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Rob Zombie's Halloween: Reader ReviewBy Josh Tyler: 2007-07-11 12:21:28
Remaking Halloween has always been a dicey proposition and even though Rob Zombie has tried to couch his re-make as a re-imagining come on, we all know what he’s doing. People are skeptical, and rightly so. He’s tinkering with a classic. On the other hand he’s Zombie, and his last movie The Devil’s Rejects showed a tremendous amount of talent for making kickass horror movies the likes of which we haven’t seen since the 70s. So there’s reason to be hopeful.
Now there’s even more reason. This morning a long time friend of mine and the site sent in his review of Zombie’s film, seen at a super secret advance screening this week. He’s asked to go by the name “Captain Spaulding”, but this is a review you can rely on. Here’s CS with an scooper review of Rob Zombie’s Halloween: Saw Halloween last night thought I’d chime in with my thoughts. First off a bit of background. While I’m a big fan of Rob Zombie to say I was skeptical about the film was an understatement. The first Halloween is sacred text to me, and when script reviews came in along with some rather underwhelming production stuff my skeptism brewed into worry. Right now though I want to run through the streets yelling “Merry Christmas Bedford Falls” because after suffering defeat at the hands of Busta Rhymes and the interweb Michael Myers is back and just as good as he ever was. Make no mistake this is the second greatest Halloween movie ever made. Rob Zombie has restored the grandeur and menace to one of the greatest horror icons in Cinema one who had long since lost it, and I can only say “Thank you”. And I mean that from the bottom of my heart. Why not start at the beginning, the much maligned Michael the early years. While this part of the film has flaws its not the disaster that many thought it would be. Zombie doesn’t explain Myer’s evil so much as show it brewing. We sense that Michael himself doesn’t quiet understand why he does the things he does and this dichotomy between a truly this confused young boy and the evil that he does makes for some truly terrifying scenes. Special mention must be mentioned of Sheri Moon. Sheri Moon played the psychotic baby in Zombies Firefly films, and I must admit while I thought she did a fine job there I assumed that was the only note she had. I was shocked to see her playing such an older sadder person. You see the lines on her face, and her sadness as she’s stuck in a life she can tell she never wanted for herself, working a shit job she’s becoming to old for and married to an asshole, with one daughter heading down the path she herself tripped down, a son who has needs she can’t fufill, and a new baby to see. Moon shows us the characters true desperation and despair and it is incredibly heart breaking. The sequences in the Mental hospital are the most Zombie like of the picture with his regulars like Danny Trejo and Bill Mosely, showing up and crazy ultraviolence being the order of the day. But then the tone shifts again and when Myers comes home he treats the whole thing not like a giddy slashfest, but almost like a Greek tradegy as a man commits horrible acts driven not by human weakness but by his nature. And here is where we come to the key to the whole thing and why I just might think Halloween is one of the best horror movies in the past five years. He treats this shit like its actually happening. About 2/3rds of the way through the film I was shocked to find myself thinking, “Holy shit I actually care about these people.” And the sad thing is I can’t remember the last time that actually happened in a horror film. How many people in all the Saws and Hostels or whatever did you care about above the knee jerk empathic reaction of “Gee that would suck if that happened to me?” None it’s that simple. Which leads to the second big surprise on the level of Sheri Moon’s acting ability. Rob Zombie can write normal people. While the Firefly clan and their satellites where fun and well written in his first two films, the normals could politely be called “weakly written” and impolitely called “bad”. The kids dialogue was great not just pat cute banter, the teenage girls fairly realistic, and most surprisingly of all the Strode’s homelife was warm and convincing when (SPOILERS) Michael visits them I felt a my stomach drop and not cause it was “cool” or “really ****ed up dude” but because in the short scenes they had Zombie got me to like these people and care about them, I didn’t want to see anything bad happen to them. Amazing (End SPOILERS) In speaking of which Scout Taylor Compton, who fills in for Jaime Lee gives off such intelligence, strength, and warmth that I find it hard to believe that she is not just as destined for stardom as her predecessor. Maybe the roles charmed who knows? Oh and in case I haven’t mentioned it this shit is scary to. The scene in the pool? Brrr… Anyway this is a fantastic film that while not as good as the first, stands well on its own two feet. I’ll see it again this August, and proudly display it next to the original when it comes out on DVD. So Mr. Zombie as one fan to another I want to thank you again, from the bottom of my heart.
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