Rob Zombie has never been one to be shy about laying all his cards on the table. When he took on the original Halloween, he made no bones about the fact that he was doing it his own way. Still, he did manage to at least keep some measure of reverence for the original John Carpenter classic. In Halloween II, he does not even seem to bother at all with such thoughts, and instead reverts to his gore hound frame of mind.
Most Halloween fans are almost as big a fan of the second movie as the first, as it is loaded with fantastic chase scenes and tension. It is not considered to be as good as the first movie, but it is not far behind. With Zombie’s version, he quickly dispatches with storyline from the original part two by cramming it into the first thirty minutes of his flick. This leaves the final hour or so for Zombie to do as he wishes with Myers, Laurie Strode and the gang.
What follows after that initial massacre at the hospital is at best suspenseful, and at worst a simple slash and gash. The movie is blood, piled on top of blood, with some guts thrown in for good measure. Fans of Zombie’s movies will get a huge taste of what he is known for, but not much else here. Gone are the subtle throwback moments seen in the first film, and instead we are treated to a film full of mindless killing. Some like that sort of thing, but I like a little story mixed in with my horror.
The first Halloween movies were classics because of the story, the soundtrack, and the absolutely terrifying chase scenes. This movie comes up short on all of these counts. No real story is told here. The soundtrack was strange and missing the classic Halloween music, and the chase scenes seemed predictable and thrown together.
Zombie does make a half hearted attempt at advanced storytelling by bringing back his wife, the mother of Michael in the first movie. The angle is so contrived, however, that it never grows legs and makes any sense at all. One would wonder if it was less about creating back story, and more about getting his wife back in the film. Whatever the case, it does not work at all.
In the end, we are left with yet another horror movie that was better off as a bad idea, and we still find ourselves longing to watch the original. The only real plus in this movie is the absolutely horrific appearance of Myers. Tyler Mane is perfect in the role, and if the story had been a little more in depth, the movie could have been a huge hit. The Myers character is the only character I prefer Zombies over the original. Will Zombie come out with three, four, five and six? Who knows? More importantly, who cares?
