Tag Archives: David Gordon Green

Film Review: Halloween Kills – 2021

Director(s)David Gordon Green
Principal CastJaime Lee Curtis as Laurie Strode
James Jude Courtney as Michael Myers
Judy Greer as Karen
Andi Matichak as Allyson

Anthony Michael Hall as Tommy Doyle
Release Date2021
Language(s)English
Running Time 105 minutes
Report CardClick to go to Review TLDR/Summary

NOTE: This is a new release and the review is based off a theatre viewing. This means the review won’t feature common elements like visual analysis, extended theme analysis, or long-form discussions of the cinematic techniques being used. Once I am able to get a copy of the movie to watch, pause, analyze, and get stills from the review will be updated to match the current site’s standard.

As a fan of director David Gordon Green’s 2018 namesake, revival and sequel to John Carpenter’s original 1978 masterpiece, Halloween, I was hopeful that Halloween Kills would continue its predecessor’s measured approach at delving into the psychology of the characters, namely Laurie(Jaime Lee Curtis), in relation to Michael(James Jude Courtney). While not in the same league as the original, Green’s previous film at least seems to understand that the terror of Michael stems not just from his brutality but from his inability to be understood or cognized. As an emissary and force of evil, he remains an enigma.

Unfortunately, Kills forgets this key fact and throws nuance to the wind in favor of brash and abrasive points, many of which become especially confusing when given a few moments thoughts. The film’s title sequence serves as warning for what’s to come. In contrast to Carpenter’s original film’s eerie and evocative opening sequence which sets its pace with a slow push in on a jack-o-lantern that flickers menacingly, Halloween Kill’s introduction opts for something more grandiose, pushing in on a sea of flaming jack-o-lanterns which dissipate upon contact with the camera. The former approach favors the slow build-up before the spectacle, choosing to savor the moment of impact, while the latter favors extravaganza for its own sake, trading slow and methodical for bombastic. These orientations towards terror set the stage for their respective films; Halloween is a tense, atmospheric, palpable nightmare waiting to imprint its horror onto its audiences’ mind, while Halloween Kills is a to-the-point gore-fest that seeks to assault its audience with a barrage of scenarios that fail to leave a lasting mark after their initial presentation.

While the story picks up right at the end of the previous film, it almost immediately undermines everything that happened before. As Laurie, Karen(Judy Greer), and Allyson(Andi Matichak) make it to the hospital, Michael is promptly freed from his burning prison and soon starts to slaughter everything in sight. His massacre calls the attention of the residents of Haddonfield, who, under the rallying cry of a much older and still very much traumatized Tommy Doyle(Anthony Michael Hall), the young boy Laurie babysat in Carpenter’s film, go to ensure “evil dies tonight.” Consequently, the narrative jumps between groups of civilians who try and hunt Michael through the city, unaware soon-to-be victims caught in the middle of his rampage, and Laurie along with her family recovering at the hospital.

Alas, none of these narrative threads is interesting or unique. Laurie’s story might as well have not been in the film given how little she ends up doing, and all the non-Laurie related plot-lines follow the same formula as one another: introduce character, introduce said character’s quirk in lieu of meaningful personality, kill character in brutal fashion. If the character is a mob character as opposed to just a victim caught unaware, they will mention, without fail, how dangerous Michael is to confront alone, let alone with group, before then confronting him alone. Forget predictable, try exhausting. Never at any point, does anything amount to more than casually interesting, and most of the film comes up much shorter than even that.

Rather than setting firm foundation and direction for the story and its ideas to traverse along, Green and his fellow screen-writers seem content with establishing threadbare connections to Carpenter’s ’78 film, as though mere association is enough to transfer heft from one story to another. Halloween Kills confuses reverence to the most minute details for enthralling cinematic texture, assuming that because the characters are related to the first film, that somehow the audience will care about them and invest into their respective stories. Every single character or detail, big or small, is highlighted by the film as if screaming, “See, it’s all connected!” But, by and large, the effort comes off as farce. No one outside of Laurie and her family, has any embellished reason for doing what they do, and the narrative never gives the audience a reason to root for the mob and their efforts.

Furthermore, even though the last film makes it clear that Michael’s murder spree in 1978 isn’t as serious a sequence of violence as status quo events (ex: modern shootings), Kills expects the audience to now believe that there are throngs of people around who are as upset and devastated about the spree as Laurie. This insinuation not only undermines the contextual work of the last film but also moots Laurie’s unique connection to the situation. If everyone is as obsessed about the event as her, then the last film would not have happened as it did, but Kills requires this to be true in order to ramp up to the ham-fisted themes and set-pieces that it so desperately wants to present as evidence of its artistic depth.

It’s evidence that the film wants to serve as a moral warning against succumbing to mob violence; don’t pursue uncontrolled violence lest you become a monster yourself. However, the story presents no alternative to the problems mob violence seeks to resolve, especially within its own context. When a police officer talks about how they didn’t want to shoot Michael once apprehended due to respect for shared human empathy and respect for the law, it seems obvious that, without context, the audience should be in favor of such a view. Officers killing unarmed and captured enemies should not be encouraged. But because we know Michael is a brutal murderer, a point the film gleefully reminds us of as he mutilates teenagers, couples, and the elderly galore, the message of restraint and respect for rule of law becomes much more confusing, especially when the narrative constantly demonstrates just how inept the law is at dealing with such events. If monsters are bad and the law is unable to stop them, chastising mob violence and condemning it in such a moralistic fashion muddies the discourse surrounding the issue.

The point also fails to make any resounding impact given that the film is a CELEBRATION of violence. It’s hard for the consequences of mob violence to linger in one’s mind in thought-provoking fashion when the camera treats this violence no differently than it does Michael’s carnage tour. If we’re supposed to marvel and cheer at the effective, technical execution of the latter, it becomes difficult to explain why the audience shouldn’t cheer for the former, especially when both are treated in the same manner: on-display gore for the audience to gawk at.

As a result, even though Halloween Kills share many of the same qualities as the early movies in the Friday the 13th franchise, namely disposable characters and focus on brutal set-pieces at the cost of narrative or thematic depth, it never reaches near the same levels of entertainment because it takes it forces its subject matter to be treated with a undeserved gravity that makes the overall experience uneven and tepid. Despite boasting Carpenter’s excellent score, slicker moment of gore, and a more robust production than many of the Friday films, Kills inhibits enjoyment by trying to tie the gratuitous and over-the-top violence to more severe and intricate themes.

With no one to cheer for and no hefty ideas to mull about on, it’s hard to recommend Halloween Kills to anyone but ardent fans of the franchise, good and bad, and gore hounds looking for mean-spirited slayings. The story is confused and doesn’t know if it wants to be a serious contemplation on evil or a carnage candy exhibition; consequently this identity-crisis permeates and undermines the film at critical junctures, leading little to offer. I can only hope that the follow-up, Halloween Ends, wraps things up nicely, but with how disappointing Kills ended up being, I’m not holding my breath.

REPORT CARD

TLDRHalloween Kills is a sorely lacking sequel that not only squanders all good will engendered by director David Gordon Green’s previous film Halloween but also fully drops the ball for the upcoming finale, Halloween Ends. The film wants to be both a blood-bath and a piece with heart, but it fails to do either effectively because it spends no time setting up its characters or its story beats for meaningful success. Only ardent franchise fans and lovers of gore should check this one out.
Rating4.8/10
GradeF

Go to Page 2 for the for the spoiler discussion and more in-depth analysis.
Go to Page 3 to view this review’s progress report .

Film Review: Halloween – 2018

Director(s)David Gordon Green
Principal CastJaime Lee Curtis as Laurie Strode
James Jude Courtney as Michael Myers/The Shape
Judy Greer as Karen
Andi Matichak as Allyson Nelson
Haluk Bilginer as Dr. Sartain
Release Date2018
Language(s)English
Running Time 106 minutes

The film opens in a psychiatric hospital. A psychiatrist working at the institution, Dr. Sartain (Haluk Bilginer) escorts two true crime reporters, Aaron (Jefferson Hall) and Dana (Rhian Rees), for an interview with the subject of their latest investigation, Michael Myers (James Jude Courtney), before he’s transferred to a more maximum-security prison. The duo approaches the serial killer, but Michael doesn’t budge; he stays with his back turned to them. But he’s very much aware of their presence as evidenced by a “reverse” over-the-shoulder shot.

Frustrated with the lack of discernible response, Aaron steps forward and taunts Michael with the latter’s iconic mask, hoping that the provocation will elicit a response. But the response comes from the other patients around Michael who start to panic and become disturbed due to the sight of the mask; the lingering presence of evil is palpable. The cries of the patients interrupt and disorient Aaron’s attempted interview but he persists, desperately asking Michael to say anything.

Suddenly, the title card drops and the iconic Halloween theme starts to play; Michael doesn’t need to speak when the music does it for him. The intro sequence pays homage to the original film’s opening. In the 1978 classic, the camera slowly pushes into a jack-o-lantern, becoming the “point-of-view” of Halloween itself. In the 2018 sequel, the camera pushes in on a broken and beaten jack-o-lantern which recovers back into its original form – a rebirth. If the original signified the birth of Michael, then this narrative is about the resurrection of the Boogeyman.

Aaron and Dana leave Michael and head towards Laurie (Jaime Lee Curtis); if the killer won’t talk, get the survivor to fill in the blanks. Aaron narrates his report on the drive over and gives us the subtext in not-so-subtle fashion. Have Michael’s actions had an impact on Laurie such that the latter has become metaphysically changed by the encounter. Has one monster made another?


The answers to these questions become murky as the reporters arrive at Laurie’s gated compound. They speak with her through a security system in order to secure an interview but receive no response until they offer to pay a fee. The gate opens and they’re allowed entry. But the inside of Laurie’s compound is even more securitized than the outside. Cameras and lights surround the outside. It’s clear that Laurie’s confrontation with Michael has radically transformed her, forcing her to live her life with a neve-ending fear of the darkness and the forces inherent to it.

Aaron and Dana mention as much in their interview with Laurie, probing into how the incident derailed her life. It’s apparent that the duo doesn’t believe in the legend of the Boogeyman and see Michael as just another serial killer waiting to be examined, a profile to be added to a personality database. They suggest that Laurie’s obsession with the myth of Michael have cost her dearly. She’s had multiple failed marriages. She lost custody of her daughter, Karen (Judy Greer), years ago and now lives estranged from any family. Instead of continuing to live her fear in deference to idea of Michael qua inexplicable evil, they suggest that she communicate with Michael and lay her grievances to rest.

But they don’t understand what Michael is or the nature of what he put Laurie through so many years ago. They don’t understand that the person known as Michael is nothing more than a moniker for a force unconstrained, an evil with no direction. Laurie knows they don’t care about such proclamations, so she end’s the interview almost as soon as it starts and sends the duo out after getting payment.

Meanwhile Laurie’s granddaughter, Allyson (Andi Matichak), asks Karen if Laurie was invited to a celebratory dinner. Karen claims that Laurie was too busy to come, but Allyson knows that Karen most likely never sent an invite out. This becomes clear when Allyson peeks out of her classroom window and notices Laurie standing outside staring back at her; this is an explicit call-back to the original Halloween where a young Laurie peeked out and saw Michael staring back at her. In spending decades preparing for Michael, it seems that Laurie has adopted some of his characteristics. Allyson calls this out when the grandmother and granddaughter reunite outside. The latter pleads with the former to give up the obsession with Michael and return to a semblance of normalcy in order to engage with the family again.

But Laurie is right and Michael proves that her concerns are more than valid when he manages to escape from the bus transporting him for his prison transfer. Now free again, the shape is more than ready to begin his nightmarish slaughter. However, this time there’s a party that’s willing and who’s trained the majority of her life for such an encounter.

The film’s set-up offers a lot of promise by building upon the original’s themes in an organic fashion. Laurie becoming jaded and militaristic after her encounter is understandable. She witnessed a person survive fatal wound upon fatal wound with no genuine injuries. She’s the only one to have an understanding of the terror he brings, so she’s focused on eliminating him and not understanding him. Opposing her are parties that attempt to domesticate Michael, either because they have trouble evaluating what he’s done in a grander or context or because they believe that his drive towards destruction contains within it some kernel of truth which can help inquiries into the psychological nature of evil. All the while, Michael kills without reason and gives no indication that he cares or remembers any of the parties desperate to control him.

If done properly, the narrative could have interweaved between all the different strands chronicling Michael and taken the question of how narratives form around evil to its most literal sense. Alas, the narrative fumbles around with its ideas in haphazard fashion, wasting much of its potential in favor of scraping the surface of the most basic themes. Part of this stems from the noted sub-text problem above; much of the story relies on characters explaining the themes and ideas as opposed to showcasing the same visually or through the sound design, so there’s a constant discord between what the films aspiring to be and what it manages to achieve.

This is an effect of the film’s misguided focus. Instead of building up its primary cast of characters and letting them get entangled naturally as the night builds up, the story gives them only the basest amount of characterization necessary to get them ready for the next story beats. Time that could have been used to flesh out the characters and make their journeys more engaging is spent on building up Michael’s soon-to-victims. These characters are little more than “cannon fodder” and do nothing but converse in “comedic” [1] Comedy is subjective, but most of the jokes between minor characters are irritating more than anything else. fashion. Cuts from the main storyline to these characters are meant to introduce a levity and get the viewer to care about the carnage to come, but the conversations between said characters are so insipid that not only do they not get the viewer to care about what’s to come but also serve as an ugly contrast with the purported severity of what the film is trying to do. It’s hard to take Michael seriously as a threat when his violence is intercut with small talk and comedic banter.

In this sense, what’s missing from the 2018 incarnation of Halloween inherent in the original is a sense of gravitas capable of transforming the on-screen violence into a nightmare that gets under the skin. Without this severity, the discussions of the film’s subtext by major characters feels even more out of place. Consequently, while the film’s depiction of Michael’s night of violence is technically satisfying, none of his murders rises past the level of momentarily shocking spectacle.

REPORT CARD

TLDRHalloween is one of the better attempted sequels to John Carpenter’s seminal 1978 classic, Halloween, but is still a far cry from the original in terms of its ability to leave an lasting mark of fear on its viewers. There’s a missing gravitas that makes this update to the slasher franchise feel lacking, but the technical competence and general respect given to the original film make this more than satisfying for fans looking for decent Halloween or slasher fare.
Rating7.5/10
GradeB

Go to Page 2 for the spoiler discussion and more in-depth analysis.
Go to Page 3 to view this review’s progress report .