Mike managed to score the workprint of Rob Zombie’s Halloween last night so we sat down to watch it. I was hunting around on the weekend for my original Halloween movie but cannot seem to find it. Does anyone out there have my copy? It’s the one on VHS.
I didn’t know really what to expect as I had heard some mixed reviews about the film and Halloween is by far my favourite horror series (next to Evil Dead of course!). Mike Myers instills fear into me like no other. He’s just some guy walking towards you with a knife. Yikes!
The film has a LOT of back story to Michael Myers…pretty well the entire first half of the film is dedicated to showing what environment Michael grew up in and how it made him into a monster. While I enjoyed Mr. Zombie’s portrayal of a twisted environment creating this crazy guy, I must admit that I preferred the mystique of just some random killer coming out of nowhere and attacking the town on Halloween night. I read a great review of the film at Ain’t It Cool News and they hit the nail on the head when they were talking about how everything needs an explanation nowadays, including Star Wars and the prequels. It used to be enough to know that Darth Vader was a bad ass and no one really know how he became one. But then the prequels come along and you see him as a kid and see what he had to go through which transformed him. Meh. What am I saying? I like the prequels so I can’t put them down, but let’s get back to Halloween. I didn’t care for the extended intro to the back story of Michael. While I think it was well done and I understand what Mr. Zombie was trying to do with his remake of Halloween, I think it would have been best if you left him as a killer with no story.
Onto the rest of the film…it pretty well is the original Halloween film and I must admit that I was on the edge of my seat for the entire time that Michael Myers is on his killing spree. It was a great feeling to once again have the fear in me while watching a Halloween film (which pretty well left me years ago…ugh…Halloween: Resurrection anyone? Michael Myers also had a new degree of viciousness to him which was brought to us by our main man Tyler Zane (who played Sabretooth in the X-Men films). It’s like he moved a little quicker and little rougher than our lumbering friend from previous films. And I liked it.
Turns out that the work print version has a totally different ending than the theatrical cut so I suppose I’ll have to rent the actual version when it comes out next year. I have read about both endings and think the theatrical one would probably be better.
Anyhoo…it was amazing and I’m glad Rob Zombie did a bang up job. It’s definitely the best Halloween movie in awhile.