John Carpenter’s Halloween (1978) is one of the most successful Horror films of all time, and a timeless movie which spearheaded the slasher sub-genre which would become wildly popular in the following decades. Films such as Friday the 13th (1980) A Nightmare On Elm Street (1984) and Scream (1996) all owe a little of their impact and subsequent successful sequels to the groundwork laid down by Carpenter’s visionary flick.
In the early 2000s remaking classic horrors was big business with the likes of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (2003) and Dawn of the Dead (2004) providing successful modern updates, and after seven Halloween sequels of varying quality it seemed the perfect time to capitalise by revisiting the original vintage slasher. Dimension Films were looking to revitalise the Halloween series and it’s legendary horror icon Michael Myers, and shock-rocker turned Horror movie director Rob Zombie (House Of 1000 Corpses) was chosen to take the franchise in a new direction … something he most certainly and controversially did!
Rob Zombie’s Halloween (2007)
“The darkest souls are not those who choose to exist within the hell of the abyss, but those which choose to break free from the abyss and move silently among us.” – Dr. Samuel Loomis
The movie opens with the introduction of the Myers family, a now typically Zombie white trash collection of characters where the opening dialogue between them is overtly crass and doesn’t make for particularly pleasant viewing. We next see 10-year-old Michael Myers (Daeg Faerch) being horribly bullied in school due to his mother Deborah (Sheri Moon Zombie) being a stripper. She is the only positive light in his otherwise god awful childhood, as he lives in a thoroughly toxic environment with an abusive step-father.
Dr Samuel Loomis (Malcolm McDowell – A Clockwork Orange) is first introduced as a child psychologist for Michael after his school find a dead cat and photos of mutilated animals in his school bag. Michael then flips and murders his school bully, before moving on to murdering his sister Judith (Hanna Hall), her boyfriend and his step-father in a scene full of blood and gore, before a subdued Michael and his bodies are then discovered by his mother.
This first act provides a far more in-depth evaluation of Michael’s psychological childhood trauma than John Carpenter’s original movie did, which only provided us with the subtle POV murder of Michael’s sister by her silent assassin. But it was the simplicity of Carpenter’s opening scene which perfectly set the tone for the movie and the mystical quality of Michael Myers as an adult killer. Zombie in contrast shows us much more of the character, grounding him with a human element which takes away some of the mystery.
Zombie then chooses to focus a chunk of the movie on Michael’s incarceration in the Smith’s Grove asylum and the efforts of Dr Loomis to try and rehabilitate the child murderer. Again it doesn’t necessarily work seeing so much of Michael’s background, with the the less is more approach of Carpenter’s original adding to the supernatural aura of ‘The Shape’ as he was simply referred to in the original script.
Michael slowly slips into becoming a withdrawn mute who is obsessed with making and wearing masks. He murders a nurse and his soul becomes lost to Dr Loomis and his mother, before the film jumps forward fifteen years and Michael has grown into an absolute giant of a man (Tyler Mane – X-Men). Zombie’s tone hits the gutter in the Director’s Uncut version of the story where we see an extended scene of Michael’s escape, which begins with the rape of a female inmate by two sickly twisted asylum guards in Michaels cell.
Zombie shows a human nature to the monster Michael has become as he saves the female from the horror being inflicted and spares her life. However this flash of sensitivity is totally removed as during his escape he next brutally murders the entire host of asylum guards, including Ismael (Danny Trejo – Machete) who had befriended him as a child inmate and was probably the closest person he could call a friend.
Dr Loomis is played brilliantly by Malcolm McDowell who somewhat sets the catalyst for Michael’s escape by resigning as his psychologist, and he is shown in a colder light with plans to cash in on his relationship with a book he has written about his time spent with the psychopath. Loomis is immediately called with the news of Michael’s break-out and told of the massacre within the institute, and is reluctantly drawn back into Michael’s tale.
Michael makes his way back to his now derelict family home in Haddonfield Illinois, viciously dispensing with a trucker on his way in a memorable fight scene in a truck-stop lavatory where he helps himself to the man’s overalls. He then retrieves his iconic mask from under the floorboards in the Myers house, a Halloween mask which had belonged to Judith’s boyfriend at the beginning of the movie, and a mask which Michael had initially put on before murdering his sister.
We meet a crass new version of Laurie Strode (Scout Taylor-Compton) a character portrayed about as far away from Jamie Lee Curtis’s book worm in the original as you can get. The trashy dialogue in the opening scene between Laurie and her mother along with the previous dialogue from Michael’s step father might have been better used in another Zombie exploitative flick perhaps, as it doesn’t quite feel right for Halloween.
From here we see a Rob Zombified version of Carpenter’s classic movie as many scenes from the original are faithfully recreated or paid homage to, but Zombie significantly increases the kill count while adopting a delirious shaky-cam technique during Michael’s attack sequences. The reveal of Laurie being Michael’s sister is also introduced and her back story as the baby Angel Myers is explained, while we also learn that Michael’s mother had committed suicide after he had killed again in the sanitarium.
Michael kidnaps and takes Laurie back to the Myers house for the finalè in which he gives her a photo of the two of them as children, before removing his mask and sinking to his knees. However Laurie stabs him with his own knife igniting a game of cat and mouse with Dr Loomis also arriving for the final elongated showdown. Zombie teases us with a false ending before the film eventually plays out with both Michael and Laurie taking a tumble through a first floor window, before she shoots him from close range and delivers a blood curdling scream.
In a nice touch for the franchise as a whole, Zombie casts Danielle Harris (Jamie Lloyd in Halloween Parts 4 & 5) as Laurie’s friend Annie Brackett, while the voice of Chucky and overall Horror legend Brad Douriff (Child’s Play / The Exorcist III: Legion) plays her father Sheriff Brackett. This remake may have divided fans, but some of the unnecessary dialogue aside it is a film which does get better with repeat viewing and when experienced within the franchise as a whole. While Zombie’s version of Michael Myers does also look fantastic, and is utterly brutal throughout!
Halloween II (2009)
Halloween II opens with a flashback to Deborah Myers visiting her young son in the asylum where they discuss the symbolism of a white horse signifying hope for Michael’s future. We then pick up from the end of the previous movie as a blood soaked and shell shocked Laurie is picked up by Sheriff Brackett, while an ambulance takes Michael’s body to the mortuary.
The paramedics engage in a horrific conversation regarding the joys of necrophilia, typically trashy Rob Zombie dialogue, before they hit a stray cow in the middle of the road and crash. Michael awakes and exits the ambulance, picking up a shard of broken glass he decapitates the one surviving injured paramedic in a truly brutal scene of visceral body-horror, before walking down the road towards a vision of his angelic looking mother with the white horse.
Laurie is brought into hospital with the setting following the same path of the original John Carpenter written 1981 sequel, with Michael arriving soon after in his blood soaked and almost scarred looking mask. He stabs a nurse to death forcing Laurie to run for her life into the rain soaked car park, as the killer once again stalks her in a beautifully shot scene with the rain flickering in the dark.
Laurie hides in the car park office before Michael arrives armed with an axe. He bashes his way in and is about to the land a fatal blow … when she wakes up in her bed and we discover the whole sequence has been a nightmare. It is actually now a year on from the events of Zombie’s first Halloween, and Laurie who lost her parents to Michael and now suffers with PTSD lives with Annie and her father.
Dr Loomis is now a successful writer and is portrayed as merely using his knowledge of Michael to chase fame. His intentions and ethics are constantly brought into question and his characterisation is a million miles away from Donald Pleasance’s original Loomis. Michael meanwhile has been living a nomadic existence for the last year, a hooded wanderer randomly walking the countryside who is haunted by visions of his mother, who tells him “Halloween is coming … you have to get ready!”
Michael is beaten up by two rednecks for trespassing on their land, but as he lays wounded he places on his mask which transcends him into ‘Kill Mode!’ and he soon has his revenge. At one stage Zombie channels his inner David Lynch and let’s loose with an artistic abstract flair as he provides a surreal fantasy sequence with the child version of Michael and his mother, which then turns out to be another dream of Laurie’s.
Halloween night approaches and Michael returns to Haddenfield where he first goes to the strip club his mother worked at. Here he savagely kills the security guard before beating the owner and his girlfriend to death, with great use of practical effects and body-horror in what are just about the goriest scenes of the entire Halloween franchise.
Zombie also provides an emotional sequence as Laurie learns the truth of her parentage through Dr Loomis’s book, while discovering she is the sister of Michael. The impact of the realisation by Laurie was never shown in prior movies with Jamie Lee Curtis in the role, and this is a nice touch. Laurie also becomes haunted by images of her birth mother and the younger Michael, appearing to have some kind of psychic connection with her unknown past.
As the film moves into the final act of Halloween night, Zombie creates a cool and colourful Rock & Roll vibe with a Halloween party set piece which oozes sex appeal, before Michael crashes the celebrations in his typically violent way. He then heads to the Brackett household accompanied by visions of his mother and his younger self, and we realise his sadistic mind has somehow made his mother the catalyst for his killings.
He mutilates Annie before Laurie returns home from the Halloween party and walks into the carnage. She tries to flee but Michael tracks her down and kidnaps his sister, taking her to a deserted shack in the woods. The local police are alerted to the situation and led by Annie’s vengeful father they surround the hideout. Dr Loomis heads to the location looking for redemption after being alerted by a TV news report, but is brutally killed by Michael.
However his presence and the subsequent attack allows Sheriff Brackett visibility of the killer through a window, and he shoots Michael impaling him on wall mounted antlers. Laurie then finishes the job picking up his knife and unleashing all of her pent up rage and fury, before she stumbles out of the shack wearing his mask.
For diehard fans of the Halloween series Rob Zombie’s sequel is often much derided and thought of as one of the worst in the franchise. However it does have a lot going for it and should really be considered more fondly as it provides its own unique style. And where his original remake stayed close to the narrative of John Carpenter’s classic story, Halloween II was written by Zombie completely shackle free … and it is probably the controversial film-makers finest work. KZ
Words by Mark Bates
Want to read more Halloween content!? Check out our exploration of the first 20 years of the franchise here :
The Legacy of … John Carpenter’s Halloween (The First 20 Years : 1978 – 1998)
kult-zilla.com 
Leave a comment