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.
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