I caught a lot of crap at work for “liking” the Final Destination series. Primarily, this is coming from a guy who proclaims his favorite movie ever is the original Saw, so I consider his opinion moot. Given the unevenness of the series, I would say “tolerate” is a more appropriate verb for my feelings on these films. That seems fair since Final Destination films seem to range from pretty good, like the original, to the offensively stupid, such as a large chunk of part 3 and all of part 4. Since the various writers and directors of the previous four films seem to have moved on, Final Destination 5‘s writer Eric Heisserer and director Steven Quale have almost a blank canvas to create on.

The synopses part of these reviews almost seem rote now but if you’ve seen any of the previous films, you know the gist. In this case, Sam (Nicholas D’Agosto) has a vision of a cataclysmic bridge collapse on the way to his company’s team building retreat. He manages to get everyone off the bus only for them all to get made dead via collapsing bridge decks, swinging suspension cables, or random sailboats. Fearing his premonition, Sam manages to get his girlfriend Molly (Emma Bell), friend Peter (Miles Fisher) and other company folk off the bridge before it collapses. From then, they all die. This is not a spoiler. This is expected for this type of film.

With five films in the can now, the main hook of the Final Destination series is undoubtedly the deaths and the almost far-fetched yet somewhat conceivable ways that people can die. On that front, FD5 is almost tame in respect to some of the other films as many of the deaths are fairly straight-forward bad luck such as the flying wrench to the skull or crushing blow to the head from Buddha. Only one sequence really sticks out as the typical Rube-Goldbergian style that the series is built on. This scene though in a gymnasium is full of misdirection and red herrings (not sure that this applies here but we’ll go with it) that make the final outcome completely out of the blue, especially since this part was featured heavily in the trailers.

In the review for FD3, I remarked: “it is clear for me that what makes a Final Destination good as opposed to just mediocre are the characters.” FD4 (or THE Final Destination if you must) was shit because it completely disregards characters entirely for stupid gross-out gory moments and deaths. FD5 though walks the thin line not seen since the second between characters you actually care about and over-the-top death scenes. Here we have a good few minutes to get introduced to the characters and their histories and dynamics before they are almost playing on death’s swing set. While it might seem minor, the fact that Sam and Molly are on the rocks or that Olivia is self-conscious about her glasses are far more beneficial than just padding the film’s runtime. Unlike the last film, we can connect with these characters to some extent and can appreciate their relationships or worries which make their inevitable deaths just a bit more impactful.

It certainly helps greatly that we have professional actors in the film as opposed to the bottom-of-the-casting-barrel detritus that turned up last time. I don’t know why but I am a fan of D’Agosto, probably stretching back to his performance in Election. #pbf’s unrequited love Emma Bell is no slouch either as the love interest and final girl of the group. And Jacqueline MacInnes Wood is quite fetching. And a good actress to boot! In fact, all of the cast including Courtney B. Vance and David Koechner are believable in their respective roles even though Vance’s random agent seems a bit ridiculous since he is trying to blame a natural bridge collapse on Sam.

Vance’s role seemed to be a not very well conceived callback to the first where Alex is suspected of involvement in the airplane blowing up. That worked, to an extent, in that film but the notion that a mild-mannered guy could cause a freak natural disaster bridge collapse is stretching things a bit. There are other underlying callbacks to the first with the mentions of Paris and occurrences of the number 180 but there was no moment where the survivors figured out how their situation tied into the first film which was almost a staple in this series (the last film notwithstanding to my recollection.) Yet, without giving too much away, the final sequence ties in nicely with Devon Sawa and Kerr Smith from the original in a way I was pretty happy with.

At this rate, there isn’t too much new that can be done with these films but I was pleasantly surprised with how effectively Heisserer and Quale are able to balance the characters with the expected death scenes. Given that this was an online rental, I did not have the benefit of 3D while watching it but the effects sans one dimension were great (especially with the opening bridge collapse) so I was not missing too much. If I had to pick, I’d probably put this entry on par with part 2. It’s amazing how having realistic, albeit someone douchey, characters can make a mindless movie like this so much more enjoyable.

The Summer of Massacre will arrive on DVD and Blu-Ray on January 10th 2012 via Breaking Glass Pictures. It is 5 stories so bloody; so full of carnage that it is apparently in the Guinness Book of World records for highest body count recorded in a film. I am too lazy to verify that, so, you know, go ahead and Google or Wikipedia that. Whichever one you use to tell you what to believe.

You ever wanted to know what it would be like if Clive Barker took mescaline and then made a film? Joe Castro provides us with a pretty good guess. This film is ultra violent about 98.7% of the time. We have 5 chapters of dizzying images, ear piercing sounds and nonsensical industrial house music, and blood flowing like urine from a pissing contest atop Mt. Everest. I mean if something or someone could bleed, they did, as if their lives depended on it (!).

Chapter 1 is called Rampage. A man  is beaten severely while jogging through a park. A woman finds him still alive and calls the police. He jumps up and slaughters her, splattering blood all over the camera and everything else in the area. He then goes around town on a killing spree like one might go on a shopping spree at the local mall. Heads get squished, flesh gets ripped from bone, pointy objects get inserted in to various orifices. It’s quite a crimson delight, so long as internal organs laying out in the open is your type of thing.

Chapter 2 is is a delightful story about siblings called Lump, which is the nickname of a severely deformed hermaphrodite named Lori. Her sister is quite jealous of the attention she gets and takes her out to the woods with their brother and some friends. Lori’s sister pushes her (she is wheelchair bound) off of a cliff. When Lori doesn’t die, the others start to.

Chapter 3 is called Son of the Boogieman. Pretty straightforward. Years ago, a woman is raped by “the Boogieman” and has a child. Jessie (the son) and his mother have been hiding from him for 36 years. Somehow he has found them, and wants son to be just like father. Anyone that may come across his path is all but liquified.

Chapter 4, called Burn, has some familiar elements to it. Some young Christians sitting around a campfire, discussing a legend of murders that happened 20 years ago. Then guess, what? They get naked, smoke pot, drink beer and die.

The 5th “chapter” is told in between each of the other chapters. Three serial killers tell their stories not only devoid of remorse, but proudly as if earning straight A’s in a mass murder college program. After chapter 4 concludes, their story is also completed in the same style the previous were.

This film has nothing to offer but gallons and gallons of blood and entrails. Not that there is anything wrong with that, but don’t pop this flick in looking for any kind of acceptable acting, original (or even interesting) stories and certainly not gifted writing. It is gore for gore’s sake, and as over the top as it is, it takes itself quite seriously. So, if you want to see a brain ooze out of a skull, this film is just for you. The sad thing is, even the gore is cheesy and not that good looking most of the time.

It was a good choice to make this film in to 5 stories. If it tried to tell one narrative instead, I would have ripped my own flesh off.

To prepare for the upcoming “Epic Finchercast,” I revisited Alien 3, or Alien Cubed if you so prefer, since I haven’t seen it since the early 90s after its debut on HBO. Since I was but maybe 10 or 11 at the time, I cannot hold myself too accountable for my disdain for this film since of course, at the time, I had not yet experienced Se7en, Zodiac, or Social Network. On the surface, Alien Cubed is a decent follow-up to the Alien saga. When viewed with the rest of director David Fincher‘s body of work, this was just the beginning.

The main consternation of Alien 3 seems to be around the death of Newt and Hicks. Now, I love Aliens (and Michael Biehn) just as much as the next guy and at the time I was sad to see them perish off-camera in rather rudimentary ways. But as the crew’s ship crash lands onto a Company-owned maximum-security prison/iron works/whatever, this time I began to see why that decision was made. Hicks was basically incapacitated and Newt, while cute and all, was still just a pesky pre-teen girl that would have otherwise been surrounded by the rapists and murderers on Fury 161. It’s tough to say but those characters had outlived their usefulness but Ripley, of course, has not.

Say what you want about the Alien series proper as a whole, but Ripley (Sigourney Weaver) has always been the backbone and Alien 3 shows exactly why. As she is told by the medical officer Clemens (Charles Dance) that her companions have perished, Ripley still has the nagging thought that an alien is behind their demise even though she is curiously restrained in explaining that. After the bodies of Newt and Hicks are cremated and a rescue team has been summoned, Ripley receives confirmation that an alien was on-board and has likely infiltrated the small camp of prisoners and corrections officers.

Having watched the theatrical cut and the “assembly cut” back-to-back, the omissions that were made are puzzling. Even knowing about the longer, fuller cut in advance, the theatrical version seems either far too sloppily edited or too truncated to do the film any justice. Out of the twenty five remaining in the facility, only a handful are ever given any characterization (such as Charles Dutton‘s Dillion) or even names (like the survivor Morse) in the regular cut, leading to the bulk of the film just an alien chasing random dudes down dimly-yellow-tinged hallways. The “assembly cut” or as close to Fincher’s director’s cut that we will likely receive is about twenty five minute longer and features not only more prominent characterizations of the important inmates but also a quite enthralling plot point that was completely omitted from the final film.

Since I have watched an ungodly amount of Fincher films in the past month, it is easy to see the visual style that he would hold onto with following films. The low- and high-angled shots, the yellow hues that permeate, and even the emphasis on character rather than flashy visuals that would define him almost two decades later are present in Fincher’s debut film. Sadly, that mostly holds true for the “assembly cut” rather than the theatrical version since a good chunk of the story was left out in the latter version. Even the other little details like the grimy set-pieces or the ruthless anonymous thugs speak toward Fincher’s other works and they certainly stand out here as Fincher seems to be more interested in the visual than the constantly changing narrative.

Even though it has been largely criticized by the movie-watching community, Alien 3 is a worthy follow-up to James Cameron’s Aliens in that it is almost completely different in its execution. Aliens was more focused on non-stop action whereas Alien 3 is more of a melding of its two predecessors. There are many horror-esque moments especially as the prisoners do not know about the threat but yet still many action sequences such as the alien chasing men through endless corridors, all while it is scaling walls and ceilings. Those chase scenes close to the finale, and even those throughout the film, are captured with almost a raw intensity that defy you to be nonchalant during them. Even the assembly cut ending which still has Ripley sacrificing herself is more impactful as the queen does not bust out just before. It not only is more fitting for the ending of a Fincher film but also makes Ripley’s journey more impactful.

There’s tons of stuff to beat this movie up on from the cruddy CGI to the underdeveloped characters but Alien 3 was nowhere near as abysmal as I feared it would be. The assembly cut is the one to watch if you have the chance but even through the studio fuckery, the theatrical cut is still a pretty powerful film on its own, and one that tries to stand up to its bigger brothers in the franchise.

After the last creatively bankrupt installment of this franchise, it’s no wonder that the Weinstein boys decided to go back to the drawing board and reboot the Michael Myers saga with Rob Zombie‘s version of Halloween. Or is it a remake? Or a re-imagining? Much like the most recent Nightmare on Elm Street film, I was confused as to the point of it all. Are we trying to fill in needless backstory about Myers and his upbringing? Are we updating the tale for a more contemporary potty-mouthed audience? Does anyone have a clue at this point?

You can probably give a brief summary of the original film in one not-so-brief sentence: Michael Myers is a messed-up little kid who kills his sister, gets sent away to the nuthouse but breaks out, and then tries to kill his younger sister many years later. In fact, that same synopsis is true for this film even though you would have to make a few inserts between commas here and there to get the gist of this film. Here we learn that Michael is not some normal-ish kid who simply snaps but is raised in an environment that guarantees an outcome of either loose or psychotic depending on the gender of the child. You’d like to think that Deborah Myers (Sheri Moon Zombie) was trying hard to raise her kids right but then you are reminded that she is a stripper and is voluntarily living with an abusive asshat. You might even feel a tinge of sympathy for Michael up until he butchers a rat off-camera in the first few moments and increases his violence thereafter.

Once the initial Halloween deed is done and Michael is found guilty of murder, Dr. Sam Loomis (Malcolm McDowell) is assigned to his rehabilitation but after a few violent outbursts and a decade and a half later, Loomis resigns having failed to elicit even a rudimentary response out of the now gargantuan Myers. Depending on which version you watch, Michael escapes somehow and treks back to Haddonfield to find Laurie (Scout Taylor-Compton) for some snuggle time. Or maybe to kill her. Or maybe not. Who the hell knows?

Now, before I go all crazy negative, I will point out some of the things in Zombie’s Halloween that I like. Visually it is quite good and I hear that is the common thread between other Zombie-directed films (this being the only one I’ve seen, I’m merely going off the consensus). The direction, mostly, is spot on with little dispute from myself and most of the actors are quite good considering they are merely playing stereotypes of previously named folk in other films. Even though I didn’t care for the identical score from the first repurposed for this installment, especially in inappropriate times, the music was good as well. But sadly, for all the praise I can give to the production design or the acting, the story is the weakest link by far.

It almost seems that during the writing phase, Zombie was torn between a retelling of the original Halloween night with its subsequent aftermath and a pretty straight-forward remake of the original complete with the same characters and even identical lines of dialogue here and there. Unwilling or unable to pick between either, these two incomplete films are haphazardly sewn together into one really odd narrative to make a full movie out of. Even more sad is that it still runs way too long for a slasher film, especially considering that our final girl does not show up until almost halfway into the film.

The most aggravating thing about Zombie’s Halloween is that I see where either part of the story could have become a decent movie if separated from the other. Truthfully, I would much rather have seen a feature-length version of Michael stalking Laurie since that is where Zombie really showed the most promise with brutal attacks, not-as-hackneyed moments, and even a healthy bit of nudity (including from Danielle Harris!). My main issue with the front half of the film is that all of the characters are one-dimensional assholes with nary a redeeming quality between them. Laurie and her friends weren’t that well-drawn either but at least they were somewhat sympathetic even though I wanted to murder someone listening to their insipid dialogue about cheerleading or boyfriends or sex. If anything, for that half of the film, Zombie needed a Debra Hill for the adolescent teenage speak but he apparently went at it alone leading to some irritating results.

For every two things I liked, there were three that I did not, including the pointless trucker (Ken Foree!), the random hook-up in the Myers’ house, or the time period ambiguous settings. If he were not so beholden to throw in as many remembrances or re-stagings of the original, Zombie might have made a pretty decent entry in the Halloween franchise. But, the bifurcated nature of the story plus the horrendously drawn-out chase scenes between Michael and Laurie really distract from any enjoyment that may be obtained otherwise. But hey, at least it’s better than Busta Rhymes in Resurrection. At least Zombie has that in his corner.

October may be over but sadly I still have a few more of these movies to suffer through. After watching Halloween: Resurrection, I began to yearn for the unoriginal simplicity of H20 or the complete and utter nonsense of Parts 5 and 6. Resurrection is the worst type of horror movie: it offers nothing of value to the franchise or the genre as a whole and it all around sucks complete ass. This movie (among others no doubt) is why horror films are seen as cheap, disposable, and worthless. In fact, there aren’t any better adjectives to describe this monstrosity.

The first ever free pass I received for a movie was for this one courtesy of a local defunct radio station. Shame on them. In fairness, I was almost excited about a new entry in the Michael Myers saga since my tastes weren’t refined enough to recognize H20 as the derivative mess it is. Yet, as I sat in a theater with hundreds of other free ticket winners, I began to see the error in my ways. Where the previous Halloween sequels can be attributed to studio perseverance for a quick money grab, at least they at least tried to tie in with the rest of the movies (Halloween III not withstanding). I cannot levy any such admiration to this piece.

The pretty conclusive ending of the last film is explained away in awkward exposition that Laurie (Jamie Lee Curtis; only in the film for fifteen minutes!) actually killed a paramedic who Michael dressed up like himself. As such, Laurie has been checked into a nuthouse where she sits comatose taking pills and staring out a window. Except for the night that He comes. And by He, I don’t mean Jesus. Laurie is made dead through stupid actions of her own and Michael walks away to his creepy theme music. Logically, since Michael has ALWAYS gone after family, you’d think he’d be gunning for John, Laurie’s son from H20. Josh Harnett was probably too busy to degrade himself with crap like this so that’s a no go.

Instead, we are introduced to Freddie Harris (Busta Rhymes) from ‘Dangertainment’ who ropes in a half-dozen dumb-shit college kids to peruse around the Myers’ house (the traditional Myers’ house that is) on Halloween for a live broadcast on the web. There’s a free-spirit chick, a wild-and-crazy chick, the bad-boy, the Rookie-of-the-year, and the final girl. Let’s just say that most meet their demise at the hands of Michael’s rage since they are … squatting in his house? The hell?

I gave Halloween III the crap category but I almost feel bad about that now. Perhaps there should be different tiers of crap: Tier 1 is almost passable like H3; Tier 4 or so would be where Halloween: Resurrection falls. There is absolutely nothing in this film that can change my mind. From the thoughtless shift from killing family to protecting property(?), to the wretched characters who fail to stick out in any way other than annoying and soon to be dead, to the abundance of Busta Rhymes, this film would probably take itself to the barn and shoot itself if it could. Even director Rick Rosenthal (of the not good, but nowhere near as bad H2) can inject anything of note into the painfully long runtime that cannot be seen in any bargain-bin horror film with a masked killer.

Even the fact that Michael Myers is so watered down in this installment is abundantly clear as he simply walks away after being chastised by Freddie who thinks he is just a random tech hand. The Michael Myers of old would have cut that sucker into a few dozen pieces before but maybe old age has gotten to him as he simply turns around and walks away. And good for us! Otherwise we wouldn’t be treated to Rhymes’ frequent utterances of “damn” and “fuck” and not to mention “Trick or Treat Motherfucker!” As a side note, it pissed me off the most that it cannot keep with the simple aspects of the series such as the always present rain on Halloween Eve. With the exception of H3, all other Myers-based Halloween films have rain on October 30th but apparently I as a 12-year-old was able to pick up on trends better than anyone involved here.

Maybe there was supposed to be some social commentary on the emerging trend of reality television but that was clearly not on the forefront of the production. If anything, we learned that Myers is probably not on a rampage because of a lack of protein or lack of sex but more likely due to a lack of not-dumbshit people surrounding him. Everyone in this movie deserved to die and maybe the character of Myers was simply trying to stop the audience from enduring any more of these films. I guess he didn’t take into account Rob Zombie. Damn!

George: A Zombie Intervention (or George’s Intervention) comes to us via Breaking Glass Pictures. It’s quite an interesting take on the genre, but poorly executed.

The film opens with an educational film shown to school children. The opening was actually quite clever. It serves as exposition to us, and is meant to teach children the facts about zombies. Zombies have become members of society. So much so that there is a zombie technical support line.  There are spores in the air that humans inhale. The spores lie dormant until the human dies. The spores then wake up and keep the brain functioning thus turning the human into a zombie. Not mindless Romero zombies. Rather, they simply remain their former selves, and are self aware that they are the undead. Unlike your typical film zombies, shooting them in the head does not kill them. It only makes them brain dead which turns them into the standard flesh seeking walkers. They only way to kill a zombie in this universe is to dismember them and burn them.

After the introduction, we see a group of friends having a pre-intervention for their friend George. He has a bit of an addiction problem. Much like you may have seen on television (or perhaps in an actual intervention), the friends are tasked to write down how George’s addiction has affected them. They arrive the next day at George’s home and he is quite resistant. George is a zombie, and he eats people. His friends plead with him to stop but he does not want to. As the group takes a break, people begin to be killed and George tries to eat them. One of George’s friends thinks that they are having a party, so George is constantly interrupted by guests arriving. He throws his victims in the basement to eat later.

This film is purposefully over the top. The gore is excessive and that’s fine. The problem is that there is an obvious attempt to make the film seem realistic at the same time, which places emphasis on its flaws. The performances are quite sub par, especially with the constant eye rolling and face acting.  Right away as the friends arrive at the pre-intervention, they act as if they hate each other. So there was a bit of confusion as to why they are friends since they were all acting like jerks. This eventually changes as Sarah reveals that she likes Ben, and we learn that Steve is just a general dick.

The most bothersome thing in this film is George’s house. It’s like a billion square feet. No one in the house knows where anyone is and can’t hear the constant bludgeoning of guests, even after the loud music is turned off. The house also is apparently self cleaning, as blood seems to disappear from the floor.

There also is some inconsistency as one zombie discovers that he has no pulse and cannot feel pain and therefore must be dead, but in another scene, a zombie complains that being shot hurts.

The film was definitely entertaining, and some of the dialogue was quite humorous. However, most of the time is was poorly written and badly delivered. And not in  a funny, quirky, Army of Darkness type way.

The very end is probably the funniest thing about the film. It is a “commercial” for a zombie rehab clinic and shows zombie supports groups and George eating Tofu Flesh.

The concept of the film is quite clever, and there are definitely some great moments. Very reminiscent of Dead Alive as far as style. I recommend a viewing, but must say that there is a lot to suffer through to get to the enjoyable parts.

Halloween H20 holds a special distinction for being the only DVD I own from a different country. I’m not really sure why I bought it on a trip to Germany over ten years ago since I cannot play it on a normal DVD player and my German is so shoddy now that I would need the dub track. But regardless, I have it on German DVD. I figured starting out the review with a random anecdote would be fine since this is more a technically-competent but superfluous anecdote than a real film in the Halloween series.

Even though Part 5 and 6 had their rough patches here and there, both films had their strong points in the ongoing Michael Myers saga. Halloween 4 was just all around excellent. Yet this Scream-derived soulless grab for nostalgia has the balls to say that everything after Myers and Loomis went up in flames at the end of Part 2 never happened. The main response used against those decrying remakes and reboots is “It’s not like a remake destroys the original.” That certainly is true but H20 does its damnedest to try to erase the old-fashioned slasher films of the 80s and replace them with polished, Creed-filled movies like this. That irritates me.

Now, that isn’t to say that H20 is without merit. Jamie Lee Curtis returning to commemorate the original’s twentieth anniversary was a nice touch as well as the other references and callbacks to the first film. But this one spends three-quarters of its runtime sloppily tracing the structure of the original with some post-modern horror moments sprinkled in occasionally. Say what you will about Druid rituals and random tattoos but at least the preceding films tried something a bit different instead of just rehashing the same stuff but not even close in its effectiveness.

As much as I love it, Scream and its successes pretty much killed the Halloween franchise. Even though it was a slasher film with visible fingerprints from the original Halloween, Scream and this series should not come close to intersecting. Yet, the main problem I have with H20 is that it does not gently merge the existing elements of the series with the popular self-aware teen talk of the 90s as much as it barrels into it. The opening scene (featuring Marion Stephens even though she was barely a bit player before) that is mostly divorced from the rest of the story reeks of studios chasing the money with attractive TV actors and a few false scares but little else. The rest of the film plays out more like a high school drama production of John Carpenter’s Halloween with some hip and edgy dialogue and a puzzling inclusion of a movie that basically acknowledges that Halloween is a movie.

Curtis’ Laurie has significantly more to do this time compared to her last Halloween film but this Laurie never really comes across as genuine like some of the previous characters. Josh Harnett (in his debut film) and Michelle Williams try to class the place up with some decent characters and above-average acting. But their other friends are horribly stock and exist only to give Michael something to do. And this features LL Cool J who was not bad per se (at least not the worst rapper to appear in the series) but was saddled with a stupid and ultimately worthless character as the posh private school’s inattentive security guard. I feel bad for Adam Arkin the most since he is only around to extract exposition from Laurie and get stabbed in the back ala Random Nurse #3 from the second film.

The final act though has some great moments as Laurie goes batshit crazy and locks herself in the compound, calling for Michael. Sadly, this lasts all of about thirty seconds before Michael attacks, Laurie responds and then runs and hides. Perhaps this was a much longer sequence but the film’s impossibly short length leads you to believe that there was a lot cut as the bigwigs demanded less boring stuff like talking or stalking and more action. Another sad casualty of the film was the score by John Ottman which is sliced and diced and intertwined with Marco Beltrami’s Scream music that it is impossible to appreciate. That is if you aren’t a nerd like me and own Ottman’s sadly out-of-print score. I took that CD with me to Germany as well.

Director Steve Miner did exactly what he was hired by the Weinsteins at Dimension to do: make a Scream-esque Halloween movie. Yet, doing so strips any remaining originality from the series and reverts it to just another Scream copycat. At least someone had the foresight to “try” and make this the final film in its closing scene. Yet, I still have Halloween: Resurrection to watch so that was clearly as miscalculated as the rest of this film.

Pure and simple, this movie is an unadulterated mess. Coming six years after the sloppy fifth film, the Halloween series had certainly seen its better days as it changes hands to yet another production company, this time the genre upstart Dimension Films. Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers also is notable for being one of the most awkwardly put together films courtesy of studio or dumbass filmmaker interference and even spawned its own alternate cut which ran rampant on VHS many years ago as the “Producers’ Cut.” Just like any relationship, this movie has a lot of baggage. And I have a love/hate relationship with it.

Remember the relative simplicity of the story in the original film? Yeah, Michael Myers apparently murdered that as well as the six in the title. Jamie Lloyd returns for a brief moment to birth a child that may or may not be Michael’s (creepy!). The town of Haddonfield has banned Halloween since its latest bloodbath six years ago (or is it five?). Laurie Strode’s previously unmentioned uncle John Strode has now moved his family into the old Myers house. His daughter Kara (Marianne Hagan) has recently moved back in with her young son Danny for reasons unmentioned. Across the street in a boarding house lives Tommy Doyle (Paul Rudd) who has been obsessed with Michael after his encounter Halloween night many years ago. Dr. Loomis (Donald Pleasence) is apparently retired and nowhere near as enthusiastically crazy as before. All of these kooky characters merge together though as Michael reappears to help reduce the dumb character population.

I have much appreciation for the one credited writer of this film, Daniel Farrands. We’re far removed from the greatness of the original but you can tell that Farrands is not only a fan of the series but understands what a Halloween movie needs. Sadly, the behind-the-scenes shenanigans undermine some of the story but for most of the first fifty minutes or so, Curse has what should be standard in a slasher film, namely decently drawn characters and tense sequences showcasing its main psychopath. I must also acknowledge Joe Chappelle (yes, the one who also did Phantoms) who has a keen visual eye for shots and sequences that go hand-in-hand with the best of the sequels. Yet, allegedly this is the same Joe Chappelle (along with the always menacing studio suits) who absolutely destroyed the final act of the film. We can’t win them all I guess.

The film does much to correct problems with the last, especially as it comes to creating the best autumn atmosphere of the entire series (original included) and ditching the gothic Myers mansion for a quaint little suburban house more similar to the original. Even though some of the characters are completely worthless and/or assholes, most of the others are fleshed out enough to care about when the Boogeyman comes knocking. A stilted performance here and there (cough, Rudd!) results in some occasional bumps in the narrative but not enough to derail your enjoyment. Until the final act that is.

While I haven’t seen the Producers’ Cut, the reported major differences start as Kara (and all common sense from the film I suppose) is flung out of a window. This is painfully apparent as the relative successes of the beginning are maimed like Myers going after a group of random doctors and nurses for no explicable reason. All of the sudden it seems, Alan Howarth’s creepy recalling of the series’ theme is replaced with screeching guitars and the delightfully tense moments from before are replaced with other random shit for no other reason than to make it “cool.” Granted there are some good moments in the final act (I especially enjoy Rudd’s facial expressions when coming across Myers) but so much is done that tonally does not match the rest of the film nor does it make a lick of sense.

For every effective kill sequence the know-it-alls counter with a head exploding because, well we all expect that from a Halloween film. For all the eery slo-mo shots of Tommy walking past the 90s version of #OccupyHaddonfield, we are treated with dumb shit like a little girl saying “It’s raining. It’s raining red. It’s warm.” And for every moment of Danny being a creepy little kid we get this crap about Michael being controlled by Druids and a specific constellation. Even with its faults, there are far too many great moments here to dismiss this one as crap. It may not be as effective a sequel as Part 4 but you get the feeling that at least someone tried to make a worthwhile film.

1989 should have been a big year for horror fans with the release of Halloween 5, Nightmare on Elm Street 5, and Friday the 13th Part 8 all together. Yet, since the late 80s marked the decline of the slasher genre, it should stand to reason that all of these films were garbage in one way or another. Similar to Nightmare 5, I have never had any fondness for Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers which I previously dismissed as just another empty cash-grab. Perhaps since it has been easily ten or so years since seeing this one or because I know there is some horrid crap to come, I came out of my viewing of this film with a newfound appreciation for it. It’s still rather terrible though.

Taking place one year after the events of Halloween 4 (according to the title card that is), Michael has spent 365 days peacefully slumming on the floor of an old hermit, Jamie (Danielle Harris) is traumatized to the point that she cannot speak, and Loomis is even more batshit crazy than before. Even though stabbing your foster mother is not usually a mark in the “Pro” category, Rachel (Ellie Cornell) and her family have adopted Jamie but stuck her in the kiddy crazy house. Since Myers is presumably dead, Loomis (Donald Pleasence) has nothing better to do than lurk around the children’s house and barge in at inappropriate times. After the events of last Halloween, Rachel’s parents convince her to get the hell out of Crystal Lake, err… Haddonfield leaving Jamie under the care of Tina (Wendy Kaplan), Rachel’s crazy friend that we never knew existed before. Needless to say, Michael is not dead yet and rises to begin yet another slaughter of Haddonfield’s denizens as he goes after his niece. Even though he can apparently kill through her. Eh, whatever.

There are many things I can accuse Halloween 5 of. This is not a very highly regarded sequel in the franchise and for good reason since other than Loomis and Jamie, it seems that this was fashioned more like a Friday the 13th movie. ::SPOILER/RANT ALERT:: The biggest thing that pissed me off as a kid and even so today is killing of Rachel. I understand the precedence from F13 Part 2 or Nightmare 3 & 4 but Rachel was not only attractive but a pretty compelling character for the audience in general. She was doubtful at the start of the last film but turned into Ripley-lite to protect Jamie from Myers. And then she dies twenty minutes into this film with a weak death scene that has no emotional resonance throughout since everything assumes she’s gone to go with her parents.

To replace her, we have Tina who might have been fun and spunky in the late 80s but just annoys the shit out of the millennial crowd. Tina, combined with her one-note, cookie-cutter friends add nothing to the story that Rachel could not have but we don’t really care when Tina is being chased/stabbed by Myers because she fails as a character. Even when little Jamie discovers Rachel dead in the palatial Myers house, there is no time to reflect or dwell on the relationship of the two. To me, hands-down, that is the biggest fault of the film.

I’d be remiss in reviewing this movie without talking about the other things that plucked my nerves: the poppy-teen soundtrack, the goofy cops (complete with clown music!), the complete bastardization of the Myers house, and of course the introduction of the major pain-point for the next sequel: Thorn and the man in black. Really, for the few positives it had (namely chase scenes in the back half), the entire production just felt sloppy. The title card indicates one year later yet all dialogue suggests it is in fact two years later what with Jamie being two years older and Loomis referencing “twelve years ago” as if it were the night of the original. And really, even if you’re an off-the-grid mountain man, are you going to let a man lay motionless on your floor for an entire year without calling someone? And even though the mask was pretty aggressive-looking this time around, it’s supposed to be the same from last time. Come on now.

For all of the huge problems this film had, it does has its positives. Director Dominique Othenin-Girard has done little that you might have heard of but that is almost upsetting since he had a great eye for the visual aspect of the picture. It’s nothing 70s-era Carpenter-esque but there were a number of sequences that were shot pretty well even though they were shoehorned into this not-good film. Alan Howarth’s score is still pretty effective and Loomis’ game to entrap Michael was well-played even though that was rendered futile by the end when Michael escapes courtesy of the shadowy man-in-black. Even the notion that Jamie and Michael are connected somehow is interesting but used poorly to the extent that it might as well have made a good six minutes or so to trim from the running time.

Supposedly legal troubles stopped a follow-up sequel the next year but I can’t be too sad about that. Since Loomis was teetering on the edge of clinical insanity and Jamie was given almost nothing to do this time around, I shudder to think of what would come next. Other than Halloween: Curse of Michael Myers that is.

At this point, the Paranormal Activity series is almost critic-proof since it is dirt-cheap to produce, brings in fists full of dollars and is generally well-received by audiences. With the departure of the Saw franchise last year, October needed another big, R-rated series to take its place to win over the hard earned cash of horror-loving moviegoers. I said in the review of PA2: “It is pretty safe to say that if you liked the first PA, you will probably like this one too.” Amend that to say the first two PA films and you have my excerpt for this film. That isn’t a bad thing … unless you really hated the preceding films.

The formula for these stories are pretty simple: a family experiences some traumatic experience leading to the dominant male of the household placing a camera, or cameras, around the house to document something or another. This film sets up the loving family of Julie, mother of Katie and Kristi, and her boyfriend Dennis who conveniently is a wedding photographer, thus having access to multiple cameras and a seemingly endless supply of VHS tapes. Katie and Kristi’s father is out of the picture but the four have a pretty good relationship especially between Dennis and the kids. An earthquake interrupts Julie and Dennis’ very tame sex tape and Dennis maybe sees something weird when reviewing the tape.

Thus Dennis does what any sensible man does and convinces his girlfriend to set up three cameras in the house, one in their bedroom, one in the kids’ and one affixed to an oscillating fan base in the living room/kitchen. The first few nights aren’t too eventful (at least those that we see) mostly consisting of Kristi running around the house and talking to Toby, her imaginary friend at 4 AM. It isn’t long though before more odd things start occurring especially surrounding the babysitter and Dennis’ friend Randy who only show up for weird shit to happen to them.

Once you get past the inevitable “Why is this dude lugging around an 8 pound camera everywhere he goes?” puzzlement, PA3 offers a lot more freaky and some downright scary occurrences. There aren’t too many jump scares this time around but many scenes that are almost unbearably tense especially around the girls. While the movie reminds us that Katie and Kristi are alive almost twenty years later, previous films have explained that they have little recollection of their childhood … and I can probably see why. That takes some of the potential bite out of the scares around the two but with the other adults around, directors Ariel Schulman and Henry Joost (from Catfish fame) have plenty of tension to work with and they do so remarkably well.

I appreciated that this go-around did not take as long to get to the meat-and-potatoes of the story as the last, or at least it didn’t feel as long due to the underlying creepiness or the decent characters. And even though there was a lot (and I mean A LOT) of stuff shown in trailers that didn’t make the final cut, you never really get the sense that this is a film cobbled together at the last minute even though it kind of is. The prequel nature of it with the same elements we’ve seen before makes the story a tad more unbelievable (ghosts/demons attacking the same two girls, yet another budding videographer in the house, etc.) but not to any real detriment of your enjoyment.

Like I said in the review of the last one, I have no idea where the story can go from here, especially since it seems to hinge on strange events of these two girls. But if this one is any indication, with the right combination of talented directors and writers, we could be seeing Paranormal Activity 13 come 2021. As long as they keep churning out films that give me chills after the fact, I’ll keep watching them.