This is the eleventh "Halloween" film. It means well and is mostly fun. It features some strong kills, decent payoffs, and well photographed and put together set pieces. I think David Gordon Green (big fan of "Prince Avalanche") is an excellent director. It's wonderful to see an older woman leading a horror film, twice as wonderful that the woman is Jamie Lee Curtis. But the newest "Halloween", like all of the sequels, doesn't seem to understand that the spirit of the original is in its simplicity.
So this time around we see THE SHAPE kill far more people, we visit far more locations, we're introduced to more characters (although having three generations of Survivor Girls is cool), we get more backstories... but we lose the straight shot of suspense that defined the original.
The stalking, the hunting, the silence, all of that is gone in favor of ramped up violence, more random kills, and less tension building. The new film is less horror/suspense and more action/horror. I assume this is the case for two reasons:
1. Carpenter's simplicity is incredibly difficult. 2. Sequels always come with story baggage.
I think there was a much more interesting and subtle take on Laurie Strode PTSD that would have gotten us to the same ending, elicited the same emotion, and given this great actress a lot more range to work with.
However we do get some star making turns from Andi Matichak, Miles Robbins, and Jibrail Nantambu.
This is not "Halloween". It's "Halloween" fan fiction. It's not the worst of the sequels, but its still just "Halloween" in name only.
PS: And that cold open... just awful. That's what "working too hard" looks like.
So this time around we see THE SHAPE kill far more people, we visit far more locations, we're introduced to more characters (although having three generations of Survivor Girls is cool), we get more backstories... but we lose the straight shot of suspense that defined the original.
The stalking, the hunting, the silence, all of that is gone in favor of ramped up violence, more random kills, and less tension building. The new film is less horror/suspense and more action/horror. I assume this is the case for two reasons:
1. Carpenter's simplicity is incredibly difficult. 2. Sequels always come with story baggage.
I think there was a much more interesting and subtle take on Laurie Strode PTSD that would have gotten us to the same ending, elicited the same emotion, and given this great actress a lot more range to work with.
However we do get some star making turns from Andi Matichak, Miles Robbins, and Jibrail Nantambu.
This is not "Halloween". It's "Halloween" fan fiction. It's not the worst of the sequels, but its still just "Halloween" in name only.
PS: And that cold open... just awful. That's what "working too hard" looks like.