Film Review: Halloween II

Posted by: – Aug 28, 2009

Halloween II finds Rob Zombie returning to the series of remakes he began two years ago. Though Rob Zombie’s first film was a straight remake, this sequel demonstrates his desire to separate himself from the iconic originals from thirty years ago. Rather than remake the original sequel, which took place in a hospital on the same night as the events of the first film, Zombie instead moves the story forward a year to demonstrate the lasting effects the events of his first film had on the characters. He clearly has an intense love of this series, and that is why it is unfortunate that he once again fails to achieve the level of terror, and overall quality, of the original films.

After an extended opening scene pays homage to the original Halloween II, this film flashes forward one year. Laurie Strode finds herself living with her friend, Annie, who also survived an attack from Michael Myers in the first film. They live with Annie’s father, the sheriff of the town who clearly has his hands full trying to help the girls move on with their lives after such a traumatic event. Meanwhile, Dr. Loomis, the psychologist who spent years trying to help Michael, has decided to cash in on horror by writing self-congratulatory books about his work. He has little regard for how his actions will be perceived by the families of Michael’s victims, or how some revelations he includes in his books may affect Laurie. The one thing everyone can agree on is that it is a very good thing Michael Myers is dead.

This, of course, is not the case. If we’ve learned anything from the previous films, it’s that gunshots do not kill Michael. When he recovers from the wounds he sustained at the end of the first film, he begins his hunt of Laurie anew, this time apparently guided by the spirit of his dead mother. Poor Michael. He just wants his family back, and he is more than willing to savagely kill anyone who gets in his way.

This new motivation for Michael’s rampage may be one of the worst additions Rob Zombie has made to the series. We already have the Friday the 13th franchise if we want to see an unstoppable brute spurred on by the ghost of his mother. Frankly, besides their choice of masks and murder weapons, the back story was one of the few aspects that separated the Michael Myers and Jason characters. Thanks to Rob Zombie, they are now one step closer to being identical, and that demonstrates to me a terrible lack of effort. Zombie obviously wanted to flesh out Michael’s character, but he just could not come up with something new.

One aspect in which corners were not cut, though, was the gore. Michael dispatches victim after victim in the most graphic and grotesque ways. It is admirable how far special effects in gore have come, but I do find it unfortunate that horror movies are now measured by the amount of blood spilled. Michael walks right up to every one of his victims and immediately kills them, be it by stabbing, beating, or what have you. I found myself longing for the Michael of the original series who would bide his time before a kill. The terror did not come from the gore in those films. Instead, it came from the knowledge that Michael was somewhere nearby… watching.

Because of the quick kills, this film actually falls into a formula fairly soon after Michael catches up with Laurie. He finds her, and she runs away. She finds someone who attempts to help her and Michael swoops in and promptly kills whoever it is. Laurie then runs off again to find the next good samaritan who will inevitably die at Michael’s hands. Needless to say, it does not take long for this to become fairly boring. If the murders themselves were not so gruesome, there would not be anything to hold the viewer’s attention.

With Halloween II, Rob Zombie takes his series on such a stark detour from the originals that his entries can no longer be called remakes. Despite this, the film still does not feel fresh. The film is one violent murder after another with nary a moment to build the tension between them. To top it off, it’s all explained through character traits lifted directly from another horror series. Both remakes and sequels are rarely able to live up to the original films they follow. As such, it is not especially shocking that this sequel to a remake had so few places to go.

by Gareth Mussen