Halloween Kills
Evil dies tonight.
Year of Release: 2021
Genre: Horror
Rated: R
Running Time: 109 minutes (1:49)
Director: David Gordon Green
Cast:
Jamie Lee Curtis ... Laurie Strode
Judy Greer ... Karen
Andi Matichak ... Allyson
James Jude Courtney ... The Shape
Nick Castle ... The Shape
Will Patton ... Officer Hawkins
Dylan Arnold ... Cameron Elam
Robert Longstreet ... Lonnie Elam
Anthony Michael Hall ... Tommy Doyle
Kyle Richards ... Lindsey
Nancy Stephens ... Marion
Charles Cyphers ... Leigh Brackett
Omar J. Dorsey ... Sheriff Barker
Scott MacArthur ... Big John
Michael McDonald ... Little John
Airon Armstrong ... The Shape (1978)
Thomas Mann ... Young Hawkins
Jim Cummings ... Pete McCabe
Summary:
The Halloween night when Michael Myers returned isn't over yet. Michael manages to free himself from Laurie Strode's trap to resume his ritual bloodbath. As Laurie fights for her life from injuries from her last encounter with Michael, she inspires her daughter Karen, granddaughter Allyson, and all of Haddonfield to rise up against their unstoppable monster. The vigilante mob then sets out to hunt Michael down, once and for all. Evil dies tonight.
Review:
Halloween Kills, remindin' us that the court of public opinion doesn't waste a lotta time deliberatin'.
And speakin' of recent indictments, it seems we've reached the end of an era, as the City Council "will no longer sanction Halloween activities in the area adjoining the Grime Time Drive-In Theater," with Judge Wrathis further ordering "that goddamned tick sanctuary be leveled in the name of public safety." I couldn't very well argue with the man under the circumstances, nor have I been inclined to do so in the years since he started usin' that ball peen hammer as a gavel. Personally, I think he shoulda recused 'imself from the case considerin' his granddaughter was discovered committing a carnal act within the confines of the Sage Maze last year and welcomed a new life into the world this past August, but I guess that's none of my business.
My business at the drive-in extends no further than operatin' the projector, cloggin' my arteries with the finest cuts of Jersey cattle deemed unfit for human consumption, and occasionally recording tawdry acts performed in the beds of pickups for an upcoming home video series. Or at least it would if not for that whole "other duties as assigned" crapola employers like to stick in their job descriptions so they can force ya to climb a power pole and disconnect the sizzling bobcat that completed the circuit between two wires while fleeing from a crosseyed bulldog.
I'm sorry if I'm bitchin' too much but my job's given me an unhealthy disdain for Halloween, and this year played out like the series finale of a sitcom that had 22 minutes to wrap up every loose story thread that's been left danglin' over the past nine years. Hell, I threw darts at a list this year to pick the flicks 'cause I knew damn well they'd only get interrupted by a rabid bigfoot attack or an outhouse-borne zombie plague spawned from the consumption and subsequent expulsion of mutant catfish fillets, although, regarding the specifics of this year's insanity, the clues were there all along for anybody unencumbered by the pressures of cinematic criticism and digestive dysfunction. In retrospect, I regret that neither of those two scenarios occurred, as they would have been far less irritating than what actually went down.
"Boo!" Skunky Hernandez cackled, rearin' his ugly head from beneath the concession stand counter.
"Skunky, I realize that the combination of long Covid and prolonged exposure to John Agar movies has restricted your recall to approximately two hours, and for that reason alone I'm not gonna hang you upside down from the monkey bars and tell all the kids you've got candy in your gutbucket... yet," I snarled, snatchin' my greaseburger and headin' for the projection booth.
"What heez problem?" Skunky grumbled.
"Dunno. Check back ih free hourf or fo," Billy Hilliard shrugged.
Maybe I'm just turnin' into an old crank, but it seems like every year there's more'n more people showin' up just to see how spectacularly everything goes off the rails like it's all part of the show or somethin', and the more time goes by the more often our mishaps seem to get dismissed as nothin' more than rural legends made up to scare city folks. Needless to say, we were once again ripe for the pickin'.
'Course, the thing about drive-ins is that when expectations aren't met on the screen (and given that my dart hit The Screaming Skull for the second feature, they weren't) people are pretty resourceful about findin' entertainment elsewhere. So if a guy wanted to, say, launch a sneak attack thirty minutes into a turkey of a second feature after faces start disappearin' into phones, popcorn bags, or parts of the human anatomy not publically endorsed by the United Drive-In Theater Owners Association, he could be pretty certain of success.
You've gotta admire the ingenuity if nothin' else, 'cause right around the time Peggy Webber went flitterin' around the plantation in 'er nightgown was when the rats started showin' up in the playground area; friendly, well-mannered rats that the kids could scoop up and carry back to people's cars to show off, at which time an abrupt change in demeanor would occur.
"Get it off!" Bev Spatz shrieked, flailing wildly to free her arm from the vermin.
"They're in my shorts!" Vick Haughton squealed, rollin' outta his backseat in an effort to squish the trespassers.
"Hey! There's a critter in my chili!" Val Winthrop complained, attempting to stab it to death with a plastic fork.
Everyone not currently doing the Thriller inside their rigs started pilin' outta their cars to see about rebootin' Rat Patrol, only that was exactly what the maniac had anticipated, and next thing the poor saps knew the rest of the bubonic battalion began emerging from the sagebrush and holding steady just outside the gravel lot as if waiting for a signal. They weren't left waiting long.
"Happy Halloween, chattel!" came a familiar voice from behind a rock jack.
"Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu...!" I groaned, pausing the flick and descending the projection booth stairway.
"You abandoned me to the elements, here, on this very ground, this very night, five years ago. Oh, I was there to 'serve and protect' you and yours, but how quickly your gratitude wanes when the situation is reversed, schlock suckers!" he spat.
"The hell'd you call me, scrote?!" Mark Skidman demanded.
"Schlock suckers, all! You fools worship this false idol, 'cinema,' but I have seen the truth - I have seen HIM," Mackle raved.
"Heem who? Eef Heem sneaked een like you hees ass ees grass," Skunky threatened, having finally waddled over from the concession stand.
"Careful, foul one," Mackle warned, stepping out of the shadows to reveal the outline of a huge white rat atop his shoulder and the ugliest family of coyotes you've ever seen in your life.
"I give you all one chance; join us in enlightenment with Him, or perish, as you left me to do," he asserted.
"Billy, you ready?" I whispered into my walkie.
"Yup," he affirmed.
"Tetnis?"
"Let's do this," he replied.
"Duke? You got our friends with you?"
"We in, Papa Jupe," Duke chuckled.
"Get ready, and watch your asses. He's got that psycho packrat that ate Clovis Skidman's finger," I instructed.
"Who will be the first to SEE?" Mackle shouted.
"Angus, you stupid asshole," I barked in exasperation.
"You! You have thwarted His grand design long enough! Now be--" he was sayin'.
"Can the community theatrics. We looked for you for two weeks, buttwad. You wigged out without your meds, started worshippin' He Who Walks Behind the Rows, and took up animal husbandry - the end," I summarized.
"So you have chosen death," he frowned.
"Beats the shit outta finishin' this movie," I shrugged, signaling for the troops to move.
Before Mackle could react Tetnis lit his high beams, hung a gas can out the window of his Dodge Dude, and tore through the lot, dumpin' fuel down the path - temporarily blinding Mackle and sending his subjects scattering. The moment he ran dry he whistled for Billy to ignite the trail and haul in the artillery conveniently stashed inside a wheelbarrow on the far side of the drive-in screen - we're talkin' scythes, shovels, hoes, pitchforks, the works. If it's somethin' that's ever confused and terrified a stranded urbanite, we had it, and we were swingin' it.
Now, in my defense, I couldn't have known *exactly* what we were gonna be goin' up against, only that it'd be mean, ugly, and not happy to see us. All the same, I take full responsibility for the rats that ran through the blaze and started a small nylon fire on Marla Ostman. That was my bad.
Unfortunately, there were just so damned many of 'em that once a few roasted to death in a particular spot the rest could just climb over 'em and get at us and things started gettin' ugly pretty quick and I ain't just talkin' about what everyone saw when Edgar Mastrude emerged nekkid from his Firebird to find out what was goin' on.
The rats had Rusty Dockweiler down and were given his earlobes the Mike Tyson treatment. Others were rootin' around in Beatrice Lankford's permanent fightin' each other for the homesteadin' rights. Juanita was forced to retreat into the meat freezer after she accidentally broke the handle off 'er spatula while deflectin' the invaders into the deep fryer, and if that wasn't bad enough Mackle had just ordered the coyotes to eat my lunch... thank cripes Apollo showed up when he did. Cut it a little closer'n I'da liked, but I guess all of us're slowin' down these days.
He got between me and the pack just before mama sank 'er teeth into my snausage and I was prepared to say my goodbyes to my best friend right then and there until somethin' funny happened - recognition. I'm startin' to get a little slow in my middle age, but I finally realized why those coyote pups were so all-fire ugly, and it's because, evidently, God did not intend for Boxers and coyotes to produce offspring. Musta been the same bitch Mackle sicced on us at the dump that day - the one Apollo got real familiar with, I mean. Mama coyote and her pups defected and started snackin' rats alongside Apollo as soon as he'd stopped to lick my face and give me that "how many times would you've died without me?" look he gets when he's real proud of 'imself.
The tide was startin' to turn our way but things were still grim - B.J. Wilder had pulled off 'er heels and started gorin' the hangers-on that'd latched onto Otis Turlinger's hinder, Buck McGurk was rollin' around in the fire tryna burn his attackers off like ticks, and Harley Pankins was boostin' Jeannie Bigelow up on top of an outhouse to get 'er outta reach at the expense of his own ankles. That musta been about the time I really started thinkin' back to the aforementioned trip to the dump, why we'd gone, and durn near filled my drawers.
"Nazgul!" I screamed.
"Make sense, man!" Tetnis shouted, pluckin' a rat offa Tucker Washburn and twistin' its head off.
"Sorry. Seagulls!" I corrected, but it was too late.
Billy, Cleave, and I musta shot a coupla hundred of 'em that day at the landfill, but unfortunately, it wasn't nearly enough, and they bore down on us like a McDonald's parkin' lot before we knew what hit us.
Billy clobbered one with a shovel and Marv Chintzley decapitated another with an old rusty scythe but there was nothin' doin'. We weren't gonna make it.
I saw one land on Buzz McCullough's face and go to work on his nose following an errant swipe of his chainsaw. Two rats had crawled into Skunky's armpits and not only survived but began gnawing into his flesh, and on the far side of Edgar Mastrude's Firebird I could see mama coyote swarmed under tryna keep the nasty little bastards off her pups. She went to her grave a hero.
All seemed lost until a lone arrow whizzed overhead and a gull flapped helplessly downward before crashing into the windshield of Dale Whelchel's Dodge Warlock. Then another. And a third. And from Mackle's rear charged Duke Tankersley and the Abominable Sagemen, trapping him between their advance and the fire that'd found new fuel in the form of greasy, heart-stopping food wrappers.
Phyllis Jablonksy, her fellow escapees from the Soggy Valley Women's Correctional Institute, and their semi-feral offspring killed more seagulls than the six-pack yoke and Alkaseltzer tablet combined, as their men blew past a stunned and confused Angus Mackle, slaughtering his remaining forces with barbed wire fence posts and sharpened cattle femurs.
The great, white general, seeing the writing on the outhouse wall, frantically began squawking at the survivors to retreat, but with his attention turned toward the battle he never saw Duke's enormous furry paw reach down for him, and the last thing he ever saw was Duke's pearly whites goin' straight for his flea-bitten jugular.
Directionless, the remaining vermin were easy pickins for the revitalized mob of movie patrons, and the surviving seagulls turned and fled back toward the dump to cower amongst the exploded Bud Light packages and discarded Keurig machines, and just like that it was over.
Skunky freed Juanita from the freezer and suffered a barrage of slaps to la cabeza due to his decision to keep our discovery of the rats and their subsequent disappearance from her. Tetnis called for an ambulance and stitched up as many people as he could with a nail and a roll of fishin' line. Harley Pankins' chivalry helped 'im overcome his debilitating personality to win the heart of Jeannie Bigelow. Apollo mourned the loss of his one-night stand, and one of the scariest bitches you'll ever meet struck up one of 'er own before the cops arrived to bust Mackle.
"Say... you're CUTE," Phyllis hissed as she grabbed Mackle, cupped 'er hand over his mouth, and drug 'im off into the brush.
Serves 'im right, of course, but Angus's cries're gonna haunt me for the rest of my days, for I know of what he screamed.
Between Tetnis and the E.R. 34 of us were treated for wounds stemming from one man's insanity, and some of the most ridiculous circumstances you'll read about this side of the Weekly World News.
Sheriff Hardassian, Diedra Duggan, and Don Dahl arrested Phyllis, her accomplices, and a permanently scarred Angus Mackle, before ordering the Sagebillies extradited back to Seattle where they've been charged with vehicular abandonment to the tune of $146,892 resulting from ten years of unpaid parking tickets.
The feral children are to be temporarily housed at a facility that studies learning disabilities, so I'd imagine it'll be about a week before they take control of the place and we start hearin' stories about pre-teen terrorists holding their caregivers hostage and demandin' a bus to Arkansas with enough Sloppy Crows to keep 'em fed until they can establish a new colony.
Duke adopted all four of Apollo's orphaned Boxer/coyote mix puppies after mullin' it over and decidin' Gank woulda wanted it that way.
Skunky, as mentioned, will be forced to level the Sage Maze as per Judge Wrathis' order, but lucky for him I printed up a buncha old timey William Castle-style "waivers" that release the Grime Time from any liability in the event of harm sustained during the course of our "terrifying" Halloween double feature, and my attorney, Cletus Rubenstein, tells me these ridiculous gimmicks will probably stand up in court. I guess God really does watch over babies and fools, so it would appear that he'll live to grift another day. But hell, I been talkin' long enough, how'd your Halloween go?
The moment Apollo and I made it home I killed the porch light to ward off trick-or-treaters, nuked some Hot Pockets, and prepared for the real horror to begin with the continuation of the Blumhouse Halloween series. Maybe that's a little unfair, I mean, at least up to this point I wouldn't say they're bad or anything - it's just that watchin' too many of these new movies reminds me that I've got about 3000 classics to get through before I die and that I oughta be doin' somethin' that benefits mankind instead of talkin' about sequels to 40-year-old movies. And sure, you could say that nobody's makin' me do this and that I can bail and go review Night of the Demons or Hollow Gate anytime I want but... it's Halloween, and not talkin' Halloween ON Halloween when there're still Halloween flicks'd be like cheatin' on the 1978 classic with some low-rent one-off skank that's gonna give your VCR heads a video nasty.
So that's that. I'm gonna renew my commitment to the franchise despite its embrace of computer effects, shaky cam, and the kid from multiple John Hughes movies showin' up to play Tommy Doyle. Now try not to think about how you'd rather be watchin' the original Halloween trilogy and I'll see if I can't pique to your intellectual curiosity with a little sagely wisdom direct from a sagebrush-addled brain.
First, guns don't kill people - car doors swung open the moment before a gun goes off, striking it in such a way as to change the bullet's trajectory, kill people. Second, while rare, a stiffed pimp isn't always to blame when two dead Johns found are found side by side. And third, never bring a gun to a Mike fight.
The movie picks up exactly where the last one left off, with Allyson's monogamally challenged boyfriend findin' Officer Hawkins grounded but vowing to soar again just as soon as he can flag down a bloodmobile, only he ends up passin' out and flashin' back to an alternate 1978 where nobody knew how to hold the camera steady and Michael Myers is roamin' the neighborhood tryna shake off the six shots Donald Pleasence just pumped into his abominable abdominals. Elsewhere, the hitherto unseen Myers House-curious Lonnie is gettin' roughed up by a trio of preteen toughs until Hawkins and his partner (McCabe) come screamin' up and tell 'em all to get their remedial rear ends indoors before they get their pumpkins smashed. The kids obey, but Lonnie ends up runnin' into Mike on his way home, at which point Mike takes one look at the pitiful little runt and decides the cruelest thing he can do is leave the kid to the mercy of the Haddonfield school system. Then Hawkins and McCabe drive over to the Myers House and go nosin' around until Mike comes home and invokes castle doctrine, only when he starts stranglin' McCabe, Hawkins accidentally blows his partner's carotid into another zip code before Mike finds himself surrounded by Loomis and Haddonfield T.W.A.T.
Next thing, we're back in the present where the carnage really begins ramping up inside a bar as amateur entertainers work tirelessly to discredit the notion that America's Got Talent until Anthony Michael Hall (Tommy Doyle) takes the stage and offers a toast to the panel of Halloween Massacre survivors in attendance (himself, Lindsey Wallace, Nurse Marion, and Lonnie Elam) and announces that autographs start at $50 with selfies being priced on a tiered scale. It's a bit of a letdown, and Jamie Lee Curtis woulda been there but for the fact that she's currently tryna keep 'er guts on the right side of 'er belly button while fleeing the blaze she ignited inside her compound in an effort to roast Mike like an Oscar Myer wiener. Unfortunately, the warnings of Jamie, her daughter (Karen), and granddaughter (Allyson) are no match for the fire engine's siren, and the hosers start puttin' out the fire until one of 'em falls through the floor where Mike picks his brain and accepts the helping hand of a second firefighter who reaches through the hole to recover his companion before proceedin' to turn the rest of the crew's skulls into whiffle balls. Meanwhile, Jamie makes it to the hospital and the hamburger helpers in the ICU go rootin' around in 'er gutbucket and try put all the haggis back where it belongs, only while that's goin' on Mike sneaks into some old couple's house and backyard wrestles 'em into submission with a busted light tube so he can take his time plungin' every knife in the kitchen into the husband's torso until he finds one that can stand up to heavy abuse and still dice tomatoes just like Barry Becher promised.
It's around this time that the doin's start hittin' the news and pretty quick all the local Back the Blue supporters get P.O.'d that the cops have yet to publically execute Mike in a Christian manner, and so everybody starts grabbin' anything they can find that'd get 'em kicked off the 3:15am red-eye flight from O'Hare to JFK and go drivin' around pretendin' they're Charles Bronson. The first group gets ambushed when Lindsey leaves 'er car to tell a coupla kids that hangin' out on the playground at night is the exclusive domain of junkies and middle-aged failures tryna figure out where things went wrong, and while she's outta earshot Mike starts doin' the spinarooni on the roof of the car and slicin' its occupants into Uber Meats till the last ma'am standing points a gun at 'im and he hasta kick the door into it at just the right moment to send the bullet on a guided tour of 'er hippocampus. Lindsey escapes the holiday festivities by hidin' in a bush and once Anthony, Allyson, and Cameron get 'er to the hospital Anthony whips everybody up into a frenzy before offering them an outlet for their rage that refreshingly doesn't involve people who stomp glasses at wedding ceremonies. Then Mike decides to cruise the old neighborhood and finds his pad occupied by two gay guys who've sucked all the death outta the place with thoughtful interior design decisions that accentuate the house's inner warmth and that makes 'im so mad that he hasta stick his thumbs so deep into their eye sockets that he ends up with precious memories stuck under his nails. While this is goin' on, the other lunatic who survived the bus crash in the first flick wanders into the hospital and everybody gets so occupied tryna crack the nut that they can't hear Jamie tellin' 'em they're bakin' the wrong fruit cake till she gets so P.O.'d that she accidentally tears all 'er stitches buryin' 'er knee into the groin of some incensed legal clerk.
Up to this point Karen's pretty well spent the entire night makin' sure Jamie doesn't permanently maim the hospital staff, but because she's also the only person in a three-mile radius not currently behaving like an extra from 28 Days Later she figures the whackadoo's only shot at livin' to drool another day is to find 'im before the mob. She succeeds in locatin' 'im and manages to teach 'im how to lock the door between himself and the moral majority, but despite her pleas for some kind of sanity there're just too many murder boners and the guy ends up findin' a window and tryna fly over the cuckoo's nest with unsatisfactory results. Elsewhere, Lonnie, Allyson, and Cameron drive to the now fabulous Myers House where Lonnie tells the kids to wait for 'im while he goes inside and see if he can borrow a cup of brains and he makes it 12, 13 seconds before a gunshot gets the kids inside the house where Cameron finds his Pop's corpse drippin' plasma all over the former occupants' Persian rug. Then Mike pitches Allyson down the stairs, shoves Cameron's head through the ornamental staircase balusters, and pikes his neck like a prop in a chamber of horrors so he can go finish off the muscle. Unfortunately, he leaves his hinder exposed to the doorway, and when he tries slicin' Allyson into teenage tenderloin Karen shows up, pitchforks 'im through the back, and starts playin' keep-away with his mask until he follows 'er out into the street where an army of decidedly uncivil civilians is laying in wait for 'im to show 'im the Shape of things to come. This's about as far as I wanna go with this one even though I'll hafta spoil it next year when we talk Halloween Ends, but even if you don't care for the modern sequels you really oughta check out the end just to see how many chunkheads actually believe they can kill the boogeyman with bats, pipes, handguns, and most frightening of all - a steam iron.
Alrighty, well, if ever there was a time to trot out the old "too much plot getting in the way of the story" chestnut, this is it, and I am. There're several reasons why movies aren't structured in a similar manner to episodic television, but pretty high on that list is - sometimes a movie comes out *three years* after the predecessor to which it is intimately tied. Don't get me wrong, the people working continuity deserve a medal for keeping so many details for so many characters and plot points straight, but if you try watching this thing three years after the 2018 flick it's gonna be like going to your high school reunion and trying to remember every single person who wanted to kick your ass, what exactly transpired to lead them to that point, and what lies you're gonna hafta tell to keep from wakin' up nekkid in a ditch on the outskirts of town the next mornin'. Characters that had previously been integral to the plot become almost grauitous, others of no significance are elevated at break-neck speed to increase the impact of their impending demise, and old favorites return to bloat the cast to levels rarely seen outside a Biblical epic due to what I can only assume is an underlying fear that the TikTok generation will lose interest if there isn't a subplot development every 18 seconds. It's a perfect example of a movie that's genuinely too short to achieve everything the filmmakers wanted to get across that, as a result of its pacing, becomes borderline tedious trying to keep all the characters and their various hopes, dreams, and turn-ons straight in what is an overbooked bridge in a trilogy.
That said, the filmmakers' hearts are, despite pumping three times their recommended volume due to some artificial stimulant, undoubtedly in the right place. The "flashback" to 1978 that explains what happened following the events of the original film that resulted in Michael Myers' extended stay in the sanatorium where we rediscover him in the 2018 follow-up is fantastic. The recasting of Dr. Loomis for his brief cameo features an actor with an incredible likeness. The returns of Nick Castle, Kyle Richards, Nancy Stephens, and Charles Cyphers reprising their roles from 40+ years ago is not a decision one makes to increase the box office receipts, but one that's made entirely to do right by the fans. And, of course, having the temerity to ask John Carpenter to involve himself in a franchise he has long since lost interest in for the sake of the fanbase is probably the gutsiest move of all - but to have to do so knowing that no amount of money can buy him off and that your ability to convince him depends entirely on your treatment of his concept hasta be very intimidating. You can say what you want about new horror in general and Blumhouse in particular (and by the time this is over I'll have done plenty of that), but you really can't question their integrity when it comes to making movies because whether or not they succeed, they very plainly have the fans' interests at heart and do their best to straddle that line between what's going to be the most entertaining experience for those of us who grew up with the original '78 version and the younger generation who're only just discovering the films, and while I sometimes question their approach, I do not for a moment question their motivations.
Okay, how was that? Half of ya think I'm a cynical old crank who refuses to get with the times and the other figures I'm a Blumhouse shill, right? Perfect. That means I've staked out the ideological center that'll satisfy absolutely nobody. Now let's take that thought a step further and examine why half the audience decided this was the worst entry in the series (until Halloween Ends, that is) and why the other half reveled in how pissed off the first half got.
The plot serves as the epicenter of controversy for this sucker even though mosta the reviews I've read are usually complainin' about somethin' completely different from what I've been gripin' about. My objections tend to stem from questionable film practices like overloading the cast and refusing to let up on the gas every now and then so that the audience can take a minute to absorb what's happened. Other folks take exception to aspects of the story - most frequently, the ease with which mob mentality can take over a group of otherwise reasonable people, which I find pretty amusing given how many recent examples to the contrary we have from around the world. Regardless, when you're looking at the story from a technical perspective there's absolutely nothing wrong with the decisions these writers made in constructing the plot, 'cause that kinda stuff happens all the time. That said, there's nothin' sayin' the audience hasta *like* the direction the film took, and I think everybody can agree that the cult-like chanting of "evil dies tonight" gets really old really quick whether your objection involves general annoyance or the fact that it's a little too on the nose where it concerns certain political movements. For my part, I found these events totally believable as far as things that really could happen were a homicidal maniac on the loose in certain areas... whether that makes for an engaging story, on the other hand, is an entirely different matter, and any way ya slice it it's small potatoes when the rest of the flick is the cinematic equivalent of watchin' a buncha college kids tryin' to break the world phone booth stuffing record.
The acting is solid, with Anthony Michael Hall picking up the slack left hanging by the screenwriters' decision to stick Jamie Lee Curtis and Andi Matichak in the hospital for 90% of the movie's running time. There are those who might argue that leaving Jamie Lee Curtis in the hospital does not substantially weaken the film and that there is precedent from 1981 backing this up, but I would counter by pointing out that Jamie Lee Curtis wasn't the primary draw in Halloween II whereas she very much is in this more recent trilogy. I would further argue that the size of the film's cast and the resulting need to jump around from group to group further reduces the amount of screentime the movie is able to spend not just with Curtis, but with all the surviving principals from the last film - particularly Will Patton as Officer Hawkins, and Omar Dorsey as Sheriff Barker who drops almost completely off the map. The upside to ballooning the cast into a position where it could conceivably fill a Carnival Cruise ship is the return of characters from the '78 movie, including Kyle Richards, Nancy Stephens, and Charles Cyphers, whose mere presence strengthens the flick's bond with the original in a way that probably hasn't been matched since Halloween II. Nick Castle's in there somewhere too as the Shape, and although there's no way of knowing what scene that might be without looking it up, the attention to detail and reverence for the series' history will not be lost on most fans and may even mitigate some of the irritation caused by the film's nonstop venue changing.
Here's who matters and why (besides Jamie Lee Curtis and Anthony Michael Hall): Judy Greer (Ant Man, Ant Man and the Wasp, Jurassic World, Halloween 2018, War for the Planet of the Apes, Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, Carrie 2013, Cursed, What Planet Are You From?), Andi Matichak (Halloween 2018, Halloween Ends, Assimilate), James Jude Courtney (Halloween 2018, Halloween Ends, Devil in the Flesh, Philadelphia Experiment II), Nick Castle (Halloween 2018, Halloween Ends, Halloween 1978, Dark Star, Escape from New York), Will Patton (The Mothman Prophecies, Halloween 2018, Halloween Ends, The Forever Purge, The Devil Below, The Fourth Kind, The Puppet Masters), Thomas Mann (Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters, Kong: Skull Island, Amityville: The Awakening), Jim Cummings (13 Camers, 15 Cameras, The Wolf of Snow Hollow), Dylan Arnold (Halloween 2018), Robert Longstreet (The Fall of the House of Usher 2023, Doctor Sleep, Ravage, Aquaman, The Haunting of Hill House, White Creek), Charles Cyphers (Halloween 1978, Halloween II 1981, The Fog 1980, Methodic, Hunter's BLood, Grizzly II, Escape from New York, Someone's Watching Me!), Scott MacArthur (The Diabolical, Ghost Team One), Michael McDonald (Ghostbusters 2016, Carnosaur 2 & 3, A Bucket of Blood 1995, Sawbones, Leprechaun 2, The Unborn II), Ross Bacon (Halloween 2018), Kyle Richards (Halloween 1978, The Watcher in the Woods, Halloween Ends, The Car, Eaten Alive 1976), Nancy Stephens (Halloween 1978, Halloween II 1981, Halloween H20, Escape from New York).
More: Diva Tyler (Halloween 2018, Halloween Ends, Mona Lisa and the Blood Moon), Michael Smallwood (Halloween 2018), Carmela McNeal (Halloween 2018), Omar J. Dorsey (Halloween 2018, Halloween Ends), J. Gaven Wilde (The Stalker Parts 1 & 2, The Black Phone, Bad Candy), Colin Mahan (Halloween 2018), Troy Rudeseal (The Black Phone, The Bay), Brian F. Durkin (Siren), Beth Felice (Heir of the Witch, The Angry Black Girl and Her Monster), Jennifer Trudrung (Survive, The Nest 2021, We Are the Missing), Drew Scheid (Halloween 2018, Fear Street: Part Two), Holli Saperstein (Halloween Ends, The Devil's Hand 2014), Jonathan Bruce (Halloween 2018), Nicholas Pryor (The Omen II, The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part I, Doctor Sleep, Brain Dead 1990), Michael Mercaldi (Hollow Oak, Captain America: Civil War), Salem Hadeed (Not Alone), Shayla Bagir (The Boogeyman 2023, #Slaughterhouse, Dropa, The Emeryville Experiment), Ryan Lewis (Rings, The Signal), Charlie Benton (Halloween 2018), Christian Michael Pates (Abandoned), Willie Raysor (Hollow Oak, Harker: The Awakening, Shutter, Witching Hour II), Jibrail Nantambu (Halloween Ends, Mona Lisa and the Blood Moon), Omar Azimi (Halloween 2018, Nest of Vampires), Dillon Belisle (The Devil's STomping Grounds, Butchered), Robert Bess (Dr. Gift, Murdercise, Wolf Hollow, Scream 6, Bloody Hooker Massacre, Appetite for Sin, Mothman, Clown Motel 2, Bloody Summer Camp, Toilet Zombie Baby Strikes Back, Dystopia).
And the rest: Haluk Bilginer (Halloween 2018), Ron Blake (The Black Phone), Kadrolsha Ona Carole (Attack of the Killer Chickens, Morbius, Godzilla vs. Kong, A Quiet Place Part II, Joker, The Vast of Night, Captain America: Civil War, Midnight Squad, Iron Man 3, The Avengers, Spider-Man 3, King Kong 2005, Independence Day, The Running Man, Labyrinth, Ghostbusters 1984), Zach Catanzareti (The Suicide Squad), Keith D. Dooley (The Suicide Squad), Chris TC Edge (The Black Phone), Willie Tyrone Ferguson (Halloween 2018), Darin Ferraro (Infestation), Robert Fortunado (The Black Phone, Halloween 2018), Stephanie McIntyre (Halloween Ends, The Purge: Election Year), Angelo Otchy (Sharknado 3), Brandon Parker (The Conjuring 1 & 3), David Pascua (The Remaining), Darrell Rackley (Hollow Oak, The Devil's Hand 2014, The Conjuring), Scott Rapp (Samaritan, Tears of the Clown), Veronica Russell (The Black Phone), Bennett Tarr (The Suicide Squad, Freaky), Josh Turner (Doctor Sleep, Spider-Man: Homecoming, Scary Movie 5), Bryan Matthew Ward (Bloody Hooker Massacre, Terrifying T-Rex, Backwoods Bubba, Dead Kansas), Matthew Warzel (Death of the Dead, Vampires Suck), Kahzim Yazici (Halloween Ends), Niko El Santo Zavero (Dr. Gift, Blood 666 Part 2, Night of the Tommyknockers, Amityville Karen, Hell House LLC II, Boys in the Trees, Dead Rising: End Game, The Quick and the Undead, Devour, Evil Eyes, Snakehead Terror, The Nostril Picker, Brain Twisters).
And the mainstreamers: Judy Greer (Cheryl Tunt on Archer), Will Patton (Dan Weaver on Falling Skies, Jackson Haisley on The Agency, Atley Jackson in Gone in 30 Seconds, Kentucky Bluebird on Search for Tomorrow), Thomas Mann (Grey in Me and Earl and the Dying Girl), Charles Cyphers (Al Yaroker on Nick Frano: Licensed Teacher), Scott MacArthur (Jimmy on The Mick), Michael McDonald (Mad TV 1998 - 2008), Kyle Richards (Nurse Dori Kerns on E.R., Lissy Preston on Down to Earth), Lenny Clarke (Mace O'Neal on It's All Relative), Omar J. Dorsey (Hollywood Desonier on Queen Sugar), (Nicholas Pryor (Victor Collins on Port Charles, Paul Bradley on Love is a Many Splendored Thing, Tom Baxter on Another World).
The special effects were accomplished with minimal CG, though one has to wonder whether anybody would really notice anymore given the speculation that the filmmakers had used it to recreate the character of Sam Loomis during the flashback sequence when it is very, very obviously not. The fact that debate actually happened does not bode well for the future of practical effects, but I don't wanna go down that road or I may still be complainin' about it come Christmas. They did use a computer to animate the fire for the scene where Michael exits the burning house, and, for some reason, a severed arm following the escaped mental patient's window plunge, but from what I could see the rest appeared tangible and included a nice arterial spray accompanying the gunshot wound to McCabe's neck, excellent gushing blood following a knife in the eye, extremely nasty eyeball gouging, and a good prosthetic mask worn by Scott MacArthur following said eyeball mashin' that looked strangely like the William Shatner mask from The Devil's Rain that was later used as a model for the William Shatner Captain Kirk mask used for the original Halloween. I'd imagine they used some CG during the climax where the blood is splattering in all directions almost nonstop as well, but if so, the scene is dark enough that it wasn't all that noticeable. In short - about as good as you can expect from a modern movie studio with the ability to take the easy way out whenever the notion takes hold.
The shooting locations are fine, and the move from South Carolina to North Carolina is largely concealed by the fact that the entire movie takes place at night. There's really nothing to complain about in the way of production design, but at the same time, nobody's ever been able to recapture the feel of Halloween in quite the way Carpenter did in 1978 (although Halloween 4 comes close). There's also a lot of green foliage on all the trees indicating that it was shot during summer, although they remedy this in precisely the same way that Carpenter did when he shot his film off-season (by plucking leaves off of trees and blowing them around in the background) and it mostly works. The Myers House in the flashback sequence is spot-on, and the renovated modern-day version shares a similar enough floorplan that it totally passes muster as a place that once bore that infamous moniker before receiving the kind of facelift a new homeowner could be reasonably expected to implement as either a matter of personal preference or to shake off some of its original spooky vibes. Additionally, the Cape Fear Community College in Wilmington was used for the site of all the interior hospital sequences and effectively looks the part following work by the production design crew, the local bar is a charming little watering hole, and the small playground utilized prior to Michael's attack on Lindsey looks good as well, but beyond that there's really nothing more to mention as the movie features surprisingly few locations despite the frequency with which it shifts focus between its characters. In other words - adequate, but nothing especially memorable.
The soundtrack, as expected, features slight retoolings of many classic tracks from the original 1978 film and was composed by John Carpenter, son Cody Carpenter, and David Davies. It's exactly what you'd anticipate and exactly what you want, with the greatest hits coming frequently and with just enough added intensity to give them the modernization necessary to keep Gen Z from gettin' the giggly over the idea that this old synthesized score actually used to scare people. It also has its share of booming bits that've become standard in newer flicks where the logic behind them seems to be "loud = scary," but the thing I found most unusual is some of the scenes where they chose to go dead silent. I won't deny the effectiveness because sometimes the best thing you can do to create atmosphere is roll with dead silence, but historically, these are scenes where Carpenter would have never passed up the opportunity to insert music (the sequence where Michael is stalking Lindsey in the park comes to mind) and strangely, they chose to abstain. I guess it doesn't hurt to change up the playbook now and then, and regardless, it's another successful composition from Carpenter and his offspring who will, hopefully, keep plugging away and ensure the continued presence of a Carpenter in the world of horror.
Overall, I just can't get past the oversized cast and the chaotic pacing required to keep up with it. What's more, you shouldn't have to watch a movie back to back with its predecessor to be able to follow all the various subplots and numerous characters, and you absolutely must do this to fully understand everything that's going on in Halloween Kills and how its events pertain to what's already happened. I won't deny that there's a noticeable drop in quality between it and Halloween 2018, but at the same time, the people blowin' gaskets over it seem to be livin' on another planet, 'cause I certainly don't see anything here that warrants the level of panty twistage I saw during its theatrical run. It's certainly among the lower tiers when compared with the rest of the franchise, but it's better than Part 5, Curse, H20, and Resurrection, and there's enough to like to earn a passing score, if only by a slim margin. Check it out, but only if you've got time to sit through the 2018 flick first.
Rating: 62%