Short Cuts – In Theaters: Halloween (2007)

Rob Zombie gets it. He understands implicitly what makes horror such a potent genre for fright fans. He’s not quite a full fledged master of macabre, but he’s getting there in amazing leaps and outstanding bounds. Frankly, the grumbling from terror devotees was all but expected when it was announced that John Carpenter’s seminal slasher film, Halloween, was poised for the mandatory post-millennial remake. After all, with already in the can disasters like The Fog to reference, and Zombie’s status as a novice director (the magnificent The Devil’s Rejects not withstanding), there was cause to be concerned. Very concerned. So as the summer season casts its final lots this weekend, the lack of publicity and bifurcated buzz would suggest that all the trepidation was warranted.

Well, that’s garbage. Halloween is brilliant. It’s a stroke of slice and dice genius. It represents some of the most solid film work this growing fright night giant has ever brought to the big screen, and it argues for putting real fear aficionados behind the lens of your latest take on a tale of terror. This is not a rip off of Carpenter’s archetypal effort. It’s also not a sloppy, substandard attempt to cash in on the fanbase’s love of an original masterwork. Instead, this is a genuine and heartfelt tribute to the man who made masked killers relevant in a decade dominated by aliens, giant sharks, and existential human dramas. When it comes to other pioneers from dread’s determined past, Zombie is first and foremost a follower. His unabashed love for the monster movies that make up his novel, no holds barred aesthetic, is obvious in every frame of this brutal, shocking spectacle.

If you don’t know the premise – and Zombie messes with it enough to warrant a repeat – here’s how Michael Myers becomes a maniac. As a kid, young Michael is abused. His horrid stepdad undermines him emotionally, and his mother withholds love as part of her lousy lifestyle coping skills. He is also picked on at school, teased for his mom’s career choice (she’s an advertised stripper at a local dive) and the resulting bullying and bad home life have driven him to a very dark place. He kills his pets, and has frequent violent outbursts. One Halloween, he snaps, and the result is a half dozen corpses. Hospitalized under the care of Dr. Loomis, our jaundiced juvenile doesn’t comprehend the gravity of his actions. After another murderous attack, he turns silent for the next 15 years. On the eve of his prior atrocities, Michael escapes from the mental hospital. With one goal on his mind, and Loomis hot on his trail, he intends to make everyone pay for what they have done to him.

With the focus on Michael as a young boy, and the obvious initial sequences that ask us to sympathize with his sickening psycho-in-training, Zombie is out to, of all things, humanize this killer. Not to apologize for him, but merely clarify. By turning him into a flesh and blood, three dimensional person, we’re better prepared for the senseless mayhem to follow. It’s hard to describe how effective the first act is. While he’s definitely doing nothing more than a hundred FBI profilers and their explanations regarding the grotesque groundwork that predicts future slaughter, Zombie gets us to experience, and better yet, recognize, why these elements result in a desire for death. There is also a clever mask motif which helps complicate the case even further. Michael often expresses that he is ‘ugly’ and ‘not himself’, and the face-shielding symbol is a wonderful way of reminding us of his past…and his penchant.

At its core, this new version of Halloween focuses on those most primal of emotions – rage and fear. The characters here are not smart aleck a-holes scoffing as knives are brandished at their drunk and debauched faces. Instead, Zombie really emphasizes the inherent terror of the slaughter sequences we witness. Individuals plead and panic. They fight back in fits of blind horror and suffer in ways that are more realistic and repulsive than some showy stunt special effect. This is a very bloody and brutal film, but Zombie never goes for gratuity. Instead, it’s all a matter of explaining and expressing how fright fuels a human’s instinctual desire to live. Conversely, Halloween is also heavy with anger. This is a mad movie, a narrative soaked in the infinite ire of a powerless persona seeking security – and some self-serving revenge – from a rotten, regressive existence. Michael is an abomination because he can only be satisfied by suffering.

When Carpenter created his film nearly 30 years ago, he was working as a journeymen hoping to branch out into the realm of the artist. He cribbed from Hitchcock and Hooper, as well as drive in titans like Bob Clark. His version of events was all about style – the extended tracking shot that starts the film, the moments where Michael and his intended victims play an apprehensive game of hide and seek among the massive shrubbery of Haddonfield. For his part, Carpenter was going for the glory as well as the gonzo, and that’s why his brilliant merging of vision and vileness still works today. Zombie’s efforts are no different. There are amazing directorial flourishes in the film, including a compelling use of freeze frame as well as an evocative moment were all movement stops except for the camera, which swings around to capture the young Michael in menacing, dead eyed mode. Anyone who says that Zombie is not a full fledged filmmaker should have their critical credentials revoked. Of course, with the way horror is routinely marginalized by the mainstream for the masses, such a sentiment is not such a surprise.

It also should be pointed out that the acting here is superb, with performances that really sell the entire sordid storyline. Oddly enough, Malcolm McDowell is one of the weaker links. He’s far from bad, but his Dr. Loomis is not given much to do except act as a catalyst for the last act police hunt. On the other hand, the director’s wife, Sherri Moon Zombie, finally emerges from under her husband’s nepotistic shadow to give a wonderful turn as Michael’s messed up mom. There’s a tenderness and a tentativeness in how she interacts with her son. As the young killer, Daeg Faerch is fascinating. He does a great job of precariously balancing his underage demon between kid and killer concepts, and Scout Taylor-Compton is fine as Laurie “Scream Queen” Strode. Perhaps the biggest revelation among many is former Halloween heroine Danielle Harris. When she was younger, she played the original Michael’s niece, as part of the fourth and fifth installments of the franchise. Now, she is Annie Bracket, and her interaction with the new slayer is sensational. It’s a brave, bravura effort.

Upon reflection, one has to feel sorry for Zombie. The overblown press who believes horror is nothing but entertainment excrement to be endured on behalf of an ever shrinking paycheck are going to ream him six ways to sundown. They’re going to reference the original (though it’s a guarantee most have not see it in 29 years, if ever) and call it a day, using Carpenter as a crutch to argue that Zombie should have never been handed the remake ropes. Similarly, current horror fans who consider Scream the genre’s shining post-modern moment and lack the basic context to consider anything different will complain like cowards about how ‘routine’ and ‘not scary’ this take on their hallowed hack and splat is.

In both cases, they’re missing the bigger picture. In the first film, John Carpenter was concentrating on the citizenry of Haddonfield. Michael was a monster – the real bogeyman – and for them, it was a question of survival. In Halloween circa 2007, Rob Zombie decided to focus on the fiend. As with most senseless crime, the victims are important, but not iconic. No, in this case, the making of a murderer and the consequences of his cravenness are what really intrigued this fan. The result becomes one of the smartest, most shattering horror films in a very long time. Don’t worry if you end up liking what you see. The wet blankets usually come around once the wool is dry. No, Rob Zombie definitely gets it. And if you do as well, then you’ll understand exactly what’s so special about this amazing movie.