Halloween Remake

for those who HAVENT seen the trailer..here it is:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6GTZiDqw8E

i feel like Jamie Lee Curtis, John Carpeneter and Debra Hill made the original Halloween and no one ELSE should try to REMAKE IT.

but from the look of this trailer....it wasnt AS BAD as i thought (and hoped) it would be. still, Rob Zombie is known for upping the GORE factor and one of the hallmarks of the ORIGINAL halloween was that it was essentially a "bloodless" film...it was more implied than anything else.

I grew up in the generation when Horror films had been forever redefined by the original Halloween. I'll see this one because i can't deny the curiosity...but i dont have high hopes.
 
I have to agree with you both. When I heard Rob Zombie was remaking the original Halloween I too was skeptical. But, when I saw the trailer I thought there was a chance it might be good. It seems far darker than the original, but that's Rob Zombie for you.

I'm debating if I wanna go see this film in theaters or wait for it on DVD. Like Farrah, I am curious about it.

But the problem with remakes is usually the viewer compares the original to the remake. Which, in most remakes its rare to find one that's done well. But, who knows, maybe Zombie can pull it off.
 
Okay, so I went to see it this afternoon. It's no secret I think Rob Zombie has made total shite movies before, not worth watching on television let alone paying $11 to see it in the theater.

HOWEVER, Halloween was worth the money.

Spoilers as to how it's different from the first film follow (but nothing too spoilery I don't think - I tried to mark the big ones).
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He definitely upped the body count. Which was good and bad. It made Michael sort of more terrifying, more of a psychopath than he "just" killed his sister. But there's also something thematically that he goes after his sisters, teens.

There's also something about the idea in the original that Michael comes from this normal, upper middle class, family and yet he is the devil incarnate. In this version, Michael is older, which I think was a mistake in some ways, and he's the son of a stripper who lives with her drunkard abusive boyfriend.

This film is definitely about sympathy for the devil - Michael is less of a child monster than in the original. It takes about an hour to get to the part where adult Michael escapes from the sanitarium. So there's a lot more backstory and "why" of Michael.

It was great to see the convention of the masks - when he is masked, he's the killer, unmasked, a child. That was a good addition I thought. I'm divided on whether I think being sympathetic towards Michael is good or not. I loved in Halloween H20 when Michael reaches out for Laurie at the end, because that was a glimpse into his humanity. But maybe this is too much of that.

GREAT cameo by
Danielle Harris as Annie. I'm wondering if and why she survived though.

The film up to this point was okay, but he really did a great job from the point that Michael finds Laurie. A good job keeping it tense and nail-biting, and it wasn't just the same thing they did in the first one. He really showed Michael as a driving force of killing, super strong and unrelentless. Again more humanity in some ways from Michael in his interaction with Laurie. And I'm not sure if again it was good to make Michael sympathetic in the part where
he takes off his mask when Laurie wakes up in the Myers house
. Also loved the location they used
Myers house instead of Tommy's house
. I really liked that they more answered the question of why he was going after Laurie.

They also kept the characteristic of Laurie as girl next door who is resourceful and doesn't just sit there and scream and wait for him to come kill her. Though she does scream a lot. I'm divided on her screaming
at the end when it's just over and over. It's half that that's probably realistic, but at the same time I want her to be more badass than that lol
.

I can't believe I'm saying it as a person for whom Halloween is in my top three horror films of all time, but he did a good job and it's worth seeing. It's not going to replace the original by any means, but it's a great example of how to show and escalate the fear in a horror film.

The worst thing in the film, though, is the money shot where Michael kills Paul and hangs him on the door, then stands there looking at him and tilts his head. They tried to do this again and they just didn't get it right. Disappointing.
 
Thanks for the review/spoilers Vil. I was actually going to see it this afternoon, but decided not to because I was afraid it was going to be a waste of my money. But i'll definately check it out if I have the chance now.:)
 
I loved in Halloween H20 when Michael reaches out for Laurie at the end, because that was a glimpse into his humanity. But maybe this is too much of that.
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Unfortunately, that was not Michael at all. It was a masked man Michael switched. You find that information out in the following Halloween film, I think Halloween Resurrection. When Laurie is placed into a mental hospital, they reveal that the masked 'Michael' was actually I believe a paramedic, who was trying to reach out to her.

Although, it really didn't make sense to me because of the fact the masked 'Michael' was trying to attack Laurie, which she then drives off the cliff and impales him with the truck.

But, based on your review, Vil, I'm glad to see the new remark was decent. I'm still going to wait for it on DVD. However, it does look very suspenseful and creepy more so than the original.
 
At the time you don't know it's the paramedic. That also has no bearing on whether it's good or bad in THIS film.
 
it sounds like Rob Zombie didnt try to do a shot by shot remake (like Gus Van Saint with Psycho) ...and while its a GOOD THING that he didnt....i DID think Gus Van Saint did a good job painstakingly updating Psycho and not changing anything. still, you run a risky gamble with doing a "remake" and from all i've been reading ....it sounds like this version of Halloween is more "gritty" and delves more into "Michael's side of the story". I still say Rob Zombie has a mental problem :rolleyes: and i HOPE that i dont get sick watching this film like i did "The Devil's rejects"....and it takes a LOT for a horror film to have that kind of an effect on me.

a Cameo??? woo!!! thats what i needed to read. Though i would have preferred Jamie Lee Curtis or someone from the original cast (nancy stevens, p.j. soles, nancy loomis [the original "annie"] etc) it was nice that they gave a nod to Danielle Harris for her role in several Halloween sequels.

I'll be checking this out this weekend.
 
Yes, it's sick, but I don't think it's as sick as TDR. As I was watching the scenes with young Michael, I have to admit I was wondering if Rob Zombie made this autobiographical lol
 
Vilandra said:
At the time you don't know it's the paramedic. That also has no bearing on whether it's good or bad in THIS film.
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I was merely saying that it wasn’t really Michael in H20. The director has the audience believing it was Michael, until you see the next film after. The way you worded it sounded almost like you didn’t see Halloween Resurrection. That’s just my opinion though.

I also wasn’t implying whether that constituted for a good or bad film.
 
Vilandra said:
Doesn't really matter if I've seen Resurrection or not. It has nothing to do with the point I was making.
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I don't want to come across as obnoxious here, Vil. If I am or if I seem like I am then I apologize.

However, its not a fact that the scene in H20 was Michael. You can't make a statement like that and have it sound like a fact. Its one thing if it was Michael.
 
what happened between h20 and resurrection was a RETCON plain and simple. it was done because Jamie Lee Curtis was OBLIGATED to appear in at least a small portion of the next halloween film as part of her contract...so since she wouldnt do it unless she could bring CLOSURE to her character, we saw what we saw in the first 15 minutes of resurrection.

what Rob Zombie is doing now SHOULDNT be considered part of the original halloween mythos...hell half the halloween films shouldnt be considered lol

the best timeline imo is Halloween 1, 2 and H20...period. the rest just dont matter.
 
Foxfire said:
However, its not a fact that the scene in H20 was Michael. You can't make a statement like that and have it sound like a fact. Its one thing if it was Michael.
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In the context of H20 it IS Michael. It is for the purposes of the sequel ONLY that we learn it is NOT Michael. My point is in asking whether making Michael seem more human is good or bad - not in nit picking about movie trivia.
 
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