Tip jar

If you like CaB and wish to support it, you can use PayPal or KoFi. Thank you, and I hope you continue to enjoy the site - Neil.

Buy Me a Coffee at ko-fi.com

Support CaB

Recent

Welcome to Cook'd and Bomb'd. Please login or sign up.

March 28, 2024, 03:49:33 PM

Login with username, password and session length

The Destruction Of The Halloween Universe/Canon

Started by Malcy, October 06, 2018, 01:00:20 AM

Previous topic - Next topic

Bad Ambassador

Quote from: Shameless Custard on October 25, 2018, 12:52:29 PM
Gonna go see this next Friday, but it's disheartening to read some of the reviews it's getting. After rewatching the perfect original today, I'm really up for a decent sequel. Bit sad to hear this might not be it

But the original. Man oh man. Still a belter

Might rewatch III again soon, as although that has cock-all to do with the first film, it's still a lotta fun. Glad it's so loved on here. We know the score

Um, the new one has had generally excellent reviews. A few negative ones, but its RT score is higher than the remake of Suspiria.

I thought it was superb. A skilful homage to the original that expand its world to allow more thematic material while not diluting the basic thriller elements of the original. It's not trying to say the original was dumb, more allowing it more time and space to explore the fallout from the first film in more depth and implicitly criticising previous sequels' attempts to "explain" Michael in a way that cheapen and undermine the central concept.

The cast is excellent with the exception of New Loomis, who felt a little too much like a caricature, but its easy to see how that character was intended before it was given to an actor who seemed happy to ham it up. The photography takes its cue from the first film - simple, unfussy composition that emphasises the normalcy of the environment invaded by Michael. Carpenter's score is obviously fantastic, probably his best in 30 years. It's a flawed film, but it has been made with love, thought and care by people who really want to get it right and who understand why the first film works.

It's obviously the best Halloween sequel, but it's also one of the best films I've seen this year.

Custard

Well, your post has got me excited! Thanks for that

kngen

Quote from: colacentral on October 21, 2018, 12:11:57 AM
This is not a good film. It's at least worse than Halloween 2, maybe worse than every other sequel.

It's flat and tensionless, often not even feeling like a horror film. Just having a maniac killing dozens of people doesn't make it a horror film, otherwise Silence of the Lambs and No Country for Old Men would be horror films, and I actually think those were scarier, and certainly more tense.

It did itself no favours by opening with the podcasters and spending so much time with them. The use of podcasting seems so unnecessarily zeitgesty in the way that webcams and reality tv were used in Resurrection. And the bloke reminded me of Elaine's boyfriend from London in Seinfeld, same voice, clothes, haircut. Cliche American idea of an English person. Awful character.

And that was the biggest issue - too many characters, and almost all bad. It was like the pilot of a HBO series with how many characters there were in this, and several of them disappeared after a bit. Where did the boyfriend go? Or the black cop in the cowboy hat? Why did a new pair of comic relief cops have to appear doing a Pulp Fiction routine about Korean sandwiches right at the end of the film?

The abundance of characters and even extras is the biggest reason there's no tension. Look at how in the original the streets are deserted; you never see any of the girls' families; that one woman behind the curtain turns off the light and leaves Laurie on the street, and you don't get a sense of anyone being in any of the other houses. That's eerie. It's a dead town.

Compare that to this film where there's a Halloween fiesta going on in the streets and there's a big dance and multiple people around at all times. At one point the grand daughter escapes after Michael kills the fat lad and gets comforted by a family of people and several police officers. There's nothing spooky or dangerous about that.

The scariest moments in the original are when nothing happens: Michael stood in the distance, seen through a foggy window, either staring or carrying the dead body around the side of the house with no scary music to tell you how to feel; or the one girl walking outside to do the laundry and getting stuck in the window. This film had none of that.

And the bit towards the end with the zooms into a load of mannequin heads was laughable, like a parody. This is not a good film. It Follows, which got panned by this forum, is much closer in spirit to what a Halloween film should be.

Saw it last night, and agree with all of this. Very disappointing.

Gonna agree with most reviews so far and say this was good and the best sequel/remake/reboot so far of the series; the score, certain kills, the little kid being babysat character and the final 30 minutes were great

colacentral

I enjoyed this podcast:

https://www.podbean.com/podcast-detail/tveg6-695d0/Halloweenies-A-Michael-Myers-Podcast

The latest episode is over 3 hours of discussing this film. They're pretty disparaging towards it which I needed for my own sanity seeing how successful it's been.

colacentral

^ Interesting thing from this is that they really liked Halloween 6, which they were surprised by. It's the one I always put as the best sequel after 3 but it's generally the one people go to when discussing how bad the franchise is.

It's a bit messy but it has a great atmosphere, very of it's mid-90's time, like Wes Craven's New Nightmare, where it was trying to get tonally back on track and take the genre somewhat seriously after the increasingly goofy slashers of the 80's. I feel like it's got a worse reputation than it deserves both because of its troubled production and because it's the end of the original continuity.

iamcoop

Saw this last night; packed house, Halloween night.

Not one single scream or decent crowd reaction during the whole thing.

It's rubbish.

NoSleep


Famous Mortimer

Quote from: colacentral on October 31, 2018, 04:39:11 PM
^ Interesting thing from this is that they really liked Halloween 6, which they were surprised by. It's the one I always put as the best sequel after 3 but it's generally the one people go to when discussing how bad the franchise is.

It's a bit messy but it has a great atmosphere, very of it's mid-90's time, like Wes Craven's New Nightmare, where it was trying to get tonally back on track and take the genre somewhat seriously after the increasingly goofy slashers of the 80's. I feel like it's got a worse reputation than it deserves both because of its troubled production and because it's the end of the original continuity.
I feel like people who defend Halloween 6 are just jaded sorts who've been on the internet too long. It's such a miserable failure. Like how he's suddenly the recipient of the Mark of Thorn and his indestructibility is due to that curse - one that's never been so much as hinted at in any previous movie. Why are no other members of the cult also immortal, indestructible killing machines? Why does (it's very heavily implied) Michael father a child when the ultimate aim of the cult is to kill every member of his own family? It's stated in the movie that unless he kills all his own family on Samhain, a demon will come down and spread sickness and destruction. Given that he fails every time, why has the demon not started the job? (maybe I'm misunderstanding some intricate part of the plot here). Oh, why didn't the guy who busted him out of prison also help him when he was locked up in part 1, or part 4?

The last half hour feels like they just gathered all the shots they had left and spliced them together at random. The one where Paul Rudd and Donald Pleasance go "huh, I guess we were drugged" when they realised they had nothing to lead on from one particular scene is one I really enjoyed.

Before I get some goon shouting at me, you are (of course) entitled to any damn opinion you please, and that you like part 3 is an indicator you and I like very different things about the series. But part 6?



Bad Ambassador

Making him the chosen one of a Celtic cult is just so incredibly BORING, like you have to put him in a box and label him. He's so much more effective when he's just an unknowable agent of chaos and death, rather than fulfilling a prophecy for a bunch of people doing rituals with candles. It takes all the menace and atmosphere away and replaces it with cheese.

colacentral

No arguments about the plot itself, which is nonsense. But I like the atmosphere and tone. I think you need to watch it as its own thing rather than as another sequel attempting to stretch the story out. I haven't seen 4-8 for years though, to be fair, but my memory is that none of them are good, but that the first half of 6 is at least the creepiest section of that batch of sequels. I think that 6 has just become an easy thing to make fun of ("The mark of thorn???") by jaded types who have been part of the internet hivemind too long as its easy to pick out its flaws and you won't get much argument by stating that opinion. Number 5, for one, is clearly a much worse movie, but gets mentioned much less frequently because it's harder to pretend to be interesting when discussing it.

For clarity, I'm not saying it's good.

And if Halloween 3 was a standalone John Carpenter film with a different name (I know he didn't write and direct it, but it feels like a Carpenter film), then it wouldn't have had a bad reputation for years. It fits alongside the Carpenter films of the time like The Thing and They Live. It has a bit of an 80's Cronenberg feel, and a bit of the Leonard Nimoy Invasion of the Body Snatchers in there too. It's a really good sci-fi horror in its own right and shouldn't be compared to the other Halloween films.

That was my polite reply. I'll add that I think you famous mortimer are a daft ignorant cunt. Of course I must be jaded to see merits in something which the hivemind have passed critical judgement on, you cheeky fucker. I'll add that I'm not a fan of Alien 3, Predator 2, or The Phantom Menace, as you obviously think I'm being contrarian.

colacentral

Quote from: Famous Mortimer on November 02, 2018, 10:21:57 AM
Before I get some goon shouting at me

Rather than add a disclaimer, you could just avoid being a stupid twat.

Bad Ambassador

Curse has the seed of an interesting idea, but its just very-badly bungled in the attempt to give Michael a backstory. There's no understanding of why the first film worked. 5 is just as bad, but throws random elements at the screen that have no connection with each other or previous films. 5 is demonstrably a worse film, but Curse is a bad Halloween film.

SavageHedgehog

There is a case that if you've reached the fifth (or fourth depending on how you look at it) sequel to a pretty open and shut film which was then nailed shut by the first sequel, you may as well go for broke, and Curse at least approaches broke unlike, say, Return of Michael Myers which is far more competent but much blander. For this reason I preferred the Producer's Cut to the Theatrical, with more of the Thorn nonsense, although I wont pretend we're talking night and day here.

I think you could probably make a pretty solid case that Zombie's two films are better than most of the sequels, but I think it's also a case of picking your poison, and I personally find the slasher cheese of #2-6 more appealing than Zombie's adolescent shock tactics and nihilism.

Custard

For the most part, I liked this. Some really good moments scattered throughout, and I actually think they captured the feel and tone of the original film quite well.

But I probably could've done without the doctor/psychologist bloke, the podcasters, and much of the stabs at humour fell completely flat for me. "That's lunch a four year old would make", etc. And there's other stupid lines, like the kid telling his dad that "dancing gets me hard". Did I mishear that, or was that actually said? Urghh.

The last forty or so minutes are solid, however. And although it was clearly sequel baiting, I did enjoy the final showdown. Laurie going all Sarah Connor was a good direction to go in, and Jamie Lee Curtis is excellent throughout, and I really was rooting for her and her family.

So not a particularly great film, but a solid enough sequel to the original, and I'm looking forward to slotting it next to the first film on my shelf.

Three buns

Btw, the IMDB trivia on this film is really interesting. So many nods to the original film and the sequels. I've not seen any of the sequels, but giving II a watch this morning, out of pure curiosity. Maybe H20, too

Bad Ambassador

Quote from: Shameless Custard on November 03, 2018, 09:00:12 AM
And there's other stupid lines, like the kid telling his dad that "dancing gets me hard". Did I mishear that, or was that actually said? Urghh.

I think you just misheard that. I've seen it twice and didn't notice it.

kngen

Quote from: Bad Ambassador on November 03, 2018, 10:07:02 AM
I think you just misheard that. I've seen it twice and didn't notice it.

That's definitely said.

Custard

Thought so! What a bizarrely inappropriate thing to say to your dad. Or is that how da kidz chat these days?

Red Letter Media's review is mostly positive, and pretty much chimed with my own views. But I did laff at Mike saying he thought they were setting up the kid to dance Michael Myers to death

https://youtu.be/90joZNE9oOA

Shaky

Thought this was enjoyably solid but I have mixed feelings overall. It never really comes close to justifying it's existence (could it ever?) and it was impossible to leave 40 years of franchise baggage at the door even if most of the sequels have now been expunged. There were also way too many on the nose script and directorial moments - not sure we needed to be told 40 years had passed quite so many times. It was also almost entirely unscary but reasonably tense. Despite all that, it was decently crafted & paced and Jamie Lee was ace.

I quite liked that it looked at one point as if Loomis #2 was going to don the mask for the rest of the film to become the new Michael, a potential twist that put me in mind of Psycho 2 the novel.


Moribunderast

I thought this was fun for what it was. Gotta say though, is it just a general rule in society now that people talk through horror films and that's okay? Get Out, Hereditary, Halloween, Mother! - all recent horror films I've seen where people just nattered on incessantly throughout. I don't get it. Surely the beauty of a horror film is in it building tension BEFORE the scares? Apparently not as cunts are just there to treat it like a rollercoaster ride where they scream at the scary bits and laugh and chat over everything else. I wish they were all stabbed to death by a masked fellow.

SteveDave

Quote from: Moribunderast on November 06, 2018, 01:14:25 PM
I wish they were all stabbed to death by a masked fellow.

"Be the change you want to see in the world"

SteveDave

This is available now and I was pleasantly surprised to find out that the new doctor was played by Mehmet Osman from Eastenders!

Other than that (and the little kid who was being babysat) it felt very flat.