31 Days to Scare ~ Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers

by 31 Days to Scare, Down from the Shelf, Movie Review • Tags: , , , , ,

The Facts:

Synopsis: Approximately one year after the events of Halloween 4, Michael Myers is back on Halloween night to try and kill the last remaining member of his family. This time, though, the town is ready for him.

Stars: Donald Pleasence, Ellie Cornell, Danielle Harris, Wendy Kaplan

Director: Dominique Othenin-Girard

Rated: R

Running Length: 96 minutes

TMMM Score: (4/10)

Review: With Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers performing so well at the box office, it was a given that another sequel would be put into production.  The cost to produce these films was so cheap that it frankly was a no-brainer to keep the series going until they ran out of William Shatner wigs or relatives of Myers to knock off.  Made and released exactly a year after Part 4, Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers spoils most of the good will that its predecessor earned in service to the ever mighty dollar.

Like Halloween II, Halloween 5 picks up right at the end of Part 4 to create one continuous story.  Myers has escaped yet again and spends an entire year under the care of an old hermit that pulled him out of a quarry.  How Myers knows that Halloween has rolled around again is anybody’s guess but before you can chop up a pumpkin with a carving knife he’s donned his mask once more and is looking for his niece Jamie (Harris) again.

I’m going to tread carefully here so as not to spoil the wicked twist of Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers but let’s just say that Jamie ended that film on a sour note.  What could have set the stage for an interesting exploration of generational traits instead is pretty much forgotten – it’s as if screenwriters Michael Jacobs, Shem Bitterman, and Othenin-Girard (who also directed) didn’t have the cojones to really go to a dark place for this round.  To be fair, the previous film painted any future sequels into a corner so with a small acknowledgement of the events at the end of 4, Halloween 5 just moves on its merry way.

That leaves the film to become just another brainless sequel putting Myers in impossibly well-timed appearances to do his dirty work.  Some of the things the quiet killer does in this entry are beyond the scope of believability and I can’t help but wonder what creator John Carpenter thought of Myers hunting people down with a souped up muscle car instead of his faithful knife.  There’s no rhyme or reason to his stalking here…he does what the script tells him to do without any point.  It’s a pretty sad state of affairs we find Myers in.

Even more embarrassing is Pleasence being subjected to this abject low-brow filmmaking.  I’m not sure if he was contractually obligated to be in the movie or did it for the hell of it but he doesn’t look entirely convinced of what he’s doing going another round with the same killer. 

Aside from Pleasence and an improved performance from Harris, the rest of the cast is dreadfully rotten with Kaplan turning in a most annoying performance of a character we’re supposed to like.  Even the actor playing Myers looks like he’s asleep behind his mask and who can really blame him?

Though it does pick up at the end with a sweaty palm inducing chase though the dilapidated Myers house and a baffling yet intriguing ending, most audiences will already have had their fill of the expired candy that Halloween 5 is giving out.

31 Days to Scare ~ Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers

by 31 Days to Scare, Down from the Shelf, Movie Review • Tags: , , , ,

The Facts:

Synopsis: Ten years after his original massacre, the invalid Michael Myers awakens and returns to Haddonfield to kill his seven-year-old niece on Halloween. Can Dr. Loomis stop him?

Stars: Donald Pleasence, Ellie Cornell, Danielle Harris

Director: Dwight H. Little

Rated: R

Running Length: 88 minutes

TMMM Score: (6/10)

Review: You just can’t keep a bad guy down and it only took seven years and one misguided sequel in name only (Halloween III: Season of the Witch) for Michael Myers to return to the big screen.  Producer Moustapha Akkad was a pretty keen businessman and when the rights to the franchise reverted back to him he didn’t waste time in assembling the pieces that would bring the killer also known as The Shape to fans across the country. 

Forgetting the previous sequel for the stumbling block it was, Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers was a tight little horror film that gave fans of the series exactly what they asked for and maybe a little something more.  In 1988, audiences were becoming immune to the endless entries featuring Jason and Freddy but hadn’t yet been satiated on the silent killer wearing a reconfigured William Shatner mask. 

Opening with shots of the sleepy town of Haddonfield IL, there’s a nice atmosphere introduced from frame one.  When John Carpenter’s unforgettably simple theme starts to play, it comes at such a precise moment that you can’t help but get a sliver of a shiver up your spine.  Though we ended Halloween II thinking Myers had perished in a fire along with his psychiatrist (Pleasance), Halloween 4 tweaks history just a tad to keep both figures alive. 

Through a sequence of events that doesn’t stretch credibility as much as one might think, Myers is headed back to his hometown to stir up some more trouble and dispatch anyone that gets in his way.  What he’s after seems to be his niece (Harris), now orphaned after her parents were killed in an auto accident (a picture of Jamie Lee Curtis stands in for the actress).  The niece…named Jamie of course…is out and about trick or treating with her foster sister Rachel (Cornell) when Uncle Mike comes a callin’.

Pleasence is also present, reprising his role as Dr. Loomis who yet again is tasked with bringing down Myers no matter the cost.  Pleasence is an agreeable force in the movie, lending it a nice vibe with his lived in look and musings on the nature of evil.  Though hardly ever speaking above a whisper, he conveys authority with ease…it’s too bad Myers isn’t as easily swayed as we are.

The script is the product of four (four!) writers but what could have been a real mess of styles and themes are rounded out nicely in Alan B. McElroy’s screenplay that explains more about the origins of evil and how it relates to Myers.  In future entries, there would be an almost supernatural element to the power of Myers but here it’s just suggested that evil is something that arrives by nature and not by nurture. 

Director Little moves the pieces of the film around in an orderly fashion with solid but overly workmanlike nature.  Neither Harris nor Cornell have the acting chops to pull the whole thing off without a few hiccups but things could have been much worse in the acting department considering how fast and cheap movies were made then.   

Abandoning the anthology idea that was introduced in Halloween III: Season of the Witch, the homecoming of Myers has a devious little ending that caps off this above average sequel to Halloween.