Halloween (2018)
David Gordon Green’s “Halloween” follow-up has been sold as, effectively, erasing all the other sequels to John Carpenter’s seminal 1978 slasher film from continuity, which is good for me, because with the exception of the last anniversary entry- 1998’s “H2O: Halloween”- I have not seen any of them. (That includes Rob Zombie’s reboots, as well.) I will eventually catch up with the franchise, I’m sure (with a particular interest in seeing 1982’s “Season of the Witch”), but for now, it’s on to discussing this year’s “legacy sequel,” which brings Jamie Lee Curtis’s Laurie Strode back into the fold, and still haunted by the events of October 31, 1978.
One of the things that has been so exciting about Green’s film, produced by horror’s modern powerhouse shingle, Blumhouse (“Insidious,” “Get Out,” “Sinister”), is that, in addition to having Curtis return to the role that made her a generation’s “Scream Queen,” the film has the blessing of Carpenter himself, who is an executive producer (along with Curtis), and is contributing the score to the film with his son, Cody, and Daniel Davies. Long-dormant reboots of horror films don’t always have that type of connection to their past, and it’s up to the filmmakers to make the audience care enough to join in. Thankfully, Green (whose career includes thoughtful dramas (“Joe”) alongside absurdist comedies (“Pineapple Express”)) is someone up for any challenge, and, along with co-writers Danny McBride and Jeff Fradley, has cooked up a story that plays honestly with the characters, and delivers the sort of slow-burn suspense and horror thrills that made Carpenter’s original film a classic to begin with.
The film begins in a mental hospital in Illinois, where Michael Myers (whose face is never completely seen, and is played by the original Myers, Carpenter collaborator Nick Castle) has been kept under the watchful eye of Dr. Sartain (Haluk Bilginer) since his capture, and the death many years ago of Dr. Loomis from the original film. A couple of investigative journalists arrive to try and speak to Michael, and maybe have him speak to them, for a podcast they are doing, and when one of them brings out the well-worn mask Michael wore that night, let’s just say things get a bit weird with some of the other inmates. Michael is being transferred to a more secure facility that evening, and access will be severely limited to him afterwards. They want to try and get to the bottom of the killings in 1978, and that means also trying to get Laurie Strode to maybe see him, and talk to him. But when they meet with Laurie at her house, wherein she has barricaded herself in for fear of him getting out, she is not willing to cooperate with them, and would just assume make sure he never sees her again. But fate has other plans, and Halloween night looks to be another violent one.
How much “Halloween” 2018 rises and falls lands on the character of Laurie Strode, and Green and the other writers make some important choices here that are responsible for not just the ways the film works, but the ways it falls short. First of all, Jamie Lee Curtis is game for what they have in mind, and she delivers a terrific performance that is everything Green asks her to do. In this film, Laurie has spent her life in fear of what might happen if Michael were to return, but also preparing for such an occurrence. Laurie in this movie suffers from paranoia, seeing the world as a dark place which she must protect both herself, and her family (including her daughter, played by Judy Greer, her son-in-law, and her granddaughter Allyson, played by Andi Matichak), from, and PTSD over what happened to her. All of this is perfectly natural storytelling for the character, but it also puts her in a position where she is at odds with her daughter, is breaking into her daughter’s house to show her how unprepared she is for what could come if Michael escaped, and projecting her paranoia onto her family in unhealthy ways. As I type this out, I’m reminded of, oddly enough, “Friday the 13th Part VI: Jason Lives,” and Tommy Jarvis, another survivor of a horror psycho who had PTSD. That film didn’t have the dramatic aspirations this one does, but seeing how trauma can effect someone who has survived this type of violent experience is well-worn material (yes, the “Nightmare on Elm Street” franchise did this sort of thing, as well). I’m not sure if I’d say that Green and co. do this better than those other franchises did, but I will say there’s a sincerity to their approach that makes it fascinating to watch.
With something like the “Halloween” franchise, or any horror franchise, for that matter, there’s only so far you can go in reinventing the wheel before you lean into the cliches inherent in the genre, and such is the case with David Gordon Green’s film. What we get is an above-average slasher film that tries to be a story of a survivor taking back their strength, and while there are elements of that idea that work here, more often than not we’re left watching Michael menacing in the dark, quiet, prepared to jump out at his prey at any moment, set to another fantastic score by John Carpenter, who adapts the ideas from his original score beautifully for this new setting. That being said, I really enjoyed the way Green staged that idea, and it was damn fun watching Michael Myers do his thing here, and seeing Laurie Strode go toe-to-toe with him in her funhouse of traps at her house. It’s still just a slasher film, though, and should not be viewed as anything that elevates what that means.
