Rob Zombie's HALLOWEEN II (2009)
I just watched this for the first time the other night.
My God. Terrible. Just absolutely fucking terrible.
I was not a fan of Zombie's first Halloween remake, but it at least had some redeeming qualities and was not completely awful.
But this...my God, I honestly don't even know where to begin. When the movie was over I felt like I had just climbed out of a pool of putrid, rotting shit.
There is absolutely no plot at all. Here's the movie: Michael Myers (fueled by hallucinations of his mother) roams around Haddonfield looking for Laurie Strode and kills anyone he happens to come into contact with. Laurie, meanwhile, is having trouble dealing with the events of the first movie and is living with Sheriff Bracket (Brad Dourif) and his daughter (Danielle Harris), both fellow survivors of the first movie.
There is literally nothing else to the story.
The main problem with Zombie's first Halloween was that he got Michael Myers all wrong. Meaning that he failed to grasp what the fans always loved about the character (the fact that we never truly knew what his "motives" were being chief among them).
But in Halloween II, Zombie not only still gets Myers all wrong, but he totally destroys the characters of Laurie Strode and Dr. Loomis as well.
Laurie (Scout Taylor-Compton) has apparently become "rebellious" since the events of the first movie...which means that she wears ripped-up heavy-metal t-shirts and says "fuck" all the time. Oh and she acts confrontational and angry towards everybody like a drama queen from a bad after-school special. Words cannot express how much Compton got on my nerves in this movie. I hated her. I hated her performance. I hope I never fucking see Scout Taylor-Compton in any movie ever again.
As for Dr. Loomis (Malcolm McDowell), for reasons that are not even explained, he has become a complete asshole. Now, make sure you understand me: I do not mean that Loomis is 'grumpy' or cranky'; I mean that he is a complete fucking asshole to everybody. He even threatens to hit a woman for no reason in one scene!
Additionally, Loomis serves NO purpose in this movie at all. His character does not affect the storyline in any way, and in fact he does not even get involved in what's going on until the very end of the movie (and even then his involvement is pretty inconsequential).
Here are a few things I'd like to say to Rob Zombie:
1). Michael Myers is not driven by delusions of his dead mother. That is Jason Voorhees. That is Friday the 13th. That is a completely different movie series. This is a Halloween movie, Rob.
2). Michael Myers does not wander around Haddonfield without a mask on or anything.
3). Michael Myers does not make loud grunting noises when he stabs people.
4). Your wife, Sheri Moon Zombie? The one you put in every single one of your movies? She SUCKS. She's a horrible actress, she is grating on the nerves, and she doesn't even qualify as eye candy anymore.
I never want to see her in a movie again. In fact, divorce her. Let her go back to stripping, where she belongs.
5). There is more to writing clever dialogue than just having everyone say "fuck" all the time. It's okay to have your characters say "fuck" a lot, but in order for the dialogue to be clever, there must be clever things being said by the characters in addition to the word "fuck".
6). Rob. You suck at making 'surreal' dream sequences. I can tell you were going for a David Lynch vibe in the dream sequences...but what you achieved was more along the lines of a crappy music video vibe.
I also want to say that Halloween II does not have ANY of the stylish directorial touches that Zombie displayed in his other movies, and were in fact one of the only saving graces of his first Halloween. Everything here is point-and-shoot, not to mention the whole thing is darkly-lit and cheap-looking.
I want to mention one scene in particular that was gratingly awful and basically summed up the whole movie for me:
Laurie (Compton) is driving around town screaming "FUCK! FUCKIN' SHIT! FUCK! HEY! HEY, FUCK YOU ASSHOLE! FUCK! FUUUUCK! FUCK!".
At this moment in the film, I don't think I had ever hated a movie as much as I hated Rob Zombie's Halloween II.
This is what Rob Zombie thinks makes a good scene in a good movie. Rob Zombie directed this scene, watched it in post-production, and thought that this was a well-made scene.
So was there anything good about the movie? Well...uhh...Brad Dourif, Danielle Harris, and Margot Kidder were okay in their parts...and that's it! I literally cannot think of anything else positive to say about this flick.
And, finally, a word about the ending. Remember the horribly laughable scene in Zombie's first Halloween where Nazareth's "Love Hurts" plays...and it's supposed to be serious? Well, in the sequel Zombie ups the ante by ending the movie with a cover of "Love Hurts". By the Cardigans. Yeah. The Cardigans. That is all.
Rob Zombie can be an okay director...but by this point, I think it's safe to say that he should not write screenplays anymore.
I hated his Halloween II. I hope he never touches this series again. You know it's bad when, as I was watching this, I couldn't help but think how much better Halloween: H20 was. Hell, Halloween: Resurrection was a more enjoyable movie than this. Seriously. No joke.
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