|
|
Halloween II
II times the cheesiness!
1981
Review: October 30, 2007
Director: Rick Rosenthal
Starring: Jamie Lee Curtis, Donald Pleasence, Charles Cyphers, Jeffrey Kramer, Lance Guest
Sure!
THE SETUP:
Michael Myers isn't ready to call it a night just yet.
DISCUSSION:
So I went to see the Rob Zombie remake of Halloween, then rented the original [which I was SO into], and I knew that Halloween II must be re-witnessed soon. This was actually the very first horror movie I ever saw in the theater—I would have been 13. And I ended up seeing it a few other times after that [somehow never managing to see the original], so much of what happened here was familiar to me. Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers is on its way to me right now, having already seen and loved the completely-unrelated Halloween III: Season of the Witch.
This movie is the rare sequel that picks up RIGHT were the previous film left off. So if you'll recall, we left Michael Myers on the front lawn with six bullets in him, and Jamie Lee Curtis as Laurie Strode all traumatized. Then they look again and Michael has taken off.
He happens over to this other house, where he comes in and steals a big sharp knife that the woman just happens to be using to make a sandwich from the massive, five-pound hunk of ham she has. Then we see Laurie as she's being loaded into the ambulance. She does NOT want to be tranquilized. Then a cop is all snide to Loomis that he has to go through all the bother of looking for the homicidal maniac on the loose. God, work can be SUCH a pain sometimes. By the way, by now we've noticed that the score here is now synthesized.
Now comes one of my favorite parts. This guy JUST HAPPENS to be wearing a Halloween costume that is an EXACT double of Michael Myer's getup. What are we supposed to think here? It's too early for Michael's image to have appeared on the news, so it couldn't be any sort of macabre copycat thing—I think we're just literally supposed to think that a white full-head mask with a union suit is just SUCH a common Halloween costume. Anyway, so Loomis is running and screaming after this dude with a gun, but he's just wandering off aimlessly like "What? Is that dude talking to me? What?" when suddenly he's hit by a car and dragged over, crushed into a van, and then the whole mess explodes. This is to divert the story a while so Loomis can run around trying to prove that Michael is dead.
So Laurie is taken to the hospital, where she meets a friend, Jimmy, played by Lance Guest, Michael Brody from Jaws 4. There are some good moments that take advantage of this movie happening just minutes after the last one, like Laurie just finding out that the killer is Michael Myers, and the rest of everyone just finding out that there was a big massacre that night. Anyway, soon there's an angry mob throwing rocks at the old Myers place [that'll sure help, guys! Thanks!] and we find out that the guy who was burned was 17, so he couldn't be Michael. He's also a little old to be trick-or-treating, if you ask me, but you know today's men, unable to leave childhood behind.
Now, in here various people have been getting killed, but they've just been so rote I haven't bothered telling you about it. There are some horny residents that go down to the therapy tub, where they make out, then one gets strangled and the other boiled, but not before licking and biting Michael's finger, thinking he's her friend. Then there's a nurse who really, REALLY needs to find Dr. Mixter, who's got something stuck in his eye, and they pull the old fade-up of Michael's face again. Anyway, by this time you will notice that this is THE most dimly-lit hospital EVER [see below]. It's actually quite ridiculous. Are they in the midst of a brownout?
SPOILERS > > >
So earlier we saw that Laurie had gone catatonic, and we never find out if she was and just woke up, or was just playing so that everyone would leave her alone, but anyway, an hour into the film, Michael starts coming after her. By this time it's just Jimmy [unconscious, I won't even go into it] and one other nurse at the hospital, and Michael has slashed the tires of all the cars. He's industrious! He kills the nurse right in front of Laurie, then starts after her. This sequence is actually fairly scary, and is probably the best of the film. Laurie is just in a hospital gown and bare feet, and is slightly injured. Then we cut to Loomis spouting some bullshit about how Samain [Lord of the Dead or whatnot] is actually the unconscious mind, and that we're all afraid of the darkness within ourselves, blah, blah, blah. I must say, I could stand to lose Loomis altogether. Dude is pretty much fucking useless, except as a gasbag. Anyway, here is where we find out that Laurie is Michael's long-lost sister, which I never thought was a very good motivation—not to mention how unbelievable it is. And it causes you to go over the movie again, saying "Well then why did he kill this person? And what about that person?"
Anyway, here also is where our dear Laurie starts to disappoint, because the script necessitates that she be much more passive and helpless than previously, so we can draw the movie out. So she finally gets out of the hospital, but decides that she might just hang out in one of the parked cars, rather than try to FLEE THE FUCKING PREMISES. Then Loomis and pals show up, and Laurie, who was RUNNING before, now can seemingly do nothing but crawl, and carefully times her scream to the moment JUST after the door closes, all of them inside. WHERE is the smart, self-reliant Laurie with the strong survival instinct we came to love? She has been BETRAYED. It also must be noted that Jamie Lee cut her hair short after the first film finished, and had to wear a somewhat obvious wig through this one.
So Laurie finally reunites with Loomis and pals, and Michael comes after them, whereupon Loomis shoots him six MORE times, and then the cop does the whole "I think he's dead" routine we've all come to know and roll our eyes at.
So Laurie and Loomis take off and hide in this room, where Michael comes after them. It must be said that Loomis is not exactly a quick shot when the situation is crying out for it. He gives Laurie a gun but she won't accept it, leading you to be like "BITCH! You gonna fuckin' DIE! Take the FUCKING GUN!" But I don't know, Laurie just doesn't LIKE guns. I mean, psychopathic killers bursting down the door AT THAT VERY MOMENT are one thing, but… So Michael burst through the door and Loomis is farting around like "Okay! All right, I'm going to aim now! Okay, I'm totally going to aim! All right, now I'm going to pull the trigger! Just a few more seconds…" and then he pulls the trigger and—no bullets! You'd think this would cause the average person—let alone a mental health professional with an advanced degree—to step away from the psychopath, but no, Loomis just stands there dumbfounded, as though thinking "Good God! I am out of bullets! Now I am utterly helpless! I—I should do something! Run away! And yet I am rooted to this spot, shocked into utter helplessness by the shocking surprise that my gun is empty! Oh, how could this be?" And he gets stabbed. Good thing, however, in these movies a simple stabbing is somewhat akin to a splinter in your big toe.
Anyway, so Laurie finally gets over her aversion to guns and fires twice—hitting Michael directly in both eyes! WHAT a shot she is! Is that why she doesn't like guns? Like, before she was adopted by the Strodes, she was forced to join a circus family and becomes an expert marksperson? So Michael is now blinded, and he's slashing around the room with a scalpel. Now if I were Laurie or Loomis, this would cause me to take evasive action, but I guess this is why I am never in horror movies. They just stand there staring at Michael is horror, Laurie whimpering as he gets closer. Loomis is not much better. They open up all the tanks of explosive stuff that just happens to be laying around, and Laurie gets out of the room while Loomis blows up himself and Michael. Please note that Loomis is DEAD at the end of this movie [and so is Michael, but whatever], so I'm looking forward to their excuse for bringing him back in Halloween 4. Laurie is loaded into an ambulance that drives off into the foggy morning, which would have been a good final image, but they had to return to Laurie, all shellshocked.
< < < SPOILERS END
It wasn't as bad as it could have been, but it was definitely far from great. In one way this is good, because it leaves the special place of the original untouched, and this one is so shoddy and totally different in tone it seems like what it is—a cash-in—than a necessary continuation of the story. It goes without saying that any of the unsettling resonances about the hidden horrors of suburbia or Laurie's yearning to meet a man have been totally eradicated.
It’s also a little disappointing that Laurie is such a stupid ass this time around. In the first she screamed helplessly for a while, then fashioned a weapon out of wire hangers and fought back. Here she screams and cowers, then cowers and screams. She also doesn’t have the richness of character that she did in the first. And the revelation about her family history, I think, just weakens the whole thing. I keep waiting for a tenth sequel in which Michael escapes again because he found out there’s a litter of third-generation puppies descended from a dog that once belonged to Laurie.
So the first one was a little piece of horror genius with many unsettling resonances, and this one is a cash-in sequel. Maybe better than most cash-in sequels, but still a cash-in sequel.
SHOULD YOU WATCH IT?
If you want. I would leave things alone after the first.
