return-you may remember that part four explicitly states that Laurie was killed in a car wreck-they had to completely retcon the previous story out in it's entirety.  This means that, while we can pretend that The Curse of Michael Myers didn't happen, all of Loomis' extended story is gone, only existing in an alternate reality with Jamie Lloyd.  

Well, there's a pre-fame Joeseph Gordan-Levitt performing some awkward humor.  A lot of movies never really get teens right, either by making them just small adults (which is probably closer to the reality) or obnoxious, jargon-spewing morons.  Anyway, the scene isn't entirely wasted-visual puns of hockey-playing teen having an ice skate stuck in his face, because Michael understands irony-we at least get a basic plot point: Loomis's nurse is Michael's first target so he can gain access to information about Laurie's whereabouts.  

What a coincidence: I, too, have a framed photo of Josh Hartnett on my desk.

While I've never forgotten that this was Josh Hartnett's debut film, it's another of those things that people like to bring up (like Paul Rudd in part 6), I forgot how generally impressed I was with him in it.  I've always liked Hartnett, really, and always found it a little unfortunate that he really never got to be the prestige actor I think he was probably capable of.being.  Not that he was unsuccessful as an actor, he just kind of stuck to genre work, and also got success FROM genre work (Rudd, for example, did not get famous off of part 6, but Hartnett got there from this film and The Faculty (which I should do for the blog at some point and is a great case of "great cast, mediocre film") which is impressive itself.

LL Cool J I am less impressed with.  He's not an actor.  I promise not to spend half this blog bitching about him, though.

While there isn't much of a real story happening, there is enough characterization to keep things afloat.  Laurie's mental health and contentious relationship with her son gives enough strong moments of drama.  Williamson's script is still way too reference heavy-sometimes to clever results, but sometimes not so much-with at least three references to Psycho in the first thirty minutes alone and by that I mean people actually mentioning the film, not any stylistic or story beat choices.  Williamson does have a way with class room dialogue: the bit of Michelle Williams giving her (admittedly accurate and intelligent) analysis of Victor Frankenstein (didn't need the Young Frankenstein reference, even if it was cute) with it having actual greater meaning to Laurie.  It's a smart scene.

I think too much time was spent on the "How will Michael get past the gate" problem.  I'm fairly certain Michael probably could have climbed over the wall faster and easier than his labor-heavy trickery of getting LL Cool J to open the gate.  But, whatever, he's in and hopefully we can move forward with the killing.

I go back and forth on the whole "Laurie is a pill-popping, functional alcoholic" thing.  On one hand there is an element of truth to it-if you underwent significant trauma in 1979 that would probably be a thing, psychiatric treatment didn't really get particularly advanced or overtly effective until the late eighties- on the other I feel like it takes an something away from Laurie as a survivor.  But, to be fair, the movie even kind of addressed it in the Frankenstein discussion: Laurie didn't actually confront Michael when attacked.  She was saved by Loomis and never did really look him in the eye.  Laurie was kind of pre-"final girl" mentality: she did fight back, but the absolute terror of that night would have left a considerable mark on a Seventeen year old.

The movie makes the leap to Michael caring about the age of Seventeen...I guess that's as good an answer as any for the "why now" conundrum.  The concept of Josh Hartnett being the actual target is also not bad.  It's even somewhat progressive.  A lot of this movie is, actually: Laurie being an actual authority figure qualifies it, too: she may not be entirely functional, in fact she's kind of terrorized, but she is in a position of authority.  Technically this need not be a reboot: nothing is mentioned that couldn't have still occurred.  Laurie says she faked her death...you would just have to accept that our heroine abandoned a Daughter in the process.  That'd be tough to swallow and still find her an acceptably identifiable hero, but it's there if you want to go with it.

Still can't escape some of the weaknesses of the slasher sub-genre, though: two kids are dead and I really don't know anything about them except Josh likes them...so their deaths are essentially meaningless and weren't terribly impressive or stylish.  Michael just stabbed them.  Meh.

There's something unsettling and even vaguely racist about LL Cool J getting shot by Laurie's boyfriend...maybe not so much at the time, but watching it today it's weird.  White man shoots at vague shape in the dark, thinking it to be an assailant, and it's a black man.  Yikes.  He lives for some reason (allegedly due to a script change as a result of LL Cool J having a specific clause in his contract that he doesn't die in movies, also resulting in his surviving Deep Blue Sea and Mindhunters) but it's still weird.  I'm not even sure why his character exists in it at all, really.

It was something of a messy second act (so many movies have that problem) but we've gotten to what we really came for: Laurie gets an axe and calls Michael out as the familiar Carpenter theme plays.  The ensuring chase is a little awkward and isn't terribly thrilling...maybe because there isn't much suspense or adequate build-up.  Given that the whole thing results in Laurie kidnapping Michael's seemingly death body and driving it away at gunpoint, I think the idea is that this is supposed to be maybe/kinda/sorta be a character study?  It's certainly a possible interpretation, but I'm not sure I entirely buy into it.

The upcoming terrible sequel ultimately makes the suggestion that the Michael that she pins into a tree and beheads was actually an orderly or whatever that he had planted...this makes no sense whatsoever since we can see his eyes and there is no fear here whatsoever.  But, whatever.  

Final Thoughts: It's jumbled and messy like so many other nineties horror flicks...the build-up is mostly non-existent beyond some characterization for Laurie and her son, and even that finds itself never expanded on or resolved, and is mostly entirely dropped.  There's no suspense, most of the deaths are random and committed on characters we don't know or care about, and the ending is a rushed dash to the credits with little meaning.  It all boils down to one singular purpose: to have Jamie Lee Curtis in a Halloween movie again.  

Final rating: Two and a Half Stars.

Movie 66: Halloween VI The Curse of Michael Myers

Starring: Donald Pleasence, Paul Rudd, Marianne Hagan, Mitchell Ryan, Kim Darby, Keith Bogart, Mariah O'Brien.

Director: Joe Chapelle.

There are three narratives in the Halloween series: There's one about Dr.Loomis, One about Laurie Strode, and one about Michael himself (or Rob Zombie's fever dreams or whatever...still dreading those).  We've reached the end, gentle viewers, of the journey of Dr.Loomis.  It's not a great send off for the character, most likely because Donald Pleasence was ancient at the time of shooting and, tragically (but not entirely unexpectedly) passed away either during or shortly after filming.  I never did get the full story, but he certainly has passed away before the film was screened in theaters.

There is a ballsy and seemingly well-intentioned attempt to jump start the story in Curse.  It's actually a little admirable, really: someone wanted to do something different and novel.  It's pretty unsuccessful but it's a nice try.  I will admit that the series clearly needed jump starting, given how pedestrian part 5 ended up being, and the self-aware generation hadn't kicked in yet at the time of this film's conception.  But, while it DID need that new direction to get it moving, I don't think anybody really needed it to be "Pagan Cult" or involve a clunky voice-over intro by Paul Rudd...who made his debut with this film and is now going to forever be hugely successful as Ant-Man.  Now that we've acknowledged that Rudd went on to be a star, we can not mention it again ever.  Too many people like to attempt to show their deep knowledge of film history by bringing up the old shames of famous actors, even though everybody knows that.  So, let's move on.

We will talk a little bit about Rudd's performance, though...he's playing a now adult Tommy Doyle, the little boy Laurie was babysitting in the original film.  It's not a bad call-back, and shows just a little of that self-awareness that would soon permeate the genre...Rudd seems to be channeling his inner schizo with the performance.  I'm torn on it's quality: just recently a friend told me it was too obvious and hammy a performance, with Rudd seemingly having some sort of disorder.  Part of me totally agrees with that: Rudd seems to push his weirdness way too far with the result of being a caricature...but part of me finds it somewhat clever and honest: Tommy Doyle would likely have been negatively affected mentally and emotionally by the events of the first film.  It does seem a little odd that he never received any treatment for those adverse effects, or that time didn't just kind of smooth things over (hell, he was like six when this happened and it's been over a decade...you'd think Myers would have eventually faded from memory).  We'll watch and see how it develops...it's been a very long time since I've seen this thing.

Pleasence brings a bit more humanity and jovialness to his performance as Loomis this time around, probably because the actor's age had just softened him quite a bit and because Loomis has had time to relax and put things to rest (like Tommy probably should have). 

Well, hey, we have Father of the year slapping his adult daughter(!) for talking back, with some awkward expository dialogue that is delivered like it's basically a normal breakfast conversation.  We learn that Kara Strode had an unwanted baby, was forced to move home, Mom is sympathetic of Kara's plight but her shithead Dad is apparently pissed about the intrusion for some reason...pissed enough to casually call his Grandson a bastard.  It's awkward, but it gives us what we need to know, especially in that little Danny, Kara's son, pulls a knife on his beloved Granddad after he slaps Kara.  So, we know Danny is apparently Michael 2.0.  

Paul Rudd (I won't likely be calling him Tommy...he's just Paul Rudd.  He's always just Paul Rudd.) does some detective work (I guess the police in Haddonfield have lost their touch without yearly Myers attacks) and finds out where Jamie (I talked about other stuff instead of that: Jamie had a baby in the Druid compound, there was some weird guitar riff lead-ins to Carpenters theme, Michael hunted her down and killed her but she hid the baby) hid her baby and meets Loomis at the hospital...there's not a lot of scene cohesion.  Just jumping scene to scene.

There is the over-the-top postulating from Loomis!  He tells Mrs.Strode all about Michael and THE EVIL and THE RAGE and THE NOTHING BEHIND HIS EYYYYYYYES!  Loving it.  They just had to do it, and I'm grateful.  Mrs.Strode does react in a very reasonable way: calls her Husband, angrily chews him out on knowing the history of the home and moving them in anyway, packs her suitcase and starts to head right out the door.  Her only problem: stopping to answer the phone.  Not a smart move.  The scene probably would have had more tension if they didn't make the maddening choice to cut away and see what Paul Rudd was up to.

Kara has the quintessential nineties hair.  It's all over the place.  It's pretty, SHE is pretty...wearing very mid-nineties fashions (sweater, blouse, ankle length skirt, white keds)...it's kind of rad.  She takes Paul Rudd's beliefs and theories pretty well and remarkably easily.  But this movie is all about taking the path of no resistance: we don't need much of an actual narrative as long as we have "weird cult" in the background that can be explained away with exposition (quick and easy, like baking a cake!) and some quick retconning.  Characters can just find themselves in the same place without really needing much motivation or reasoning.  

Just when you forgot asshole Dad, he comes home to get killed in yet another run-of-the-mill slasher movie scene, complete with bumping washing machine filled with blood and electrocution...and an exploding head.  For some reason.

They literally bring the radio show host in JUST to cause characters to return to the main set piece.  I mean, he speaks a few lines of inflammatory dialogue and then adds to the body count, but really it's just for a venue change.  

Actually, when Tim and Beth return to the house there's some nice use of lighting.  It's very unusual and kind of striking, even if it doesn't really serve any functional purpose within the story. It just looks nice.  The same could be said of the scene at the fair where Paul Rudd witnesses a little girl in a white dress getting covered in "blood rain."  It doesn't really DO anything, it just looks nice.  Rudd gives a typical mixed reaction: he seems affected, but not really.  It's a very distant performance. He gives, like, half an emotion every time.  

VERY little build-up to any of the deaths in this film: actually, oddly enough, more effort was spent on getting us invested in Tim and Beth than Mom and Dad...and we spend a LOT more time watching a build-up to the deaths of Mom and Dad than Tim and Beth.  Mom and Dad got death scenes, Tim and Beth just got kinda murdered like after thoughts.  Maybe Mom and Dad didn't really need to be in this film?

I'm not sure what's going on with the music in this film.  It has this weird hiss sound and then a slam.  Over and over again.  Even when there isn't really anything to put emphasis on.  Are Thunderstorms normal in Illinois during October?  That doesn't seem likely, but I've never been to Illinois or really know anything about it.

Sudden heel turn for Dr.Wynn which would be intriguing if we knew anything about Wynn or cared in any way.  More great moments in writing: quick cutaway, Rudd and Loomis say "we've been drugged and weren't killed because there's a sick game being played" and off we go to act three. Loomis knows just where to go, too.  Purely coincidental writing.  No matter, Loomis has thirty seconds of dialogue with Wynn trying to justify his continued presence in the film (instead of being killed by the enemy), is knocked out (and is once more allowed to live by the villain)...and we're off to Rudd exploring the sanitarium which is apparently also Pagan central after hours.  After a weird, out of nowhere scene involving a crazy woman screaming nonsense at him, Rudd attempts to rescue Kara.

Actually, Rudd just did some interesting stuff performance-wise.  While attempting to free Kara, Micheal arrives.  Rudd takes a look at him, freezes, and has the most honest mix of reactions cross his face: laughter, terror, excitement, dread...all at once.  He kind of sags for a moment, then pulls himself together and keeps trying to save Kara.  It was a decent moment.

Wynn knows how to perform surgery?  He's the administrator of a sanitarium.  Do they even have facilities to perform surgery in a sanitarium?  I feel like the movie kind of lost it's mind, even within the context of this film.  Michael murders all the doctors...but weren't they on his side?  They never even really explain what they were doing there: what were they doing surgery on?  Why are they doing any of the things they're doing?  How has Michael not killed them dozens of times over in the past decade or so?  I guess it doesn't matter, Michael is hunting the protagonists and I suppose that's really all that matters.

Rudd comes up with an okay attack plan: fill Michael full of sedatives and savagely beat him with a pipe.  That's not bad.  Kind of random...would have been nice to have some sort of establishment that the character knew something about medication or whatever.  You know, more establishment of Rudd's personality would have helped a lot.  Just one scene of him talking about "the hospital" or whatever, intimating that maybe he's lived a life of treatments or is incredibly stressed by everything...I dunno, something.  Loomis arrives, again by random act of god, to be of assistance in their escape.  

The characters drive off, Loomis stays behind for some reason...and then we hear Loomis scream and are left with the implication that, in the end, Michael gets Loomis.  Which is kind of a bummer, and not really the ending the good Doctor deserved.

Final Thoughts:  While I still feel like Halloween Resurrection is actually the series low point, this really does run it a close second.  It's a remarkably sloppy movie with one of the worst narrative flows I've come across.  Characters just appear places, motivations are flimsy at best, nothing is fundamentally established or explained with anything except a few cursory lines of expository and nonsensical jargon.  That said, a few brief flourishes from Pleasence (as wasted as he is here) and Rudd's mixed bag of performance choices (ranging from interesting to watch in a hilarious sort of way to painfully stiff and awkward) bring some life to the piece...not enough to really save it from being one of the worst examples of the horrible stuff the mid-nineties managed to produce.

Final Rating: Two Stars.

Movie 65: Halloween V The Revenge of Michael Myers

Starring: Donald Pleasence, Danielle Harris, Ellie Cornell, Wendy Foxworth,  Beau Starr, Tamara Glynn.

Director: Dominique Othenin-Girard.

This is the point where the Halloween series basically becomes a run-of-the-mill slasher flick with little to no plot or sense meaning whatsoever.  Only reason I'm even really bothering to watch it is, well, that's kind of the point of this whole blog and it's almost Halloween.  Like, three more days for me to watch what are mostly groan-inducing sequels, reboots and remakes that will likely kill large portions of my soul.

After being shot by the Police and Mob at the end of Part 4, Michael gets washed down river, and ends up hanging out at the shanty home of some weird Sailor guy with a Parrot and goes to sleep for a year, because writing is hard.  I don't see why he sleeps for a year.  I don't see why the grungy sailor dude keeps him around...does the sailor also feed him?  Bathe him?  Does Michael, y'know, shit?  They establish that the guy eats in the first movie... It's a full year, guys.  Not a day, but a full year.

Did they retcon Jamie murdering her foster mom?  I guess she just "attacked" her, which I guess is something you get over.  Jamie is in some hospital under constant observation, is now mute, and apparently has some sort of psychic connection to Michael all of a sudden.  It isn't the WORST hook, but it's not a great one, too.  But, anyway, Loomis is back to gravelly deliver more lines and not present any civility or explanations for his actions and, as such, once again be the best part of the film.  When Jamie feels some sort of fear that Michael killed her Dog and Rachel, Loomis calls and just shouts orders at Rachel with no explanations offered...to Rachel's credit, she wisely does what he says.  If Loomis called me while I was in the shower and told me to run outside "now, now, now" I'd totally do it.  Who'd argue with that guy?  

I'm getting the impression Loomis might not be the best Psychiatrist in the world.  He doesn't seem entirely up to the task of caring for a young girl, at any rate: I know he needs to bring down Michael and is rightfully paranoid that a return of the killer is imminent, but is yelling desperately in her face really, y'know, theraputic?

Why are the cops goofy Abbott and Costello types?  Why does clown music play?  I know writing is hard and all, and it was 1989, but...huh?

Of course, listening to Loomis ultimately bites her in the ass and Rachel comes down with a case of "sudden sequel death syndrome" and out.  It's an odd choice...I'm assuming Ellie Cornell was just not game for the whole thing?  Anyway, we're left with Tina which is actually probably my favorite thing in the actual movie.  It's not that Wendy Foxworth is an exceptional actress or anything, or that the character is interesting at all, it's that Tina is not a character we usually see taking the role she does.  Tina is very much the ditzy best friend who by all rights should be killed at the end of the first act to get things rolling.  Instead, Tina is the ditzy best friend who 1)actually CARES about and loves Jamie, the little nutcase sister of her best friend and 2) actually has a decent head on her shoulders when push comes to shove. It's a very unusual element, fleshing out a cannon fodder character to an important role.

Loomis continuing to shout at, bully, intimidate and threaten a little girl is only really acceptable as sequel behavior: the guy has been through a lot and knows that shit is going down and doesn't exactly have time for civility or decency.  A little wouldn't be a bad thing, of course, but Loomis is if nothing else a completely static character: there is no growth to Loomis, no real change, just the deterioration of his body and the deepening of his own obsession.  It's a bit of a cliche, but Loomis is very much the Captain Ahab of this series, desperately hunting his white whale. The only thing that distances himself from Ahab himself is that while Ahab hunted the Whale primarily because it was there, and because he sought vengeance, Loomis has his obsession born from a desire to protect the innocent (at first anyway), he's just very extreme and impolite about it.

There's not a lot of cohesion going on-I had forgotten about the guy with the boots(all we see is boots) wandering around throughout the film that never goes anywhere-or any real...it just doesn't work.  It wants to do a lot of things: be cute and funny, be suspenseful, seemingly have some sort of connection to various other supernatural thrillers...but it just feels flimsy and shallow.

Alright, I legit felt my heart warm when the boy with the stutter brought Jamie flowers and gave her his bracelet. It was really actually very sweet.  

Tina's costume is pretty hot.  It's a little strange that she doesn't seem to realize that Michael is not her boyfriend simply because of his sheer size and...well, she's dating the guy.  Does she not know her boyfriend when he's a few feet away?  I assume she figures it's him because he acts like a dick.  

If there is anything this film does well, it's sentiment.  Danielle Harris is a capable actor, and when she manages to squeak out Tina's name, or tearfully beg Tina not to leave, it's effective.  Wendy Foxworth does well with the material as well: she provides her own tears in a way that feels very honest.  Again, I can't say enough about how impressed in general I am with the way the character of Tina is handled and the tropes that it averts. The movie never forgets who she is, though, and so she does become a little uneven...but I honestly don't mind so much about it.  It actually provides a dimension to the character not normally seen: we see her serious, we see her childish and ditzy.  We see her responsible and we see her flighty: there's a version of her she puts out into the world and who she really is.  I might be overstating it, maybe even reading into things a little more than I should (it certainly seems like it was a course correct due to the unavailability of Ellie Cornell), but I feel like Tina is easily the best thing about this film.

I think the worst thing about this film is it's attempt at humor.  I keep trying to put my finger on what it is exactly about this film that makes it feel so...awful.  The humor is probably the worst of it.  I think the thing about it is that Halloween 5 isn't that bad a film, really: it handles sentiment and character well enough, it's as generally technically sound as any other average film...it's just that it's not a GOOD film at all, either. It manages to justify itself well enough-I'm beginning to feel like maybe this movie is given a harder time than it deserves-but it just doesn't manage to make the horror elements quite work.  Michael is pretty standard slasher movie monster, killing randomly and without purpose which-given that the series was always based on him hunting a very specific person and killing whoever got in his way(or potentially could get in his way)-is entirely out of place.  Why would Myers go to a party and kill teenagers when Jamie isn't anywhere near there?  Is Jamie no longer the target?  It's just stereotypical slasher film stuff.  There's no suspense or tension...no plot, just random kills.  

Kids in danger is always easy but usually effective.  There's a single shot of Jamie running across a field through the fog with a car chasing her, the headlights the only illumination in the frame...it's well done.  Once Jamie and Tina are united and both attempt to distract Michael from the other, things come alive a bit more, even if Michael just doesn't seem as credible a threat as he has in other films.  Actually, we got to the end of Tina.  It's not as dramatic as I remember, but it still worked well enough.  Just as Michael gets the drop on Jamie, Tina leaps into action to protect her and is stabbed as she tells Jamie to run.  It's not the most fitting end for Tina, exactly-it would have been nice if she made it to the third act, she had earned it-but it always tickles me when a character who has no real business being heroic acts heroic.

The set-up for the third act isn't great.  Loomis gives a speech designed to make Michael go to the house after Jamie (suddenly that's his goal again) with the entire Haddonfield Police Force hanging around outside.  It seems like it's supposed to be a trap but...what was the end game of that?  It does have Troy Evans, though, a great character actor.  Unfortunately he comes off very To Catch A Predator in his scene with Jamie and he clearly isn't meant to.  He recovers, though, once Loomis shows up.  But really, this set-up isn't great.  The only thing that works is Loomis clearly expecting the Police to do the dumbest thing possible (being manipulated into sending the entire police force away by what is obviously a diversion) and preparing to spring his trap which, apparently, was to have a chat with Michael about rage and love or whatever.  Shockingly, it doesn't work and Loomis takes another slash and is thrown through yet another window.  Then Michael kills Troy Evans, to the surprise of no one.

It feels like the film falls completely apart after Tina is removed from play.  We like Jamie well enough that we aren't completely bored or whatever, but Michael stalking her around the house while she hides in a dumbwaiter or whatever isn't exactly exciting.  I will say the fact that Jamie is kind of taking a beating in this flick is somewhat surprising and maybe a little alarming.  But there's very little sense of proportion or spacial reasoning happening here: just a house that doesn't seem to have any logical sense of space.  It's way bigger than it should be for a suburban house.  

Why does Michael suddenly have a shrine basement?  Why did he keeps the body of the dog hanging around (but kudos for remembering you introduced a dog, guys)...why is Rachel's body still there?  It's hard to imagine Michael carefully setting up this quaint little room with candles and stuff before going out and killing people.  

The film attempts to use sentiment to it's advantage again and very nearly succeeds.  As Jamie attempts to reach whatever humanity is left in Michael isn't entirely ineffective...it might have worked better if it had been instrumental in his defeat, but instead it's just kind of a random thing that happens to break up the narrative.  After this attempt fails, Jamie runs into Loomis who uses her to lure Michael into a trap with a solid steel chain and then beats him into the ground.  I don't know where Loomis had this net stored, or how he got it where it was...but, maybe if Jamie had used sentiment to lure him into that trap instead of being bait we might have gotten somewhere.

Michael Myers sitting quietly in a jail cell makes no sense whatsoever.  Myers has freak super strength.  Why did he just sit mournfully and not keep smashing at the cage to get to Jamie (who is literally standing on the other side of the bars)?  Then the guy with the boots massacres an entire police station and absconds with Michael...Jamie sees the carnage and cries a little and then we're done.  What a lousy last act and a lousier ending.

Final Thoughts:  The worst sins of Halloween 5 are how utterly run-of-the-mill it really is.  There's no plot, no suspense, no tension, just random kills and scenes with very little cohesion.  Plus, that last act is very by-the-numbers and ludicrous with one of the more rotten endings in recent memory.  That being said, the film does a few things well: The subversions apparent in the character of Tina are well played and interesting, even if that's blown to all hell by the sudden need to unceremoniously ditch her at the end of the second act, and the film plays well with sentiment and emotion (even if the characterization, particularly in who they are and what they do, is occasionally in question), with a few capable actors making those emotions work.  It isn't a good film, but I wouldn't necessarily call it the utter pile of garbage that many make it out to be.  I feel like it's heart is mostly in the right place, there just wasn't enough skill to keep it all afloat.

Final Rating: Two and a Half Stars.