Halloween Kills

If I gained anything from Halloween Kills, it's the knowledge that Haddonfield, Illinois is a terrible place to live.  Surprisingly, it's not just because it is the regular stomping grounds of inhuman serial killer, Michael Myers (played here by James Jude Courtney, with assistance by the original 1978 actor, Nick Castle).  It's because the town is made up entirely out of angry rampaging mobs, bratty kids, and people too stupid to know it's not okay to poke around dark places when Myers is in town.

I know that David Gordon Green's 2018 film, which dropped the entire mythology that had been building up since after 1978 and gave it a fresh start, was admired by a lot of people, but I was not one of them.  I thought it was a well made, but largely ineffective thriller that missed out on the tension and suspense that John Carpenter's film had in droves, and emphasized bloody carnage and characters I couldn't give a hoot about meeting grisly ends at the end of Myers' blade, hands, foot, whatever.  With a title like Halloween Kills, I kind of got the impression that this sequel was not going to be any different.  What I did not expect was how little an impact returning heroine Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) would have here.  One element I did like about the previous film is that it gave us a Laurie who was realistically haunted and battle-hardened by the events she endured 40 years ago, and created a powerful bond with her newly-introduced adult daughter Karen (Judy Greer) and teenage granddaughter Allyson (Andi Matichak).  I was at least hoping for some more emphasis on this particular angle.  

If anything, this sequel downplays that aspect, making Laurie and her family into almost an afterthought.  Though it's always great to see Curtis on the screen, especially in her defining role, she is given little to do here, and spends much of her time unconscious, or in a hospital bed.  True, the plot kind of forces her to do so, but that's really not what you expect, is it?  As for Karen and Allyson, they are minimized here as well.  Instead, the film's main focus is on an angry mob that has been whipped up by Myers survivor, Tommy Doyle (played here by Anthony Michael Hall).  The mob is made up of locals who are sick of the town's legacy around Halloween, and aren't smart enough to move out of town, or at least go on vacation when the holiday rolls around each year.  As they roam about the city streets and the local hospital looking for Michael, they endlessly chant "evil dies tonight".  Considering there's one more Halloween movie on the way next year that will supposedly end Michael's reign of evil once and for all (Yeah, right.), you already know walking into the movie whether or not the mob will be successful.

Since this is the middle entry of a planned trilogy, it can go one of two ways.  It can either set up some exciting revelations for when next year's Halloween Ends rolls around, or it can spin its wheels and largely serve as a film that does not advance much, and instead feels like diminished returns.   If you're this far in the review, you already know which path Green and his writers took.  There's very little to gain here, other than to be reunited with a lot of returning characters, pick up on some references to earlier movies that have been slipped in, and toss in a few new characters like an elderly couple and a gay couple that exist solely to add to the film's body count.  This is essentially an expertly made gore show.  It's been well shot, is well acted, and the filmmaking and editing is top shelf.  But it's all at the service of a screenplay that is no different from a half other dozen rip offs the first Halloween inspired throughout the 80s.  Strip away the high end production values, and you could easily mistake this thing from any cheap old things you used to find on the video shelf.

Maybe that's the whole appeal with certain viewers, but it felt like this movie was missing the point.  The reason why John Carpenter's film is remembered over 40 years later is because it was atmospheric as hell, tense, and truly frightening.  This film does not want to thrill audiences, it just wants to make them squirm with some truly gruesome kills, and then send them home 103 minutes later with nothing gained.  There is nothing scary, nothing exciting, and nothing new in general here.  Does that make this the worst film to hold the Halloween name?  Far from it.  There have been far worst attempts to continue or reinvent the Myers legacy over the years.  But that doesn't excuse this beautifully dressed up piece of exploitative sleaze.  

The same week this movie premiered, another slasher icon, the notorious Chucky Doll, got his own TV series on the SyFy Channel.  And while it's not perfect, it is a better representation of updating an iconic monster, developing him, and expanding its world and story.  And while only one episode has aired, it already did a much better job than Halloween Kills has done with living up to its famous name and legacy.

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