Halloween (2007)
The Boogeyman has a backstory, who knew?

So many unnecessary remakes these past few weary years, especially of perfectly acceptable horror flicks: The Hills Have Eyes, The Fog, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, The Hitcher, and Dawn of the Dead are but a few of the titles that come instantly to mind. Note to filmmakers: If I forgot to list your particular remake, don't assume I'm letting you off the hook; no way, man. I assure you there is a hook — a very large and roomy hook, as deadly as the one used by Leatherface in Chainsaw Massacre — and you are most definitely still on it.

On a list of cheap horror films not requiring a remake, John Carpenter's Halloween would probably sit at numero uno. This is not because I hold it in any particular reverence. There are many factors that contribute to its status as a classic (It's low cost/ridiculously high profit perhaps being the greatest of these factors), but in truth, Halloween's plot is thin to the point of being almost non-existent. Lop off the surprise twist prologue (and aside from the surprise twist, how much of the story is actually driven by the prologue?), and the story can be seen mainly as a clothesline on which a few suspenseful scenes can be hung. When all is said and done, here is what you have: On Halloween eve and night, a Mysterious Masked Man stalks and kills a few teenagers. Meanwhile, unknown to the kids, a Crazy seeming Old Guy is trying to track down the Mysterious Masked Man. The MMM is about to claim his final victim when the Crazy Old Guy shows up just in time. Could the MMM be the boogie man? The End.

The nominal protagonist in Halloween is a virginal good girl, Laurie Strode, who runs away from the "shape" (as he is referred to in the credits) until she doesn't have to run anymore. This is the fatal flaw of Halloween's story. It is wrongly framed as a Laurie Strode's story when, in fact, she is, and remains throughout, not a protagonist, but a confused bystander. While it's true that she does eventually put up a valiant defense, this is not the same as having to take action. Throughout the film, she is primarily a passive observer of unfolding events, never putting the pieces together until it is too late to do anything. She does not form a plan of action, she does not have to risk anything, she has no try/fail cycle in overcoming the problem facing her.

It is clear who the antagonist is: Big hulking masked menace with a very sharp knife? Check! No need to search any further on that score. And the person who is most directly involved with countering this person? The person who knows what is at stake, who is knowingly risking his life, who has a plan of action, who keeps failing only to try again? That's right, it's Dr. Loomis. Dr. Loomis is the protagonist of Halloween. He is the one who has the history with Michael Myers, who feels responsible for not doing enough, who is prompted to act.

Though Carpenter gave Halloween to the Laurie Strode character, the movie rightfully belongs to Dr. Loomis. For the canny filmmaker, this opens the door to a remake that could prove very interesting. It would, in fact, be a legitimate reason, for once, for remaking one of these old but perfectly acceptable films.

Unfortunately, the trend in remakes is perplexing. The question I hear most often from friends is an anguished, "Why?" If you ever watch the DVD extras on the remakes, all you hear is a bunch of lame mumbling about redefining it for a new generation jibber jabber jib. Fair enough, but they never really redefine anything. They just change a few things, add a few more effects, and extend the finale by infinity minutes.

So it is to Rob Zombie's credit that he did in fact try to look at the original movie from a fresh perspective by questioning the main tenant of the original (and ensuing series): is Michael Myers a murderous young kid who grew up to be a murderous adult? Or is he really a supernaturally powered embodiment of pure evil, which Carpenter, probably wrongly, identifies as fitting the description of the Boogeyman.

To explore the question too far, I think, is to give Carpenter, and original co-screenwriter Debra Hill, too much credit. I believe the origins of Halloween are probably far more prosaic. It's more likely that the film was designed simply to deliver as many thrills and chills as their limited budget would allow and in a very limited amount of screen time. Is Michael Meyers the boogeyman? Perhaps, but then his indestructibility works just as well as a device to allow Laurie to fight back without bringing the action to a halt. Ah, hell, sure. Why not make him the boogeyman, whatever; there is no downside. As Poe's raven might have said, "only this, and nothing more."

But Rob Zombie explores the question, and thereby uncovers some interesting new thematic territory. Dr. Loomis enters the picture early, as Michael is just embarking on his murderous career. The warning signs are all there: loner kid mutilating animals, a tough home life, no stability, poor role models. Is there a chance to stop Michael before he goes to far down the path of the dark side? Is it even possible to turn him around. What if some people are just born to be killers, no matter what you do? I hadn't expected Mr. Zombie to do anything nearly so intriguing; the course of having Loomis confront Michael in the sanitarium is a thematic field of gold: the doctor's hope of curing a patient (later in the film, Loomis is accused of cashing in on Michael's notoriety, but being able to effect a cure would most likely yield greater fame and monetary rewards); the growing despair of seeing little progress as Michael retreats into his world of masks; the sense of futility and failure, the idea that all his study and learning can achieve nothing in the face of the inscrutable mystery that is Michael Meyers, finally, the cynical cashing in on tales of facing "The Eyes of Evil."

And there's even more to explore! Loomis is trained in science and rationality. What if all that science pointed to only one logical conclusion: that the only explanation for Michael Myers is that he is a supernatural agent of evil, not even human, but if not, what? What else could explain his utter failure? This could move the film into Val Lewton territory: horror derived from how quickly our pragmatism can disappear when confronted by something in the shadows, how superstition and primal fears can surface with such stunning swiftness. This is but one direction the film could go. Why are modern horror films always so boringly literal?

I grant you that such a film would do nothing for the unsubtle crowd (the target audience so eagerly sought by producers looking for a big opening weekend) for whom the concept of horror and chainsaws and slicing and dicing have long since become inextricably linked: "That movie sucked! No one got chopped up or anything."

Still, when Michael sat down across the table from Dr. Loomis, and the situation still seemed normal, and the possibilities loomed out before me, I confess I got a little excited. I was hoping that it all might go somewhere. Alas, Mr. Zombie didn't take it nearly far enough. All the lovely scenes I was envisioning failed to materialize. All too soon, it became evident that the opportunities would be lost in favor of rejoining with our regularly scheduled program. All that remained was for Michael to make his inevitable escape and return home and start the meaningless mayhem. And sure, maybe that's what the unsubtle crowd wants to see, but, God, I can't tell you how screamingly boring the standard Maniac Attack film has become to me as the years have gone by.

So, anyway, Michael Myers escapes. He returns to the scene of his previous crimes, and the film devolves into a tired retread of the original film. An hour into its running time, just as in the original, the film is turned over completely to Laurie Strode; and even though Mr. Zombie has tried to develop her backstory a little, it still is not her story. Michael follows her around town, kills some of her friends for reasons that almost make less sense now than they did in the original because now we have spent some little time with him and now we are expecting his actions to have some kind of internal logic. But they don't.

Just to pick on one of those murders: Mr. Zombie even recreates the most ludicrous murder from the original. Linda's boyfriend, dispatched to get beer, meets Michael Myers instead, who promptly pins him up on a wall with an ordinary chef's knife. The logistics of this are impossible; the length of the blade, the thickness of the body, the weight of the body, the amount the blade would have to be in the wall to support the body… boogeyman or no, this murder just ain't gonna happen, folks. Just ain't gonna happen. It's just one of many things that just ain't gonna happen.

So, let's skip to the end — the real end. If you have the double disc director's cut, check out the alternate ending. This is how the film should have ended. Halloween is not Laurie's story, remember, it is the story of Dr. Loomis and Michael, the rational Vs. the supernatural, Dr. Loomis thinking he can map the human mind Vs. the impossibility of penetrating the mystery of Michael Myers. Photographically, it's a beautifully composed shot. The frame is blackness and shadows, broken by twin pools of white: the ghostly whiteness of Michael Myers' mask, balanced by the whiteness of Dr. Loomis' hair. Darkness separates them. They are each in isolation. The soundtrack echoes with the almost hopeful sound of their first conversation. Science, rationality, and logic have completely failed; Michael remains an inscrutable mystery that can never be solved, Dr. Loomis remains as far beyond finding a solution as he ever was. In my book, that's pretty damn creepy; it's certainly more horrifying than the mere cut and slash, the mechanics of gore.

But unfortunately the story has been given over to Laurie Strode, and now it is she who must resolve the problem, even though, strictly speaking, it is not her responsibility. It is she who must dispatch the MMM, and the finale says more for her ability to absorb physical punishment and abuse than it does about her character. As in the first movie, her struggle can have no proper dramatic conclusion because it is still only Laurie, forced into a mindless reaction to an attack she can't understand.

But now I've bashed the film enough. Time to balance the review, because there are some good things. First, the points I've already awarded for attempt at expanding the story. There are some genuinely creepy moments — the outsized mask Michael Myers dons for his first kill spree is both funny and creepy bizarre, a nice touch. The opening scenes were disturbing, and Daeg Faerch embodied the emerging blankness behind the eyes of young Michael Myers well. Tyler Mane is obviously an imposing physical presence, but his performance behind the mask conveys a surprising amount of Michael's character; he's not just stalking about, but portraying a character, as cryptic as that character remains, regardless. The trailer trash messiness, of Michael's early family life was perhaps over-played, but Sheri Moon Zombie finally got me to empathize with her plight as a sad single mother way out of her depth. Her imagination just isn't up to the task of seeing Michael for what he is until it's too late. As I've indicated, I would have loved to have seen Malcolm McDowell given a bit more to play with in the role of Dr. Loomis, and Scout Taylor-Compton gives Laurie a different, more playful side apart from the button-down seriousness that Jamie-Lee Curtis brought to the role — and she has a wonderful rapport with her baby sitting charges. I was rooting for her survival, and that's what she was supposed to make the audience feel. Danny Trejo, it's always a pleasure when he shows up in a film, but after a while, I felt there was a tendency toward too much stunt casting in the film. Richard Lynch, Udo Kier, Clint Howard, Sybil Danning — there's nothing wrong with any of them, but after awhile they all began to seem more like crunchy croutons, tossed into the cinematic salad for hungry film nerds. It broke down the fourth wall and became self-concious. Hey, that's so and so! Yes, I have seen all those old movies, too. Yes, I get it. Don't let it get in the way of your NEW movie!

But in spite of all its good points, Halloween 2007 remains an unnecessary remake and is, overall, a rather dreary affair. It starts out with a nice promise to shake things up, then peters out quickly into a surprisingly faithful reprise of the original movie. With Carpenter and Hill's original film serving as this remake's third act, Mr. Zombie's additions really only succeed in adding a first and second act to the original running time. In the end, however, they don't expand the story in any meaningful way, and that's a darn shame.