Movie Review: Halloween 2 (1981)

Friends, it has once again become time to talk about a spooky movie. I know, I’m as shocked as you, but it’s the truth. So let’s ge- oh, and spoilers for the end of the first movie, as that leads into what happens here. So if you’ve somehow not seen the 1978 original and rather not be spoiled, you know what needs to be done.

Ladies, gents, and non-binaries… “Halloween 2”.

While Laurie (Jamie Lee Curtis) gets brought to a hospital so she can be treated for the injuries that were given to her by Michael Myers, a frantic Dr. Loomis (Donald Pleasence) must go on a chase across Haddonfield in order to find Myers, who seemingly survived the Doctor’s ballistic intervention at the end of the previous movie. I found the story here to be pretty enjoyable, a decently tense horror romp that builds on the ideas set up in Carpenter’s original, though also not without its own set of flaws. While the main thrust of the narrative, the hunt for Michael Myers and Myers’ hunt for Laurie, is a fun, intense ride, some of the specifics surrounding certain plot beats and reveals that just feels like it undermines some of the creepiness and suspense that made the first film’s plot so good. The way they craft some of the set pieces I really like, and they roll into each other quite nicely, but some specific details in story evolution and in some of the kills just keeps it from being as solid of a narrative as it could be. Fun and tense, but also a bit contrived.

The characters in this are fine, you get the gist of them all fairly quickly, but most of them feel a bit underdeveloped. Though you also have the returning Dr. Loomis, a man hellbent on stopping Michael, but who also seems to harbor some regret behind his eyes, about how he couldn’t help Myers. And Donald Pleasence is stellar in the role. Laurie doesn’t do much here, but when she does get shit to do, Jamie Lee Curtis is really good in the role. Charles Cyphers, Jeffrey Kramer, Lance Guest, and a bunch of the other supporting actors are good too. Then you have Dick Warlock as Mikey My-My. He does bring a pretty good physicality to it, though I do miss the eerily cold and efficient movement of the first movie’s Shape. All in all, solid cast.

The score for the movie was composed by John Carpenter and Alan Howarth, and it’s fantastic. Takes the motifs and musical ideas from the first film and builds on them marvelously. From the remixed main theme to some of the new, creepy tracks, it’s an absolute feast for my ears and I loved every second of it.

“Halloween 2” was written by John Carpenter and Debra Hill, with directing duties now being handled by Rick Rosenthal, who I think did a really good job. His direction brings a similar creepiness as Carpenter did, crafting some really awesome and intense wide shots that uses shadow and negative space in really unsettling ways. Doesn’t hurt that Dean Cundey’s cinematography looks spectacular as well, marrying with Rosenthal’s direction beautifully to create a really visually rich movie that also manages to maintain the grimy, low-fi aesthetic of the first one.

This movie’s gotten some mixed reception. On Rotten Tomatoes it has a 33% positive rating. On Metacritic it has a score of 40/100. And on imdb.com it has a score of 6.5/10.

While the writing is a little bit of a letdown at times, I very much enjoyed “Halloween 2”. It has a fun plot, okay characters, great performances, fantastic music, and great directing/cinematography. Time for my final score. *Creepy breath*. My final score for “Halloween 2” is an 8.44/10. So while flawed, I’d say it’s worth buying.

My review of “Halloween 2” is now completed.

Hospitals really make for a good horror setting.

Movie Review: Halloween (1978)

Ladies and gentlemen, we’re here. The final review in my Month of Spooks series. I’ve had fun with it, but as you know, all good things must come to an end (for this year at least, wink wink). So let’s go out with a bang by talking about the movie with the perfect title for this occasion.

Ladies and gentlemen… this is “Halloween”!

Fifteen years after he killed his sister and got sent to a mental hospital, Michael Myers manages to escape, returning to the town of Haddonfield to kill once again. So now we have our slasher plot. And I think it’s actually pretty great. While this is kind of the grandfather of slashers, setting up several of the cliches of the genre, but it also does it with a lot of subtlety, relying more on slow tension-building rather than just jumpscaring the audience every five minutes. It is a slasher… but one with nuance and subtlety as it’s primary ingredients, and that’s why the plot holds up so well here.

The characters in this are likable and interesting. First up we have Jamie Lee Curtis as Laurie Strode, a high school student who just wants to have a chill and enjoyable halloween night. But as we all know, that takes a bit of a left turn when a certain someone comes to town. She’s a nice, fairly normal, and relatively crafty young woman who I liked following, hoping she would make it. And Curtis is really good in the role. Next we have Donald Pleasence (R.I.P) as Sam Loomis, the doctor who tried helping Michael for years, but ended up giving up in more recent years when he saw that Myers was beyond helping. He knows that Myers has to be taken down, but there’s also remorse behind his eyes, as if he’s sad that he failed at helping Michael, making him a compelling character. And Pleasence is great in the role. We also get supporting performances from people like Nancy Kyes, P.J. Soles, Charles Cyphers, Nick Castle, and more, all doing well in their respective roles.

The score for the movie was composed by John Carpenter, and it’s really good. Heavily based in synth, it creates an atmosphere that just oozes suspense and uneasiness. There are a couple of the more typical horror stings that aren’t great when repeated a couple times, but for the most part the score here still holds up very well. And man, that theme is still exquisite.

As you all know, this movie was written (with the help of Debra Hill) and directed by John Carpenter, and he did a great job. Remember how I mentioned that the story relies more on subtlety than on just blatant horror bullshit? Well, that translates to Carpenter’s direction as well. It’s slow, subtle, and generally helps create an eerie vibe that absolutely creeped me out. Adding to that is the cinematography by Dean Cundey, which not only looks great, but also helps sell the almost uncanny vibe of Michael Myers’ stalking.

This movie has been very well received. On Rotten Tomatoes it has a 95% positive rating and a “Fresh” certification. On Metacritic it has a score of 81/100. Roger Ebert gave it 4/4 stars. And on imdb.com it has a score of 7,8/10.

So yeah, “Halloween” is still great, 40 years after its release. It has a really good plot, good characters, great performances, really good music, and great directing/cinematography. Time for my final score. *Ahem*. My final score for “Halloween” is a 9,78/10. Which means it gets the “SEAL OF APPROVAL!”.

My review of “Halloween” is now completed.

The night HE came to my blog.

Movie Review: They Live (1988)

 

Anyone else that the tought that we are subconsciously being controlled by everything in our environment? Okay to be fair, I don’t think it’s that bad, but it is an interesting thought.

Ladies and gentlemen… “They Live”.

We follow a drifter named Nada (Roddy Piper, R.I.P) who comes to Los Angeles for food, shelter and work. And while he actually finds that and even a new friend named Frank (Keith David), he also stumbles upon a pair of sunglasses that let’s him see that the earth has been taken over by aliens. He sees that some people actually are aliens in disguise and he sees that signs that to the naked eye look like normal advertisements, actually subconsciously tells us what we should do. I’m not gonna lie, it’s actually really clever. With the setup it could have been incredibly cheesy and even bad, but they pulled it off. It is a clever satire on society combined with an alien invasion movie. I’m not gonna lie, I kinda loved that.

Having a professional wrestler star in your movie is a pretty risky move, but here they actually managed to pull it off. Roddy Piper (Again, R.I.P) is actually really good in the movie. Sure, he’s not Mr. Oscar Worthy, but he’s actually pretty great considering he’s a wrestler. I think a lot of that comes from his overall charm because in this movie he seems like the type of guy you’d want as your friend. Keith David also has a pretty important role in the movie and he’s great. There’s really nothing else to say, he’s Keith David, he’s always great. I also have to mention that those two have pretty good chemistry, not really Mel Gibson/Danny Glover level of chemistry, but still good chemistry.

The score for the movie was done by director John Carpenter and composer Alan Howarth. They have collaborated before on other movies like in “Escape From New York”. And while one might call it cheesy, I still really enjoyed it. It is a strange mish-mash of rock, blues, sci-fi (A.K.A. typical sci-fi music) and synth. Some might call that an awful combination, but I call it awesome.

Like I said, this movie was directed by John Carpenter (Sidenote: For some reason I have watched a fair amount of movies by him recently). And he did a great job, the shots look great and the camera work overall is really solid.  I especially love the shots in black and white which if you didn’t know, are the shots we see when Nada puts on the sunglasses. Those shots I just simply love. And the action in the movie is pretty good too.

This movie has been pretty well-received. On Rotten Tomatoes it has an 83% positive rating and a “Fresh” certification. On Metacritic it has a score of 52/100. And on imdb.com it has a score of 7,3/10.

“They Live” is a surprisingly clever movie with a story featuring great social commentary. The characters/performances are really good too, the music is really good and the directing is great. Time for my final score. *Cough*. My final score for “They Live” is a 9,88/10. It gets the “SEAL OF APPROVAL!”.

“They Live” is now reviewed.

I have come here to chew bubblegum and kick ass… And I’m all out of bubblegum.

 

Movie Review: Escape from New York (1981)

Raise your hand if you like 1980’s/1990’s action. Okay, now let’s all sit down and relax… good. And while you sit down and relax, let me review a 1980’s action movie.

Ladies and gentlemen… “Escape from New York”.

The year is 1997 (Hey, the year I was born!) and the USA has gone to shit. Because of ultra high crime-rates, the entire city of New York has been turned into a maximum security prison. Then one night, the US president (Donald Pleasence) crashes into the giant city and gets captured by crazy people. So then a police chief named Hauk (Lee Van Cleef, R.I.P) decides to send in criminal & manly-man Snake Plissken (Kurt Russell) into the city to go in and save the president. The idea I personally think is great, turning a familiar environment into a hostile and dark place for the sake of entertainment… genius. Problem is that for some reason I never really felt invested in it. Don’t get me wrong, I love the idea and the pacing was very good, but I jsut didn’t feel that invested into it. So let me put it like this, the plot was good, but I didn’t enjoy it as much as I should’ve.

The characters in the movie are colorful, entertaining and Kurt Russell decided to try to do his best Clint Eastwood impression. And you know what? All those factors come together so well that I can’t really criticize it. Sure, it’s cheesy but it is also incredibly fun and entertaining. Kurt Russell in this movie is really good in this movie as the macho manly-man Snake Plissken. Is he cheesy with the Clint Eastwood voice? Yes, but I still enjoyed it a lot. And I can’t help it, whenever I see Lee Van Cleef on screen in a movie I just have to smile… I love that guy. And Ernest Borgnine is a million flavors of fun in this movie as well. Every character in this movie is entertaining and every actor does a great job.

Fun fact: the score for the movie was done by none other than the director, John Carpenter. And it is the typical synth-based sci-fi/thriller soundtrack that you would maybe expect at the time. Not that it’s a bad thing, I did rather enjoy the music in the movie. It fit in very well and was used to really good effect.

Like I said, this movie was directed by John Carpenter who delivered a very well-directed and tense style to the movie. However I feel like the movie could be a little brighter because a large amount of the time it was difficult to see. I’m not saying that it should be really bright and happy and colorful and such, I am just asking for it to be a little brighter so I can see the action going on. That is anotehr thing, the action… it’s fine. Nothing special, it’s fine action.

This movie has been pretty well-received. On Rotten Tomatoes it has an 84% positive rating. On Metacritic it doesn’t exist. Roger Ebert never made a review of it. But it does exist on imdb.com at least and has a score of 7,2/10. Weird, the movie only exists on two of my regular sites…

“Escape from New York” is a decent action movie with a pretty good plot even though I wasn’t very invested in it, it had fun characters, good music and good direction despite being a bit too dark. Time for my final score. *Cough* My final score for “Escape from New York” is an 8,88/10. It is worth buying.

Review of “Escape from New York” is completed.

If you look closely at the plot, you’ll notice that this movie definitely inspired parts of the game “Batman: Arkham City”.

Movie Review: The Thing (1982)

You know what’s weird? Ever since I saw “The Shining” about a week ago, I feel more open to watching horror movies. I guess it is because since I finally saw a good horror movie I have hope in finding more ones. So let’s review a horror movie that has been on my watchlist for quite some time.

Things… “The Thing”.

In this movie we follow a bunch of scientists that work on a research station in the Antarctic. But then on one day, something strange happens. And by strange I mean a murderous alien that can shapeshift into any person/animal invades the place and they will have to stop it. What I like about this plot is that you never know who the “Thing” is. It is a detail that keeps you guessing as to who it is through the entire movie. It will also keep you on the edge of your seat because of how scary that shit is. Come on, not knowing who the monster is… that is terrifying. And I like that!

The characters are pretty entertaining. Sure, they aren’t that fleshed out, but they at least keep you entertained. What is pretty great here though is the acting. I couldn’t find any weak performance. And in my opinion, I don’t think Kurt Russell has ever been this good in anything (in anything that I’ve seen at least). Wilford Brimley (before his diabeetus) is also great in the movie. And I was glad to see Keith David in the movie, I just love that guy. And I swear, this movie contains the single greatest dog performance ever. That’s right, Lassie ain’t got shit on the dog here! As a matter of fact, every actor was great in the movie. And I think some of it came from the fact that the set was chilled down to 40 degrees fahrenheit to actually make it seem like a cold place.

Here is one of the most surprising things about the movie, the score was done by none other than Ennio Morricone. You know, the same guy that has done the music for about EVERY WESTERN EVER! Okay, not EVERY western, but a lot. But while I was surprised to see his name attached to this movie, I thought the score for the movie was pretty great. it helped hold the already excellent suspense, but it also helped raise the tension of any more (in lack of better words) action-y situation. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised since this is the same man that made a five minute staredown epic and suspenseful… hmm.

This movie was directed by John Carpenter who also directed the original “Halloween” which is the only movie of his I had seen before this. I have also not seen “Halloween” in a few years, probably should. Anyway, getting off topic, uhm… oh yeah, “The Thing”. Yeah, John Carpenter directed this movie and he did such a great job with it. The shots look great and the cuts are magnificently edited in. And this movie has some of the best creature effects/prosthetics I have ever laid eyes on. Not that I would want to lay my eyes on them because these effects are some of the most disgusting ever… still great though! Also, did I mention that this movie is terrifying? Because it is.

This movie when first released wasn’t that well-received. But over the years people have opened up more and more to it. On Rotten Tomatoes it has an 80% positive rating with a “Fresh” certification. On Metacritic it doesn’t even exist. Roger Ebert gave the movie 2,5/4 stars. And on imdb.com it got an 8,2/10 and is ranked #164 on the “Top 250” list.

Guys, “The Thing” is a disgusting movie… but it is pretty awesome with a suspenseful and scary story, great performances (yes, even the dog), excellent music, terrific direction and some fantastic visual effects. Time for my final score. Jeff! Envelope now! Thank you! *Jeff flips Markus off*. Yeah, fuck you too! My final score for “The Thing” is a 9,86/10. It definitely gets the “SEAL OF APPROVAL!”.

Review of “The Thing” is completed.

“The Thing”, “The Stuff”, what’ll they think of next?