Although we’ve already had a “final” Halloween film with a “final” confrontation between Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) and Michael Meyers over twenty years ago in Halloween: H20, as well as having the first film been remade by Rob Zombie (complete with a sequel) over ten years ago, there’s still more money to be made in having a masked psycho from hell chasing them Strode gals! And so we have Halloween (2018), which is a direct sequel to the 1978 original. Ignoring all of the sequels and remakes that came in between, the ’18 Halloween manages to offer a bold new idea.
This latest entry proposes the concept that Michael Meyers had been captured just after the end of the first film. And that he’s spent the last forty years in a mental institution. Despite this, Laurie Strode, now a grandmother who’s estranged from her grown daughter, has taken a page from the playbook of Sara Connor (the bad-ass protagonist from the first two Terminator films) and turned her cabin in the woods into an armed camp, complete with various weapons, traps, and really bright searchlights. It doesn’t matter that Michael has been safely locked up all this time, Laurie’s still ready for him.
And it’s just as well, too, because a pair of clueless journalists pay a visit to Michael while he’s in the institution and start screaming at him to say something, all while waving the original mask that he wore back during his killing spree. The horror movie trope of dopey people doing dopey things is alive and well here. And did I mention that Michael’s due for a prisoner transfer soon? Prisoner transfers usually don’t wind up going too well in these Halloween movies, and as expected, Michael breaks free, gets his mask back from the journalists (he didn’t ask politely for it) and away we go once again.
Despite having the usual lame tropes--like a woman interrupting a make out session with her boyfriend because she heard something--the new Halloween still stands head and shoulders above the legion of sequels and remakes that came before. That’s because director David Gordon Green realizes that he’s dealing with a horror icon in Michael Meyers (who, along with Freddy and Jason, has become one of the classic horror movie monsters of the 70s/80s), and treats him accordingly, with loving call-backs to the original Halloween, as well as the sequels, in almost every shot that’s seen and line that’s spoken.
But Green brings his own fresh sense of style to the proceedings, imbuing Michael’s “kills” with more realistic and shocking moments--thanks largely to the brilliant special effects that seamlessly blend in so well you don’t know what’s real and what’s an effect. By forcing us to view Michael in terms of being a more realistic killer, this pushes him back into the villainous dark side, where he rightfully belongs. Part of the problem I’ve had with the slasher genre is that the killer--who should be the villain--oftentimes becomes so popular that it seems like he’s cheered on in his murderous ways, with his “kills” being present either comically or in a way that the victim somehow had it coming. But Green solidly makes Meyers the bad guy by having him casually kill a child among his present day victims.
Besides, the real focus of this film is Laurie Strode, a survivor of Michael’s earlier rampage forty years ago who struggles to lead a normal life because she’s so afraid of losing it in a rematch. Jamie Lee Curtis is superb in this role, easily settling into the part of an older woman who recognizes that she is damaged, but refuses to back down from her fears. Judy Greer and Andi Matichak are also very good as Laurie’s daughter and granddaughter, respectively. This movie was so unexpectedly superior overall--catching me completely (and pleasantly) by surprise--that I really wouldn’t mind seeing the sequel that the ending hints at. --SF
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