Halloween II (2009)

Dir. Rob Zombie

One year on from her ultra-violent and blood-drenched encounter with her psychotic brother Michael Myers, and Laurie Strode is still trying to come to terms with the trauma. With her brother’s body still missing and All Hallows Eve just around the corner, Laurie soon realises that the terror she experienced the previous year was just the beginning. Like the tagline states, and because slasher villains are just too darn lucrative to kill off: Family is forever. We learn that, unsurprisingly, the supposedly dead Michael Myers has actually been living a hermetic existence in the countryside, and as the anniversary of the massacre approaches, he returns to Haddonfield once more to ‘reunite’ his dysfunctional family.

With his remake of Halloween, Rob Zombie attempted to explore the man behind the mask - Michael Myers. Delving into Myers’ troubled childhood and dysfunctional family Zombie attempted to address the issues that made Myers the relentless killing machine he grew up to be and show how someone could potentially commit such atrocities. This aspect of his remake was perhaps its most original and compelling segment before it eventually plummeted into repetitive, mindless violence and tensionless cliché. With his follow up, Zombie maintains this trajectory and not only probes Myers’ mindset again (as he experiences vivid visions of his spectral mother (Sherri Moon Zombie) with a white horse urging him to ‘reunite’ their family) but also the fragile and damaged psyche of Laurie Strode as she attempts to get her life back on track and cope with the devastating events of the previous Halloween. As the self-destructive and lost Laurie, Scout Taylor-Compton delivers a nerve-wrecking performance. Elsewhere, Malcolm McDowell returns as Dr Loomis, now getting rich off of the sales of his new bestseller – a sensationalist book about Myers and his family. McDowell layers the ham on thick and renders his Loomis a dislikeable hot head who serves no purpose other than to offend people.

Zombie’s Halloween II is not a remake of Rick Rosenthal’s 1981 slasher, though he does explicitly reference its hospital setting in the opening scenes of this film *spoiler alert* that are later revealed to be one of Laurie’s recurring nightmares. Zombie opts to focus on Laurie as she continues on her downward spiral into depression, reckless abandon and despair. She now lives with her friend Annie (Danielle Harris) – another survivor from the first film, and Annie’s father Sheriff Brackett (Brad Dourif) in a modest house on the outskirts of Haddonfield. She works in a café populated by Alice Cooper loving Goths and confides everything to her counsellor Barbara (Margot Kidder).

To say Halloween II is brutally violent doesn’t really do it justice. Zombie truly outdoes himself with the gut-churning, sweat-inducing and relentless violence he depicts throughout this twisted tale. Heads are pummelled into the dirt, flesh is eviscerated and blood doesn’t so much flow as feverishly erupt from the plethora of broken bodies that lay in the wake of Myers’ murderous rampage. The violence eventually has a numbing effect: none of the characters are particularly likeable anyway and each attack has no tension leading up to it – it soon wears thin, as Myers shows up, usually out of nowhere, and mindlessly slaughters two dimensional hick-ville stock-types. The special effects and make-up are strikingly realistic though and at first they create an uneasy and powerful impact – however as mentioned, the violence soon begins to throw up a numbing and distancing wall. The plot lurches spasmodically and violently forward as the bodies pile up and Myers closes in on the unsuspecting Laurie.

Where Zombie does undeniably excel though is in his astute ability to create a creepy, dank and memorable atmosphere. The scenes where the hooded Myers converses with his dead mother and his younger self (Chase Vanek) are ethereally lit and exude a dreamlike quality, with Sherri Moon-Zombie resplendent in moon-white robes and resembling some Shotgun Wedding Bride of Frankenstein. Moon-Zombie delivered a moving, committed performance as Myers’ mother in the first film, however she isn’t really given a lot to do here except look forlorn and spooky – but it sort of works and goes some way to realise Myers’ unhinged outlook on the world and provide the film with some truly striking visuals.

The production design by Garreth Stover really enhances Zombie’s sleazy, grimy and downright grainy aesthetics; sets are cluttered with all manner of bizarre bric-a-brac and lurid lighting. Laurie’s bedroom is strewn with the remnants of her shattered life, her walls are adorned with EMO-dark paintings and soul-purging graffiti. Haddonfield has never looked so ramshackle or dilapidated – so far removed from Carpenter’s cosy suburban vision in the late Seventies. The lurid Halloween party scene in ‘Uncle Meats’ is another showcase for Zombie’s off-kilter, carnivalesque style and it features an array of weird, freakish costumes worn by even more grotesque caricatures, sorry, characters. We also venture once again into the squalid Red Rabbit strip club for one of Myers’ more disturbing attacks. No one does creepy, soiled and nauseating like Zombie – who also makes atmospheric use of old Moody Blues song Nights in White Satin - with its eerie beauty and deep melancholy.

Halloween II is a truly visceral film that while not note-perfect, still proves that Zombie is an imaginative filmmaker with genuinely disturbing and discomforting vision and more than capable of creating an atmosphere crawling with grit, sleaze and gut-churning anxiety.