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Description

“Trick or Treat, Motherfucker!”

Well, back at it again with the Halloween movie on Halloween night. This October Horror has certainly been a rough one with it being my only one thus far that hasn’t gone the full marathon, and there’s no better film to cover on this night than “Halloween Resurrection”, which is probably one of the most infamous of the Halloween films. Not because of any controversial decisions, but rather of its use of one the laziest premises for any horror film - a reality TV show. I only know of one other franchise that went that route and that was Wrong Turn, a series I’m surprised I haven’t covered - though less because the series is actually good, and more that I haven’t dove into that yet. Still, I’m distracting myself - this isn’t about a series that had one good film and then got worse over time, but rather an entire franchise that had 3 good films and then got worse - and then better - and then worse again - and then better - and worse once more - and so on and so forth.
Previously on Halloween we’ve seen Michael Myers go from a simple-minded murderer to a pagan monster and back again to a murderer, but this time with a focus on killing his sister Laurie Strode. In “H20” we’ve seen Michael Myers rise again to hunt Laurie all the way across the states to attack her, her son, and a bunch of private school children - and him seemingly getting killed after such a long chase. However, as is the case with any long-running horror franchise, you can’t keep a slasher down - and so comes in “Resurrection”, a sequel to “H20” (and thus Halloweens 1 and 2) and the last film to use the original films as a basis before the series would be rebooted/remade under Rob Zombie, then given a sequel, and then re-continued again with the more recent Halloween trilogy. So the question remains: is “Resurrection” any good? Is there fun to be had? Well, the answer to the first question is a solid no, but as for the second… let’s see!

After the events of “H20”, Michael Myers returns and manages to track his sister to an asylum where he finally manages to kill her once and for all. With his objective finally complete, Michael returns back to his old house in Haddonfield - unaware that a group of strangers also have their sights set upon the place. With the legend of the Myers killings growing more and more, a reality TV studio has decided to host a horror-themed show starring local college students who’d be spending a night at the abandoned house, all so that they may “uncover” the secrets as to why Michael Myers became the evil man he is today. As the show continues through the night, the stars dig through the house - learning that they aren’t alone, and that what they thought would be a reality TV show is becoming real - and that the killer, Michael Myers, has chosen them as his latest victims.

This is very much an early 2000’s movie with all the failings you’ve come to expect. The story doesn’t make much sense, especially as it continues on with the “revelations” that the TV show cast finds in the house and how they react to such information, and overall it starts to bore you out - with the waiting for Michael getting so bad that you can’t get much invested into the character’s on-screen. It doesn’t help that their personalities are what you’d expect with a film like this; they’re essentially kill-fodder for when Michael finally goes on his murder-spree. They’re thankfully not hateful, and best of all they aren’t annoying either, but they barely have much character to them and really you could completely ignore them up until the horror stuff actually happens. There is however some interesting ideas, such as how the house is artificially laced with creepy objects such as toys, drawing books, and high-chairs with chains that try and pretend that Michael Myers was always a disturbed psychopath from birth (at least from the perspective of the fictional TV-show producers), and how it presents a false idea of what sort of evil person Michael is. The film suggests that there wasn’t some grand evil origin to Michael, but that he was simply a child that did a terrible thing, and later shown to be a psychopath - a more complex yet darkly realistic approach that would’ve been ingenious had it been in a better made film. Besides that point, however, the film is very paint-by-numbers. It does the things you’d expect from a film of this genre/era, and it does so with a tone that is barely ironic and is overall lazy. Yet, from that comes the hilarity. There are times throughout the film that I had a lot of fun with it, either in laughing at the poor acting or at some of the dumber scenes presented within the film. It’s so comical in places that you can’t help but enjoy it, especially so when it includes two certain celebrities.

The cast is made up of a small number of lesser known actors who don’t really give their best. There aren’t many memorable characters, and what they do is largely boring, up until Michael appears - though really at that point it’s more fun with the slasher than it is with the actual protagonists. However two actors have a lot of fun with this film: show-host Tyra Banks, and rapper Busta Rhymes, who play the producers of the reality show in the movie. Tyra Banks has a few scenes and does some fun things, but Busta Rhymes meanwhile steals the show in practically all the scenes he’s in. Whether he’s verbally or physically fighting Mychael Myers, it’s either hilarious, awesome, or awesomely hilarious. It’s the sort of casting decision that is so stupid it suddenly turns into amazing, and I think the film would’ve been a whole lot worse and forgettable had he and Banks not been in this film. As for Michael Myers, he’s good. You can’t go wrong with doing Myers, and the actor who portrayed him (Brad Loree) did a great job.

The effects are decent, although the scares are pretty weak. There’s a few inventive kills in the film that can be somewhat memorable, but overall it lacks any real punch because the victims aren’t good enough to be invested in what happens to them. Overall I’d say this is the least bloodiest of the film series, which surprised me further when I initially thought this to be a PG-13 horror film but was instead an R-rated movie. There’s a lot of scenes that are very dark, and the utilization of head-set cameras to get the feel of a live-streaming show really ruins the viewing quality in some parts of the film. It gets so pixelated that it feels less like an inventive perspective and more of an obvious indicator of how low-budget the filming was. It’s not as hard to watch as, say, “AVP: Requiem”, but at certain points it can get almost as bad. The music is very typical, and there’s really no other stuff regarding the technical-stuff that’s worth mentioning.

Like I said, this isn’t a good film. “Resurrection” had a lot of problems and as a whole is simply the laziest and cheapest of the Halloween movies, especially in a creative sense. However, whether on purpose or by accident, it is a funny movie to watch. What ultimately stops this from being the worst Halloween movie is that at the very least you can poke fun at the decisions taken as well as the presentation given, and with friends it becomes a hilarious thing to watch during Halloween. So would I recommend it? As a comedy film for friends, absolutely. Shut your brain off and enjoy it for the mess it is.
So with all that done, I wish you all a wonderful Halloween. Although this year’s October Horror has been a mess, at the very least I’ve enjoyed it for as much as I could - and I hope that you all can enjoy yours as well. Thank you, and happy holidays.

Description

“Trick or Treat, Motherfucker!”

Well, back at it again with the Halloween movie on Halloween night. This October Horror has certainly been a rough one with it being my only one thus far that hasn’t gone the full marathon, and there’s no better film to cover on this night than “Halloween Resurrection”, which is probably one of the most infamous of the Halloween films. Not because of any controversial decisions, but rather of its use of one the laziest premises for any horror film - a reality TV show. I only know of one other franchise that went that route and that was Wrong Turn, a series I’m surprised I haven’t covered - though less because the series is actually good, and more that I haven’t dove into that yet. Still, I’m distracting myself - this isn’t about a series that had one good film and then got worse over time, but rather an entire franchise that had 3 good films and then got worse - and then better - and then worse again - and then better - and worse once more - and so on and so forth.
Previously on Halloween we’ve seen Michael Myers go from a simple-minded murderer to a pagan monster and back again to a murderer, but this time with a focus on killing his sister Laurie Strode. In “H20” we’ve seen Michael Myers rise again to hunt Laurie all the way across the states to attack her, her son, and a bunch of private school children - and him seemingly getting killed after such a long chase. However, as is the case with any long-running horror franchise, you can’t keep a slasher down - and so comes in “Resurrection”, a sequel to “H20” (and thus Halloweens 1 and 2) and the last film to use the original films as a basis before the series would be rebooted/remade under Rob Zombie, then given a sequel, and then re-continued again with the more recent Halloween trilogy. So the question remains: is “Resurrection” any good? Is there fun to be had? Well, the answer to the first question is a solid no, but as for the second… let’s see!

After the events of “H20”, Michael Myers returns and manages to track his sister to an asylum where he finally manages to kill her once and for all. With his objective finally complete, Michael returns back to his old house in Haddonfield - unaware that a group of strangers also have their sights set upon the place. With the legend of the Myers killings growing more and more, a reality TV studio has decided to host a horror-themed show starring local college students who’d be spending a night at the abandoned house, all so that they may “uncover” the secrets as to why Michael Myers became the evil man he is today. As the show continues through the night, the stars dig through the house - learning that they aren’t alone, and that what they thought would be a reality TV show is becoming real - and that the killer, Michael Myers, has chosen them as his latest victims.

This is very much an early 2000’s movie with all the failings you’ve come to expect. The story doesn’t make much sense, especially as it continues on with the “revelations” that the TV show cast finds in the house and how they react to such information, and overall it starts to bore you out - with the waiting for Michael getting so bad that you can’t get much invested into the character’s on-screen. It doesn’t help that their personalities are what you’d expect with a film like this; they’re essentially kill-fodder for when Michael finally goes on his murder-spree. They’re thankfully not hateful, and best of all they aren’t annoying either, but they barely have much character to them and really you could completely ignore them up until the horror stuff actually happens. There is however some interesting ideas, such as how the house is artificially laced with creepy objects such as toys, drawing books, and high-chairs with chains that try and pretend that Michael Myers was always a disturbed psychopath from birth (at least from the perspective of the fictional TV-show producers), and how it presents a false idea of what sort of evil person Michael is. The film suggests that there wasn’t some grand evil origin to Michael, but that he was simply a child that did a terrible thing, and later shown to be a psychopath - a more complex yet darkly realistic approach that would’ve been ingenious had it been in a better made film. Besides that point, however, the film is very paint-by-numbers. It does the things you’d expect from a film of this genre/era, and it does so with a tone that is barely ironic and is overall lazy. Yet, from that comes the hilarity. There are times throughout the film that I had a lot of fun with it, either in laughing at the poor acting or at some of the dumber scenes presented within the film. It’s so comical in places that you can’t help but enjoy it, especially so when it includes two certain celebrities.

The cast is made up of a small number of lesser known actors who don’t really give their best. There aren’t many memorable characters, and what they do is largely boring, up until Michael appears - though really at that point it’s more fun with the slasher than it is with the actual protagonists. However two actors have a lot of fun with this film: show-host Tyra Banks, and rapper Busta Rhymes, who play the producers of the reality show in the movie. Tyra Banks has a few scenes and does some fun things, but Busta Rhymes meanwhile steals the show in practically all the scenes he’s in. Whether he’s verbally or physically fighting Mychael Myers, it’s either hilarious, awesome, or awesomely hilarious. It’s the sort of casting decision that is so stupid it suddenly turns into amazing, and I think the film would’ve been a whole lot worse and forgettable had he and Banks not been in this film. As for Michael Myers, he’s good. You can’t go wrong with doing Myers, and the actor who portrayed him (Brad Loree) did a great job.

The effects are decent, although the scares are pretty weak. There’s a few inventive kills in the film that can be somewhat memorable, but overall it lacks any real punch because the victims aren’t good enough to be invested in what happens to them. Overall I’d say this is the least bloodiest of the film series, which surprised me further when I initially thought this to be a PG-13 horror film but was instead an R-rated movie. There’s a lot of scenes that are very dark, and the utilization of head-set cameras to get the feel of a live-streaming show really ruins the viewing quality in some parts of the film. It gets so pixelated that it feels less like an inventive perspective and more of an obvious indicator of how low-budget the filming was. It’s not as hard to watch as, say, “AVP: Requiem”, but at certain points it can get almost as bad. The music is very typical, and there’s really no other stuff regarding the technical-stuff that’s worth mentioning.

Like I said, this isn’t a good film. “Resurrection” had a lot of problems and as a whole is simply the laziest and cheapest of the Halloween movies, especially in a creative sense. However, whether on purpose or by accident, it is a funny movie to watch. What ultimately stops this from being the worst Halloween movie is that at the very least you can poke fun at the decisions taken as well as the presentation given, and with friends it becomes a hilarious thing to watch during Halloween. So would I recommend it? As a comedy film for friends, absolutely. Shut your brain off and enjoy it for the mess it is.
So with all that done, I wish you all a wonderful Halloween. Although this year’s October Horror has been a mess, at the very least I’ve enjoyed it for as much as I could - and I hope that you all can enjoy yours as well. Thank you, and happy holidays.