Halloween II

***1/2**
Three and a Half Stars out of Five

I generally hate any review that has 'X' and half number of stars, but this is one case where I just can't help myself from doing so. "Halloween II," the sequel to Rob Zombie's remake of "Halloween" (that's right, a sequel of a remake) is better than the first film, which I really enjoyed and gave three stars, but it's not "great." As such, it's better than good, but not great. It's a halfsy - this is probably the only review I'll ever write in which a movie is given a half-star in addition to the others that I grant it. Sorry for the preface, but I felt it necessary to state that from the get-go.

As I said, this is a sequel to 2007's "Halloween," which was also written and directed by Rob Zombie. Fans of the series who disliked the first one will absolutely loathe this movie as Zombie continues to move Michael Meyers(the still hulking Tyler Mane) away from evil in the shape of a body of a man to a man who is just evil. Doesn't sound like a big difference does it? But fanboys will be fanboys and will find a way to hate anything that's remotely different from the original version they fell in love with. I've already made clear my stance on remakes - if you're not going to do something quite different from the original, then don't bother remaking it - so I won't elaborate on that any more here. Instead, I'll focus on the movie itself.

It's good. It's actually really good. Disturbing and brutal, but good. Zombie veers off the typical slasher trail here and actually lets us see into the mind of Meyers here, which is something entirely new. Meyers has never been so much a character as a vessel for death and carnage. Zombie instead gives us a monster who has ghostly visions of his mom(Sheri Moon-Zombie) and a white horse. The white horse mythology of the movie itself is interesting; according to some beliefs, white horses in dreams are meant to be messengers of death, and that's obviously what Michael Meyers is. Michael is a twisted individual who wants to make his family whole again (at least the ones he cared about), and his rationale for doing so is by killing his baby sister, who just so happens to be Laurie Strode (Scout Taylor-Compton). We learned of this connection in the first movie, but as the sequel begins, Laurie has yet to discover this.


Moving on to a quick synopsis. The movie begins directly after the conclusion of the first one, and it is revealed that Dr. Loomis, Annie, and Laurie have survived. After a disturbing dream sequence, we pick up a year later and see what the survivors are up to. Zombie did a great job here capturing the different ways to handle such a traumatic experience: Dr. Loomis (still played by the scenery-chewing and awesome Malcolm McDowell) has traded in his reputation as a serious doctor to exploit the events of Haddonfield. He's publishing a new book detailing Meyers' rampage throughout the town, and he's become a bit of a self-inflated scumbag. He makes the rounds on the press circuit and is constantly reminding people Michael Meyers is dead, even though a corpse was never found. Laurie's life is in shambles as she tries to pick up the pieces of her shattered life. Her parents are dead, she can't sleep at night, hangs out with douche bag hipsters, and is heavily medicated. She can't get over the experience of being chased down by a masked psycho and having to kill him. Annie (series staple Danielle Harris, also appeared in "Halloween 4" and "Halloween 5") is the most well-adjusted of the survivors. She's pretty much fully recovered, minus several scars on her face, and she is ready to put last Halloween behind her. Laurie has moved in with Annie and her dad, the sheriff, but they don't seem to hang out all that much. Their relationship seems strained, but they're still tied together given their past.


Surprise! Michael Meyers didn't die. He survived being shot in the face - Laurie has pretty bad aim, apparently - and he's living in the middle of nowhere as he gets ready for his favorite holiday. He doesn't wear the mask all the time, instead wearing it only when it's time to "go to work," and even though he's covered mostly in shadows when we see him, it's clear that he's not been practicing good hygiene for the last 363 days. He's got a beard that would make Grizzly Adams blush. On October 29, Michael sets out to reconnect with his baby sister.


That's about it for the set-up of the movie. It doesn't seem like a sweeping story, but the devil, as they say, is in the details. Zombie never explicitly tells us how we should feel about the survivors, but their actions lead us to think about them a certain way. Without ever "picking sides," Zombie lets us watch them and make up our decision about how we should feel. Is it really wrong for Loomis to exploit this situation, or is he simply dealing with the events the only way he knows how? Is Laurie maybe overreacting a bit, considering Annie has re-adjusted to normal life, and she was cut up by Michael Meyers? It's pretty good stuff, considering this is just a slasher flick.


Once the violence sets in, it's pretty gruesome stuff. People are stomped, stabbed, and strangled to death several times throughout the movie, and a few scenes are kind of hard to watch. The sound effects are top notch, as we hear every squishing noise of the knife penetrating some poor schmuck's back. In addition to these noises, Michael is now more vocal when he's killing his victims. He's not talking to his victims, but he grunts every time he stabs somebody. It's a tiny little thing that adds to the horror expontentially; Meyers is exerting himself here, and one gets the idea that he enjoys himself too much, even for a serial killer. Michael also serves his victims with overkill here - he doesn't quickly abandon them when they die, rather he sticks around and stabs them more times that necessary, and it looks like he just gets lost in the moment. Pretty disturbing stuff.


My only real complaint is the mask. I liked that he doesn't wear it non-stop, but early on, a piece of the mask gets ripped off near his right eye, and that eye is clearly exposed for the rest of the movie. I always liked Meyers' eyes being eternally covered in the shadows, and the visibility just makes him a little less threatening here. It's not a huge complaint, but it's something that did indeed rub me the wrong way.


Horror fans will again either love or hate this movie. Rob Zombie has that polarizing effect on people. Count me among those who liked it. It was a great horror movie that delves into the coping mechanisms of trauma, psychosis, and some twisted sense of familial bonding. Check it out, but be warned that this is definitely more brutal than it's predecessor. It's one of the most violent movies I've seen in a while, and though it's not entirely disturbing, it's gory as hell. You've been warned.