Resurrected from the ruins of a horror franchise gone sequel crazy, Halloween is sharp in its aim and cutting in its execution, David Gordon Green creating a new nightmare sure to entertain horror fans old and new.
There is a great Seinfeld episode where the frustrating, yet lovable, George Costanza laments what to do after he quits his job in fiery fashion. How to come back from such a thing?! “Just show up!” says his best friend Jerry. “Pretend it didn’t happen”. So it goes with Halloween circa 2018, a direct sequel to the seminal 1978 horror classic directed by John Carpenter. The ten sequels and reboot in between? Wiped from the franchise slate. An audacious enterprise that craps on every filmmaker, actor and crew member who worked on those films, but we shall move on.
Directed by David Gordon Green (Pineapple Express), Halloween is set 40 years after the original. Monstrous serial killer Michael Myers (Nick Castle and James Jude Courtney, respectively) has been incarcerated in a psychiatric hospital during this time. Meanwhile Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis), lone survivor and main target of Myers, suffers from PTSD and lives in isolated, fortified home. When Myers breaks out and recommences his violent killing spree, Strode is willing and ready to face the monster who has haunted her.
A production of the currently hip Blumhouse Films shingle, Halloween is terrifying, entertaining and topical. While it is a film that is timely, it will also prove to be timeless, a rare occurrence where a sequel (no matter how many films along) strikes the same grimacing fear and engrossing investment as its original. Green wisely brought on original Halloween director (and genre master) John Carpenter on board as a creative consultant, creating a horror movie that is as much about the connection between predator and prey, as it is about the creative ways to transition anticipation into tension and tension into violence.
Key to all of this is the return of Jamie Lee Curtis in the role that made her. While by this point Lee-Curtis has indeed appeared in three other Halloween sequels (including getting killed in 2002s Halloween: Resurrection), this retroactive outing proves to be much more successful and interesting. With her hair frazzled, guns loaded and strapped, and mind ever paranoid, Laurie Strode version 2018 is one step away from cat lady status yet is (ironically) kept in check by her lifelong purpose to destroy the man, the monster, the “Shape” that has cast a shadow on her soul.
Green expertly stages the scenes of Michael’s terror with much more imagination and terror than most modern mainstream horror filmmakers and their jump screen tactics. Michael - just like his horror monster brethren Jason and Freddy – is a figure that has been parodied and projected to such ludicrous levels, that the fear has eroded. Green has successfully thrust that fear back into the Shape and the Halloween franchise. He has also expertly aligned it to a momentous cultural movement regarding women’s equality. In a genre where the role of women is not only important but has also been exploited, it makes sense that Halloween has rebooted the narrative, while re-establishing its identity.
