Halloween Kills 2021 Movie Review
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Halloween Kills 2021 History
In 2018, David Gordon Green’s reboot of “Halloween” left me with the impression that the gifted director had fundamentally misunderstood what succeeded about the John Carpenter original, resulting in a project that was devoid of genuine tension, in spite of a few impressive set pieces. After seeing his follow-up film, “Halloween Kills,” I believe I was correct. With a bizarre, unrefined commentary on mob mentality that is quite simply some of the worst material in either Green’s career or the history of this rocky franchise (which is saying something when you’ve seen, say, “Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers”), this film muddles its entire concept even further. Even more unfortunate is that while there are some effective set pieces here—and the ones here are particularly brutal—campy dialogue that draws attention to itself, too much fan service in the references department, Laurie Strode herself being sidelined for the majority of the project, and truly inconsistent characters combine to produce a final product that is certainly not lethal. It hardly even causes any pain.
Following directly after the conclusion of the 2018 picture (and it’s likely not a coincidence that the majority of the action takes place at Haddonfield Memorial Hospital), “Halloween Kills” appears to be an obvious allusion to the original sequel. But it starts by introducing a few new/old characters, some of whom will be familiar to fans of the Carpenter films but who will be unfamiliar to viewers of the Green films. The most well-known of these is Tommy Doyle (Anthony Michael Hall), the child Laurie was babysitting on that fateful night in 1978 when the incident occurred. Every year, he gathers with other survivors, including Lindsey Wallace (Kyle Richards, reprising her part from the 1978 original), Marion Chambers (Nancy Stephens, reprising her role from the first two films), and Lonnie Elam (Kyle Richards, reprising his role from the 1978 original) (Robert Longstreet, not in the Carpenter movie,d but the character is). They’re getting together on Halloween to commemorate surviving the most horrible night of their lives four decades after it happened, but they’re really being set up as future victims for anyone who has ever watched a horror film (which is, based on their behavior, absolutely no one in Haddonfield).
The following day, across town, Cameron (Dylan Arnold) comes across the bleeding body of Deputy Hawkins (Would Patton), who is taken into custody and taken to the hospital, where the two will later share a room with Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis). The original film ends with Michael Myers escaping the burning house from which he escaped and beginning a genuinely savage rampage through the streets of New York City. Continuing on that trend, “Halloween Killings” is a significantly darker film than its predecessor, and it has more than a dozen of what slasher aficionados once referred to as “quality kills,” which are particularly effective. In the meantime, Laurie’s daughter Karen (Judy Greer, who has at least a little more to do this time around than she did last time) tries to prevent Laurie’s granddaughter Allyson (Andy Matichak) from joining the mob organized by Tommy to track him down as Myers makes his way through Haddonfield. During the course of their chanting “Evil dies tonight,” they make a number of blunders, to put it mildly.
“The plot of ‘Halloween II’ totally hinges, of course, on our old buddy the Idiot Plot, which necessitates that everyone in the movie behave at all times like an idiot,” Roger Ebert said about the first “Halloween II” back in 1981. The fact that co-writers Green, Danny McBride, and Scott Teems had this quote written on a whiteboard in the writer’s room is a testament to the fact that they get this part of being authentic to the previous two movies correct the most of any of their other work. There’s something incredibly stupid about everyone in “Halloween Kills,” whether it’s Tommy’s mob, which forms far too easily, the common trope of victims who know there’s a killer on the loose investigating the thump upstairs instead of simply fleeing, or some truly ridiculous decisions made in the final scenes that defy all logic. Because when a film like “Halloween Kills” is successful, the “Idiot Plot” will be overlooked by the audience. It is only when they are not invested that it becomes an issue, which is exactly what is happening here.
There are a few brief moments where the workmanship on display here helps to make the Idiot Plot a little easier to overlook. The film is shot with a fluid viciousness by Michael Simmonds, and the editing by Tim Alverson allows things like burst jugulars and broken heads to stay in the viewer’s mind. We are surprised that the film is being released on Peacock so rapidly because it is the type of picture that works best when viewed with a crowd, particularly at midnight, applauding each new murder as it takes place.
Despite the fact that I believe even the most ardent fans of the last Green film would be disappointed even in a large crowd. The most significant distinction between Carpenter’s and Green’s views comes down to the concept of momentum. The first “Halloween” is lean and mean, whereas its sequel can’t keep its audience’s attention for more than a few minutes at a time, and so it resorts to corny, overheated language to impart the gravity that the film’s lack of momentum lacks. Laurie’s monologues, in particular, are a mishmash of drivel about irresistible evil that is difficult to follow. And fans will be quite disappointed that she scarcely leaves the hospital or has any significance in the plot, which is a perplexing move given how much fans of the previous picture appreciated Curtis’ reappearance, which seemed to connect Myers and Strode together before untying them again here.
Halloween Kills 2021 Release
‘Halloween Kills’ adheres to the famous sequel pattern of ‘Again, But More of It’. There are more kills, more characters, more references, and more general mayhem in this installment of the game. All of this, however, serves to detract from the story of a bogeyman who came to life and transformed into something else entirely. So many versions of Michael Myers have appeared over the years, from John Carpenter’s to Rob Zombie’s to all of the different sequels in between those two filmmakers, and there are yet more to come. When I think about it, I’m surprised that a director with undeniable talent, such as David Gordon Green, could produce, barring an incredible comeback in the already-greenlighted “Halloween Ends,” what will be one of the franchise’s most forgettable entries.
The film will be released in theaters on October 14th and on Peacock on October 15th.
