HALLOWEEN
US, 2007, 109 minutes, Colour.
Malcolm Mc Dowell, Brad Dourif, Tyler Mane, Daeg Faerch, Sheri Moon, William Forsyth, Richard Lynch, Udo Kier, Clint Howard, Danny Treyjo.
Directed by Rob Zombie.
Rob Zombie’s excursions from the music world into film directing are marked by a ruthless obsession with blood and gore in the context of extreme horror movie conventions. The House of a Thousand Corpses and The Devil’s Rejects (much of the same in both) were experiences of the ghastly.
It is easy to understand what impelled him to write an update of John Carpenter’s 1978 classic as well as to direct it. After all, there were four sequels to Halloween and an update to 1998, Halloween H2O. While Carpenter’s film was a ‘breakthrough’ in visual terror and horror in the 1970s, it was violent in its way and, of course, paved the way for various imitations as well as the Friday the 13th franchise and Wes Craven’s Nightmare on Elm St series (and all the variations on those films) as well as for Rod Zombie.
His version of Halloween keeps close to the original for a lot of the time as well as developing for almost an hour, the more interesting themes of the childhood of Michael Myers (and his clown mask) and the killing reasons for his internment in the mental institution. William Forsythe as his stepfather is loathsomely murderable. His mother, played by Sherri Moon Zombie, is far more sympathetic. There is gore but more Carpenter-like than Zombie-like.
However, as Myers escapes from the institution, the body count rises as does the blood flow, though no more than in other like films. But the film sorely lacks the presence of Jamie Lee Curtis and her strong screen impact. This time the sister is a screamer but not as sympathetic or interesting. However, we do have Malcolm Mc Dowell in the Donald Pleasence role of Dr Loomis. He orates with great gusto, enunciating and declaiming as if the screenplay were by Shakespeare.
What drags the impact down is that syndrome of terror movies, the interchangeable young adults who are sex-obsessed and readily disposable (and are disposed of). Some more ‘ordinary’ characters or characters behaving ordinarily would be far more effective that this knife-a-victim lot. (But, it was already in 1980 that Friday the 13th introduced this group of characters so they have been with us – before being sliced and gutted – for almost thirty years.
This Halloween was better and more thought through (despite its limitations) than expected.
1.The status of John Carpenter’s Halloween? An icon of the 1970s? The influence on sequels? On other horror films in the succeeding decades? This film as a remake and as a tribute?
2.The film staying close to the original film? Using some of the musical score? The characters, the situations? The changes, the 21st century? The victims and their being callow young people, in themselves, in relationships? Killed off?
3.The setting: the town, the past, the homes, school? The woods? The town after fifteen years? On Halloween? The homes, the abandoned home? The streets? The night? The contrast with the scenes in the institution, highly institutionalised, sinister? The musical score?
4.The title, expectations? The opening, the young Michael Myers, his clown mask, his relationship with the other children, bullied? Wanting to go Trick or Treating? The later Halloween, Michael Myers’ return, tracking down his sister? The atmosphere of Halloween?
5.The film amplifying the earlier years of Michael Myers? The ten-year-old, his appearance? At home? The callow attitudes of Ronnie White, the brutality at home? The language, the insults, slovenly? His being murdered? Michael and his devotion to his mother, her love for him, his sister? The baby? Her arguments with her husband? Her being a pole dancer? The criticism of the other children in the town? The ridicule to Michael, his revenge on them, his tormenting the boy and killing him?
6.Doctor Loomis, his personality, wild in appearance? Sympathy? Treating Michael? The principal of the school, the discussions, the mother coming to the school? Being institutionalised? Doctor Loomis and his concern? His writing the book and publishing it?
7.Michael and his anger, his mental states? His brutality and his murders? His sister and the boyfriend? His stepfather? The rampage? His seeming innocence when talking about it with Doctor Loomis – or his silence?
8.The passing of the years, Ismael Cruz and his kindness towards Michael Myers? The institution? The others ridiculing him? Yet his being killed?
9.Michael Myers as grown up, the mask used to kill his sister? Taking it with him? The manoeuvres in order to escape from the institution?
10.The concern, Doctor Loomis, going to the town? Trying to track Michael down? The other doctors and their opinions?
11.Michael Myers and his getting to the town, the confrontation with the black man and killing him? His arrival? The sheriff, his concern? The daughter, her being adopted? Doctor Loomis having to track her down? The death of her adoptive parents?
12.The young people, sexual preoccupations, chatter? Callow? The daughter and her part of this? A bit different? Their being gradually killed off? The gory scenes?
13.The final confrontation, Doctor Loomis’s death? The daughter defending herself against her brother? His wanting to bond with her? His seeming death?
and14.Why has this Halloween story become so popular in world consciousness? In film-making?
