Halloween: Resurrection Review
Written by: joeytonz
Charting the downgrading of the Halloween series is tantamount to reversing human civilization; demoting the human race from civilized, intelligent and rational beings to hairy, misshapen and farting gorilla-men shitting in their tiger-skin togas. If the original Halloween is the valedictorian of his senior class in Yale scoring with hot chicks, telling witty jokes to large laughing crowds and curing cancer while singing a Latin aria, than Halloween: Resurrection would be the retarded fat kid with thick glasses and a lazy eye who randomly shouts "mayonnaise" on the short bus, as he shakes his hat off his head, shits himself, and licks the window. The series has had its ups (parts 2, 4, H20) and its downs (3, 5, 6), but never has any franchise been delivered such a hard, collective kick in the proverbial balls than Halloween: Resurrection has to its beloved fan base.
The beginning of the film finds two nurses in an insane asylum discussing the plight of Laurie Strode, who now resides there. Short Old Black Nurse annoyingly dictates what has happened to Laurie in the past to Plain Young White Nurse, providing exposition for exactly the kind of people who came to see a horror movie starring an obnoxious rapper and Rookie of the Year: people with awful taste and nothing better to do. True fans need no annoying exposition, but then again, this film was not made for true fans. Jamie Lee Curtis, former godmother of the series, was contractually obligated to appear in this installment, a previous stipulation of making H20; however, she allegedly liked the script so much that she expanded her role. Don't believe the hype. The only thing she liked about the script was the resolution of her character: her demise at the hands of Michael, not one of fear, but of relief and unyielding valor. After the last stab that Michael's blade would ever inflict upon her person, her body slowly tumbles down through the foliage of the autumn trees…as does the quality of this movie, only much MUCH quicker.
We then meet Sara as she wistfully rides her ridiculous Vespa through her college campus, which is the most development her character will receive: a Vespa owner. She hooks up with her stereotype, Jen, who mugs for the camera and unintentionally ends up acting like some idiot who accidentally wandered on-camera and decided to stay. They go and meet Rudy, fulfilling his part as being 1/3 of the black trifecta that this movie is depending on to get asses in the seats. He's chopping veggies, because he wants to be a chef. He'll reference food nonstop throughout the movie. Character development for Rudy: check. They all provide more exposition by discussing the "contest" they have entered, that of spending a night in Michael Myers's former home, now an abandoned house, for a grand prize of a random sum of money. Sara goes back to her dorm and chats with her online "mate" of sorts, Deckard, a fifteen-year-old boy pretending to be older. Deckard's friend, who remains one of the most annoying actors I have ever seen in film, continues to over-annunciate every last syllable of his dialogue, spastically freak out over Deckard's lack of attention to him (probably a gay thing) and fail to keep his Parkinson's in check. All at once!
And what's with this score? This simple, brainless plucking of guitar strings that sounds like it should be complementing footage of old cowboys sitting around a fire, bitching about life?
Anyway, we finally meet Busta's character, Freddie. Freddie owns Dangertainment, some sort of entertainment company that the filmmakers don't even bother to explain. He lives in a motel and watches royalty-free karate films. His sideburns don't come close to symmetrically matching. He is also mentally retarded. Character development for Freddie: check. We then meet the rest of the cast, who I won't even bother describing because they're all as vapid as the would-be love child of Paris Hilton and a dick-shaped can of beans. I will, however, briefly detail Rookie of the Year's character: he's constantly thinking about boobs and sex and is supposed to come off as the jovial horn ball, but actually comes across as the creepy sex offender your mother warned you about. He'll spend the entire movie grinning and licking his lips. While the Scooby Doo gang is exploring the house and "discovering" planted bullshit, Deckard and his gay mate attend to a Halloween party. Deckard, being the nerd that he is, immediately finds a private room with a ginormous computer monitor and tunes in for the Myers House broadcast. Soon, the room is full of curious party-goers, all who would rather watch stupid kids wander around in the dark than drink, fuck and listen to hip hop. They all enter Michael's house, but…UNSURPRISING TWIST…so does Michael! He takes his good old time, dispatching each victim one by one. Jen gets her head cut off, and as it bounces down the steps, I wonder to myself "when did this series descend into nothingness?" People get stabbed, heads get crushed and the talentless get impaled on rusty gates.
Soon only Sara and Freddie remain (trapped inside by some apparently inescapable twenty-year-old boards nailed over the windows). Deckard, watching the internet broadcast, tries to warn Sara and Freddie of their impending doom via Sara's Palm Pilot, as the director lamely references Hitchcock's Rear Window. Busta karate kicks Michael out the window and he gets hung in some power lines. Of course he's dead, right? No, he's not fucking dead, but I wish everyone in this movie was. Sara attacks Michael with a chainsaw and still manages to barely hurt Michael, as the filmmakers actually have the audacity to have Sara blurt out, with each saw swipe, "This is for Rudy! This is for Jen! This is for all of them!" Then, of course, she falls and has heavy Foley board equipment fall on top her. Surely this is the end of Sara and the movie...or this is the part where Busta pops in and acts the hero part in the corniest and most overly-dramatic scene in the movie. He swats at Michael with a shovel, and instead of beating his head with the metal part, figures he'll just beat Michael's shoulder with the wooden part. Way to go, hero. After doing retarded karate, Freddie is stabbed once and thrown aside. Why only once? Because idiotic 16-year-olds from the Bronx who test-screened this mofo wanted Busta to live. And we are now suffering because of it.
Halloween: Resurrection goes down the list of ways Michael hadn't yet been killed, picks the most ridiculous one, and utilizes it: electrocution of his dingle-thing. After Michael's temporary demise, Busta realizes he has seen the error of his ways. Upon being asked by some reporters about his enounter with Michael Myers, Busta nobly responds, "Michael Myers is not a soundbyte...Michael Myers is a killer shark in baggy ass overalls who gets his kicks from killing everyone and everything he comes across." Jesus... But hey, thank God, it's finally over. Or is it? Michael's eyes pop open at the very end of the film. Yes, much like the ignorance of test screen audiences, the Halloween franchise will never die. Had the filmmakers book ended this film with Jamie Lee, still not giving her much to do during the bulk of the film, yet having her inexplicably show up to kill Michael--and fine, die in the process--at the end, it would have made this film feel less unnecessary.The creators of Hypercube and The Birds 2 felt otherwise. And thus ends a series that started off brilliantly and would ultimately cock-whip the audience with Halloween: Resurrection.