Friday, 19 February 2010

Halloween 6: The Curse of Michael Myers (1995)


"He's come back...and he's very angry!"
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By this point, Michael Myers had been doing the same slasher shit for well over ten years, so the producers (those money grubbing Weinstein's) thought that in order to keep and hold the audiences interest, they must expand on explaining the boogeyman. Yeah, not that great an idea there. Michael Myers is who is he is because he originally was just purely, simply evil, but the fact that they gave him a reason and more understanding just diminishes who he is.
~~~
So it is now 1995, and after six years of being unheard of Mikey is back. The film starts off with the heroine of the previous two films giving birth to a baby while being held captive by her Uncle Michael. It's never explained if Michael had raped Jamie (which is sick) or anything. It is heavily implied, however. Jamie escapes but eventually meets her demise in a abandoned barn where Michael finds her and cuts her body up with a deadly machine. Back in Haddonfield the family that raised Jamie's mother Laurie, the Strode's (Jamie Lee Curtis) now live in the Myers House. What is completley ridiculous is how none of the family members living in the house (besides the jackass father) knows that the house once belonged to the Myers family. Really? None of them ever knew that the lived in the most infamous house in town?? Anyway, we now follow Kara Strode played by Marianne Hagan who creates a strong, likeable character who get unfortunatley trapped in a night of mayhem. It just so happens that Tommy Doyle, who was babysat by Laurie in the original film, lives across the street from Kara and her family. He like Dr. Loomis, has an obsession with killing Michael. Tommy is played with determination by a young Paul Rudd, and he seems very commited to his role/performance.

Michael belongs to a cult, and for his last sacrifice he needs Jamie's (his?) baby which Tommy is hiding. The cult and curse aspects ruin the film, and really had no place, but in the producer's cut they go into it a lot deeper I suppose. Tommy has to protect Kara and her almost catonic son Danny as well as the baby Stephen. How will he do it?....

 Now, by itself, the film's alright -- it's very dark, not just lighting wise but the subject matter and Michael is actually played as a very ominous and frightening shape of terror. It has some nice kills, but the blood and gore is at times favored over suspense and build up (which is key). The biggest problem with the film is of course the rough story and plot development, because of having to cut/remove scenes which drastically changed the entire film. The performances are actually pretty good with the standouts being Hagan, Rudd, and Pleasence in his last film role. This film also marked the last chapter in this storyline (Jamie's as opposed to Laurie's), before moving on to the more simplistic followings of Halloween: H20, which is a direct sequel to Halloween 2, and ignores the fourth, fifth, and sixth films. I perfer Laurie's storyline to Jamie's mostly due to its real suspense, and how it does not get all tangled up in stupid characters, unnecssary gore and sex, and lame plot developments.

Halloween 6 is a fun film for Myers fans, that's usually pretty good, but never all that great.


What say you??

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