Franchises: Halloween. Halloween (6): The Curse of Michael Myers (1995)

If you've seen the VHS and early DVD releases of this film, you likely saw the blurb from the "Academy of Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror Films" (I have no clue who they are or if they even exist) on the covers which proclaimed it was, "The scariest Halloween of them all!" Can't say I agree with that sentiment, but it is arguably the most controversial Halloween of all, not only in regards to its plot and story elements but also its production history. Ooh, boy, is this one polarizing. Most absolutely despise it and consider it among the worst, if not the absolute absolute worst, feeling it completely ruined the character of Michael Myers, the series' mythos, and so on, while others enjoy it because it was ambitious enough to do something vastly different from the previous films, even if they feel it wasn't completely successful. When I first looked up the Halloween series in our satellite provider's programming guide for October of 1999, I couldn't have comprehended just how much baggage it had. My first hint came when I looked the films up on websites devoted to the series and I often saw plot synopses for both the theatrical version and something called the "Producer's Cut," but I never paid much attention to the latter because I was still too young at the time to understand what that meant. I had no idea about director's cuts, theatrical cuts, TV cuts, and such; I just assumed that a movie simply was what you saw whenever you watched it on either video or TV, or in the theater. But over the years I learned more and more about the film's incredibly troubled production and that the Producer's Cut which was the initial version before it was re-shot and -edited after some disastrous test screenings. Thus, I've always found Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers to be one of the most fascinating entries in any franchise, not just Halloween. Not only are its production history and alternate versions very interesting but, for a long time, there was a mystique to it as it was difficult to determine what exactly went on behind the scenes. The Halloween: 25 Years of Terror documentary and other sources, such as interviews with writer Daniel Farrands on podcasts and at convention panels, shed some light on it, but until Scream Factory's Blu-Ray set and books like Taking Shape came about, it was still a big gray area.

What I hoped to accomplish when I first wrote this review, besides the usual goal of giving my personal opinion on the subject at hand, was to get the facts right on what went down during the movie's production. I wasn't trying to make a big official piece on the film but was hoping that getting the info right would help people, myself included, understand why the film is the way it is. In fact, this is the Halloween I was dreading from the beginning because of the mess it is with the Producer's Cut and all the drama that occurred during the filming. And knowing what I do now, I can safely say that I was way off in some of those initial thoughts and summations, particularly when it came to certain people. This time, I hope to get things right.

Theatrical Version

Aside from Halloween III, this was the last of the movies I saw up until Halloween: Resurrection, which hadn't come out yet at the time I got it on VHS in early 2002. I picked it up along with Halloween 5 but had no idea what to expect because, in stark contrast to that film, which I had seen a few good notices for, I saw almost nothing good said about Curse. In Creature Features, after giving 5 a pretty good rating and review, all things considered, John Stanley absolutely trashed Curse, calling it "sloppily written," "one sorry excuse for a horror movie," "an insult to John Carpenter's 1978 original," and ended his review with, "It's time for a treat instead of a trick." I hadn't even seen the movie yet but I was still like, "Damn!" The same went for a lot of the reviews I saw on IMDB and other websites. There may have been some positive ones here and there, but all I remember is one negative write-up after the other. I can remember one person who said that when they saw the TV spots, the movie looked absolutely terrifying and they wondered if they would survive the viewing experience... then said there was nothing remotely scary or entertaining about it. So, with all these bad notices in the back of my mind, I braced myself when I finally popped the VHS in the day after I watched 5, expecting to see one of the most awful horror films ever. But, surprise, surprise, not only I did not come out wanting to smash the VHS to bits like I was expecting but, in fact, I rather enjoyed myself. Yes, I know this will confound a lot of people, but I've always liked Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers. I understand why so many don't, especially this version, as it is a huge mess, with a lot of plotholes, and some story elements that I don't like at all, but I've always found myself drawn to it, regardless. I realize I probably should hate it, but there's something about it that makes me want to go back to it time and time again. I'll try my best to explain why but who knows if I'll succeed.

Six years after both she and Michael Myers are believed to have died, Jamie Lloyd, now fifteen, has been kidnapped by a mysterious, Druid-like cult, headed by the mysterious Man in Black. Impregnated, she gives birth to a baby boy on Halloween Eve, 1995. The baby is meant to be part of a ceremony, but a sympathetic nurse brings the baby to Jamie and helps them escape. However, Michael Myers, who has also been taken in by the cult, kills the nurse and pursues his niece, who escapes using a stolen pickup truck. Meanwhile, Dr. Loomis, now retired and living in seclusion near Haddonfield, is visited by his old friend, Dr. Terence Wynn, chief administrator at Smith's Grove. Wynn tells Loomis that he's retiring and wants him to take his place, something Loomis is very reluctant to do. Jamie reaches a bus station near Haddonfield and uses a payphone to call into a Chicago-based radio show, which is having a special program devoted to the town, which has banned Halloween for the past six years. She pleas for Loomis' help over the airwaves and, sure enough, he hears her. However, Michael manages to trap and kill her, only to discover that the baby is nowhere to be found. In Haddonfield, relatives of Laurie Strode's adopted family are living in the Myers house. Among them are young mother, Kara, and her six-year old son, Danny, the latter of whom often hears and sees visions of the Man in Black, telling him to kill. At the same time, Tommy Doyle is now a slightly disturbed and reclusive young man who's obsessed with Michael and also heard Jamie's pleas. He manages to find her baby, whom he names Steven, and meets up with Loomis, both knowing that Michael has returned. Tommy then introduces himself to Kara and Danny, warning the former of the danger they're in, as well as telling her of a theory he's developed about what drives Michael. However, as Michael begins hacking up Kara's friends and family, she and Tommy also have to worry about the cult, who have insidious plans concerning both Danny and baby Steven.

Realizing that they'd badly dropped the ball in rushing Halloween 5's development, coupled with the movie proving to be a box-office disappointment and going to straight to video in a number of countries outside of the United States, Moustapha Akkad knew he had to take more time with the next film. But early on, he hit a major snag when his rights to the franchise lapsed and he entered a bidding war with none other than John Carpenter, who'd partnered up with New Line

Cinema. Akkad, in turn, partnered with Miramax and the Weinsteins, who, of course, won the rights, doing so right before their company was acquired by Disney and intending on releasing the film through their Dimension label. While it initially seemed like a major coup and opportunity for the franchise and its shepherds to now be partnered with a major studio again, Akkad and his camp, which included his son, Malek, as associate producer, and Halloween 4 producer Paul Freeman as main producer, would often find themselves at odds with the Weinsteins throughout production. As far as writing goes, the most interesting rumor was that, fresh off the success of Pulp Fiction, Quentin Tarantino was going to do the screenplay. Though he turned this down, he and his producing partner, Lawrence Bender, did consider acting as executive producers and suggested Scott Spiegel, co-writer of Evil Dead II, to write and direct. Though Bob Weinstein approved of Spiegel after seeing his slasher movie, Intruder, Akkad wasn't impressed, and when Spiegel refused to revise an initial script they had to work with, both he and Tarantino left the movie.

In the end, Akkad hired Daniel Farrands, a life-long fan of the series whom he'd met in 1990, to write Halloween 6. Just twenty years old when he first met Akkad, Farrands had gotten into contact with Halloween 5 producer Ramsey Thomas and sent him a writing sample. Thomas was so impressed with it that he arranged for Farrands to have a meeting with Akkad, which Farrands prepared for by assembling a lot of Halloween series data, like a timeline family tree, and even some research on the actual Thorn symbol, into a bible. As impressed as Akkad was with him, he initially passed but not only kept the bible but actually used it during the development process. Deciding that Farrands knew the series inside and out more than any professional screenwriter he could find, Akkad brought him back in. He went through many, many drafts of the script before settling on a "final" one but, as it would turn out, this is one of those productions where the script was changed constantly throughout filming. What's more, he realized many of the higher-ups didn't know much of anything about the Halloween franchise, nor did they even care. This included Freeman, whom Farrands described as being unpleasant on set, and who has also been charged with being terribly incompetent by other members of the crew. But even though his dream of writing a Halloween movie didn't go as he hoped, and he was very vocal about it on set, to the point where he was warned he was going to be fired, Farrands has continued to prove how much he does genuinely love the horror genre. Most notably, he's written and directed a lot of really good documentaries on various franchises, such as His Name Was Jason: 30 Years of Friday the 13th and Crystal Lake Memories: The Complete History of Friday the 13th (based on the book by Peter Bracke), Never Sleep Again: The Elm Street Legacy, and Scream: The Inside History, as well as a couple of really good episodes of the show, History's Mysteries, on the real story behind The Amityville Horror.

 

Before we go on, I want to briefly touch on John Carpenter's small part in where Halloween went at this point, specifically in how, when he and New Line Cinema were bidding for the rights, his idea for the movie they would've made was to send Michael Myers into space, which would've made this the first horror franchise to do so. This is referenced in the theatrical version, where Barry Simms cuts off a conspiracy theorist who claims that the CIA shot Michael into space after they failed to control him, then incredulously says, "Michael Myers in space." According to Daniel Farrands in an interview he did on the Uneeda Horror Podcast on Planet CHH on YouTube, that was inserted because, in the lead-up to the film's release, Carpenter took a dig at them in Fangoria, denouncing it even though he hadn't seen it. I'll say it again, I love Carpenter as a filmmaker. He's made some of my favorite movies ever, and I would say that I either love or, at the very least, enjoy about 85% to 90% of his work. But, not only does he have a reputation for being rather cranky and curmudgeony, especially in his old age, he also seems to be contradictory and full of shit about some things. As the hosts of that podcast mention in their interview with Farrands, Carpenter tries to make it seem as though he's been attempting to distance himself from Halloween since he sold off his rights, when that's not the case (he'd pop up again briefly during the development of H20). What's more, I find it so bizarre that the man who thought the original was a one-and-done story, and didn't like where it was being taken, was seemingly planning to regain control of his creation only to then shoot it into outer space! I just don't get his mindset about that. I know he tends to smoke weed and such, so maybe he was really tripping out when he came up with that idea, but I find Carpenter to be really hard to read sometimes.

Like the previous film, a lot of interesting people were up for the directing job. Besides Scott Spiegel, there was Fred Walton, director of When A Stranger Calls and April Fool's Day; Michele Soavi, frequent collaborator with Dario Argento and director of Stage Fright (this was before he made Cemetery Man); Gary Fleder, who was mostly a television director at that point, notably on a very well-received episode of Tales from the Crypt; and Matthew Patrick, who brought along his frequent cinematographer, Billy Dickson, who would initially shoot the movie, even though Patrick left just two weeks before shooting was originally set to begin. Ultimately, the job went to Joe Chappelle, whose only previous credit was 1993's Thieves Quartet, which few saw but impressed the Weinsteins, regardless. After Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers, Chappelle became something of a favored director for Dimension, as they had him replace Kevin Yagher on the set of an equally troubled sequel, Hellraiser: Bloodline, and he later directed the movie Phantoms with Ben Affleck and Takedown with Skeet Ulrich, neither of which did anything at the box-office. Chappelle then began directing for television and, save for a 2002 direct-to-video film called The Skulls II, and a 2018 political thriller, An Acceptable Loss (which actually starred Jamie Lee Curtis), he's remained there ever since. He has found a fair amount of success in TV, though, directing episodes of popular shows like CSI: Miami, Fringe, and The Wire, but his theatrical track record is, needless to say, spotty. In fact, while Curse was hardly a blockbuster, it's the most commercially successful feature film that Chapelle has ever been involved with!

In my initial version of this review, I completely trashed Chappelle, as I didn't hear much good about him at the time. Two things particularly stuck in my mind. One was how, in her interview in Halloween: 25 Years of Terror, actor Marianne Hagan said, "Joe Chappelle had no interest in Halloween 6; he had an interest in getting a three-picture with Dimension, and that was his sole purpose in doing this horror film." And if you watch that interview, there's more than a little contempt in her voice. The other was how badly it seemed Chappelle treated Donald Pleasence. I'd read that he didn't even want him to begin with but Moustapha Akkad insisted and, even after that, Chappelle wasn't respectful of him. Worst of all was the rumor that, during the re-editing after the bad test screenings, Chappelle himself decided to get rid of a lot of Pleasence's scenes because he felt he was boring. That, coupled with how this was the legendary actor's final film, as he died before that test screening, and the producers were compelled to give him an in memoriam before the end credits, made it feel like Chappelle basically spit on his grave. However, I have heard Daniel Farrands say that the decision to cut down Pleasence's screentime was a studio decision, rather than Chappelle's. In fact, I was wrong when I originally said that just about everyone involved with the movie hated Chappelle, as Farrands has often stated that he always got along with him, that they were never at odds, and is quick to defend him from the fans who trash him. Also, Malek Akkad seemed to like him as well. From everything I've read, it seems that Chappelle was just trying to make a living as a filmmaker to provide for his family and thus, he was going to go along with the more powerful Weinsteins and do whatever they want, rather than the Akkads. Basically, while he was the director, he was far from the movie's chief creative force. 

 

As the authors of Taking Shape noted, we still don't have the entire story because we don't have Chappelle's own perspective. Indeed, he is, by far, the most elusive Halloween director as, to this day, he will not talk about the film. He's turned down numerous offers to discuss it on special features and audio commentaries, and also has never attended a single convention. Given his own lack of interest in the franchise to begin with, as well as the crap he's gotten from fans over the years, it's not surprising that he's reluctant to discuss it, but it is still a shame that we don't have his own thoughts about the movie's clusterfuck of a production. Thus, while we know a lot more now than we did before, there is still something of an enigma about Curse.

I know one thing for sure, though: nobody who was close to the Akkads approved of how, after that test screening in early 1995, the Weinsteins took the movie away from them and did extensive reshoots. In fact, according to Farrands, the Akkads and Paul Freeman voluntarily walked out when they realized what was happening. Moustapha himself is even said to have considered a lawsuit against the Weinsteins but ultimately decided not to go through with it. While Farrands was supposed to write the new scenes, anything he wrote was rejected in favor of work by Rand Ravich, who'd written what Joe Chappelle had re-shot on Hellraiser: Bloodline, and not even everything that he wrote was ultimately filmed.

Okay, that's enough behind-the-scenes drama for the time being. Let's get into the movie itself. First off, as much as I love Donald Pleasence as an actor and the character of Dr. Loomis, this is one Halloween I wished he'd stayed out of. For one thing, I hate seeing him like this. The poor guy looks so frail and gaunt, and his voice, for the most part, sounds horrible. I really don't like hearing him sound so wheezy and shaky, especially when I remember how he used to sound. You literally almost expect him to drop dead onscreen at any given moment. For another, I hate how dismissively he was treated in the final edit. After a career that spanned decades and over 200 films and television appearances, the majority of his scenes and dialogue were removed just after he'd died because he was deemed boring and not someone who teenagers would be interested in watching. Finally, in both versions of the movie, Loomis has virtually no purpose in the story, but it's especially bad here, as the only meaningful thing he does is warn Debra Strode that her family lives in Michael Myers' old house; otherwise, nothing. His hearing Jamie Lloyd's cries for help over the radio don't lead to anything, and neither does his learning that she's been murdered and gave birth, or his meeting up with Tommy Doyle (why would he have any reason to know who he is?). He's incapacitated for the majority of the third act, and, worst of all, he doesn't have a single scene with Michael! Yes, in his last appearance, Loomis doesn't get to confront him at all. Not that he could've done much in his condition but, at least, they should've had a scene where they see each other or had Loomis shoot at Michael, for old time's sake. It kind of makes me wish they'd stuck with the original plan and had Halloween 5 be Loomis' last appearance. I may not have cared for what they did with his character there, but at least he would've gone out after fighting with Michael and beating the crap out of him. Instead, both versions of this movie end on an unresolved and not so nice note for Loomis, especially this one, where it's implied that Michael kills him offscreen.

All that said, Donald Pleasence, as always, is still great here, and he manages to redeem the character of Loomis a bit. He's not overly crazy and obsessive like in the previous film; in fact, his portrayal is quite poignant. When you first see him, you learn he's not only retired but quite broken in his old age, refusing his old friend, Dr. Wynn's, offer to come back to Smith's Grove, telling him that he's finished with it all and has no desire to practice medicine anymore. You can really see how

all of his chasing and obsessing over how to kill Michael Myers over the years has just drained the life out of him, and it's really sad to see this beloved character in such a state. (What's even sadder is that Pleasence is said to have loved Daniel Farrands' original script, calling it the best he'd seen in years, and in the end, no version of the movie is exactly what he originally signed on for.) In any case, as minute as his role in the theatrical cut is, Loomis is still a great presence here, with

some great moments and lines. When he warns Mrs. Strode about Michael, he tells her, "This force, this thing, that lived inside of him, came from a source too violent, too deadly for you to imagine. It... it grew inside him, contaminating his soul. It was pure evil... This house is sacred to him. He has all his memories here. His rage! Mrs. Strode, I beg of you, don't allow your family to suffer the same fate that Laurie and her daughter suffered." When Wynn is revealed to be the Man in Black, Loomis growls his name in a nicely

venomous manner, and after Kara, Danny, and baby Steven have been abducted, he ominously intones, "It's his game, and I know where he wants to play it," leading into the climax at Smith's Grove. Finally, when he confronts Wynn, pointing a pistol at him, he tells him, "You... are... a madman... I thought Michael was a monster. But you..." The only thing I don't like is how, as you can see, he again talks about Michael as if he were a victim rather than a monster. As we went over back in my review of Halloween 5, this flies in the face of how Loomis viewed Michael originally and I don't care for it one bit.

They originally wanted Brian Andrews to reprise his role of Tommy Doyle but, because he'd left acting by that point and no longer had an agent, they were unable to find him. Instead, they went with a then unknown Paul Rudd. A lot of people bash Rudd's performance here but I've never had a problem with him (although, I will admit that, in retrospect, it is weird seeing him in this type of film after he's become best known for silly comedies and playing Ant-Man in the MCU). I think he does a fair job, coming across as an unbalanced, traumatized guy with his movements and facial expressions, and we also see just how Michael Myers has consumed his life, with the extensive research in his room at Mrs. Blankenship's boardinghouse and how he intently listens to Barry Simms' Halloween special on Michael and Haddonfield. Significantly, he's learned what the Thorn symbol represents and correctly deduces its connection to Michael, something not even Dr. Loomis is aware of. I also like how, even though he is a bit disturbed and a little spooky at points, Tommy isn't an asshole or a creep. Well, okay, watching Kara's bedroom window through a long lens in his first appearance is a little suspect (even though you learn his motivation is because she and her family live in the Myers house, it's still icky, to say the least) but, other than that, he comes across as sincerely wanting to help her and her family, as well as keep the cult from getting Jamie's baby. Some may say he's being creepy when he suddenly appears in front of Kara's son, Danny, causing him to drop his pumpkin, but I'd say it's more a case of him being socially awkward due to his slightly unhinged mental state. As someone who has Asperger's syndrome, I know all about that and can actually relate to some of the ways he interacts with people. I feel the same way about his voice. Some have said that Rudd often speaks in a very flat, unemotional tone but it's never really bugged me; again, I've always attributed it to his mental state.

There a few things about Tommy that do kind of annoy me, though, mostly in this cut's third act. For one, he suddenly gets these weird, spontaneous facial expressions and vocal tics. When he's wandering Smith's Grove and sees a door that says "MAXIMUM SECURITY," he inexplicably scoffs and reads it out loud. Right after that, when he's trying to get Kara out of a locked room, he turns to see Michael standing down the hall, looking at him. Tommy actually smirks, makes a gesture with

his head, as if he's telling him to come get some, and when Michael starts walking towards him, he stands there for a bit and even laughs, before finally going on with what he was doing. I also don't like this awkward laugh he does when he attempts to fake Michael out near the end, or this cocky grin he gets after whacking the crap out of him with a metal pipe. The most inexplicable thing he does is when he and Kara spy on Dr. Wynn and his colleagues as they're about to perform some 

kind of surgery, and Kara says, "There's Danny." Tommy suddenly grabs her, pulls her away from the door, bends her over a sink, and tells her to be quiet in a growling voice. What in the hell was that about? Was he afraid that her talking out loud would give them away? She didn't say it that loud, and plus, couldn't he have just quietly shushed her and had them duck down below the window? I used to think it was because he heard Michael coming and got them both out of sight, but that doesn't make sense, as they don't see Michael's

shadow when he opens the door until well after that moment and even then, Tommy seems as shocked and scared as Kara. Something else, which I felt was far too heartless, is when, after Michael has slaughtered everybody in the operating room and is chasing them, Tommy closes the door on this poor escaped surgeon, letting Michael kill him. I know the guy was part of Wynn's staff but he seemed genuinely terrified, so what would it have hurt to help him? And finally, despite knowing how resilient Michael is, Tommy is content to just walk out and leave him there after beating him with a pipe, smugly confident that he did him in. That's just lazy and there's a reason for it, which I'll get into later.

I also don't mind our female lead, Kara Strode (Marianne Hagan). A rather mousy and bookish young woman, like Laurie in the original, Kara is someone you have sympathy for long before her first run-in with Michael Myers. A single mother, she's trying to do good in college, obviously aspiring to give her son, Danny, a better life than he has at the moment. The two of them are currently living with her parents in Haddonfield, and she has to deal with her horrible mentally and physically father, who seems to utterly despise both of them. On top of that, she realizes there's something going on with Danny, who's been having nightmares and making some very violent and disturbing drawings, involving the mark of Thorn. Then, when she meets Tommy Doyle, she not only discovers that her home was once the Myers house but also that Michael has returned and Danny is being influenced by the Thorn cult and the Man in Black. What's really great about Kara is that she's a mother who's more than willing to protect and defend her son, like in the scene where Michael is stalking both of them through the house and she manages to whack him in the back of the head with a fire poker, sending him tumbling down the stairs. For that matter, she defends Danny from her abusive father after he calls him a "little bastard," saying he's the only bastard there. I also like how her compassionate mother side comes through when Tommy is having trouble quieting baby Steven's crying and she manages to do so by holding and feeding him. And finally, she manages to beat Michael up quite a bit during the climax by whacking him with a metal pipe, before he, predictably, overpowers her. But while she does need to be saved by Tommy a couple of times, Kara proves she can hold her own when the situation calls for it, which I like.

You'd think, since he's being influenced by the Man in Black and is apparently meant to be the next one to inherit the curse of Thorn after Michael makes his final sacrifice (this is much clearer in the Producer's Cut but, again, we'll get to that), Kara's son, Danny (Devin Gardner), would be a real central point in the story. Instead, he's more of a side-note, as baby Steven is both Michael and the cult's main target. In fact, nothing ever really comes of the notion that Danny hears the same voice that first drove Michael to kill. All it amounts to is the voice telling him, "Danny, kill for him," or "Danny, come to me," and while Danny does fall under its control when he hears it, it never goes any further than him listening or going to it, save for when he picks up a small knife and points it right at John Strode after he smacks Kara. The voice never tries to force him to kill his mother or anyone else he cares about, which you would expect it to (suggesting Michael must've been a pretty weak-willed kid). Other than that, there isn't much to Danny's character. Devin Gardner isn't the best child actor, for one thing, and he doesn't have much to do except run from Michael, follow the voice, and yell for his mom a bunch of times. The latter gets rather annoying after a while, particularly in a scene where he sees Michael standing in the house's front yard, or near the end when Michael is trying to get at him and he hysterically screams, "Mommy!", over and over again.

The character who makes the least amount of sense in the theatrical version is Dr. Wynn (Mitchell Ryan), Loomis' old friend who's revealed to be the Man in Black and the leader of the Thorn cult... or so you think. I say that because I really don't get what Wynn was hoping to accomplish here. At first, it seems like he leads the cult and is intent on making Jamie's baby Michael's final sacrifice, seeing as how he puts some blood in the shape of the Thorn symbol on his belly. You also assume that's why he comes after the baby when Michael himself fails to find him, but once he and the cult capture everyone, Wynn's motive appears to change. Instead of completing Michael's curse and passing it on to another person, i.e. Danny, now it seems like he wants baby Steven for some genetic experiments, which are foiled when Michael massacres everyone on in the operating room. Later on, when our main characters are being chased by Michael, they end up in a lab with test tubes full of aborted fetuses, labeled with genetic codes. Earlier, when Wynn talks to Dr. Loomis in his office, he mentions he's had failures before, obviously referring to these fetuses, and alludes to Jamie's baby being the one that will be successful. I guess he's trying to use Michael's DNA to create more evil beings like him and baby Steven is meant to be the first of those... I think. Like I said, this version, even though I do enjoy it myself, is so convoluted in its story that trying to rationalize this stuff will make your head explode. None of what we see in the third act matches with what we've seen up to that point, and it seems like Wynn was using the cult as some sort of facade. When he comes to do whatever he was planning in that operating room, he even tells his cronies, who are still in their robes, "You can take that off now. Halloween is over." Well, if it's just a joke to him, why go through that big, elaborate ceremony at the beginning, with everyone dressing up in these robes, and creating the Man in Black persona?

For that matter, if the cult was just a coverup for genetic research, how was Wynn able to first influence Michael so many years ago and now do the same to Danny? If there was a real supernatural aspect to the cult and his Man in Black persona, as there is in the Producer's Cut, then I could buy his ability to get into their heads and appear to them and then disappear at will, as he does with Danny at the beginning, but that doesn't seem to be the case here. So, how was he able to put the Curse of 

Thorn on Michael in the first place, and for what purpose? I'm guessing, again, that the answer to the latter was to create a specimen of pure evil whose DNA he could use in his experiments, but that doesn't explain Michael's inhuman invincibility. Come to think of it, why is he trying to turn Danny evil? You'd think by this point that he would have plenty of Michael's DNA to work with, so why would he need another evil specimen? Again, the cult seems to be little more than a facade, so it can't

be to continue the curse of Thorn... could it? And what does he want Loomis for? At the beginning of the movie, Wynn asks Loomis to come back to Smith's Grove and, when his true sinister nature is revealed, he offers for Loomis to join them. Why? Because Loomis was the first to recognize the power of pure evil? I guess he feels Loomis' understanding of it could be beneficial, but does he honestly think that, after spending the majority of his life trying to destroy Michael, Loomis would help him in whatever it is he's trying to do? Plus,

does he not see how frail and sickly Loomis is by this point? How much longer could he have lasted? I used to just go along with all of this but when I really started thinking about it for this review, I realized how this doesn't make sense at all. At least in the Producer's Cut, Wynn's motivation is more understandable, and he's more intimidating; here, the inclusion of all that science fiction crap in the third act throws a gigantic monkey wrench into everything. Finally, as for Ryan's acting, it's passable, but he doesn't have much to work with

and is hardly menacing when it's revealed he's the villain (Daniel Farrands wanted Christopher Lee but he said in his audio commentary that the studio said, "No one will get it,"). Plus, the revelation that he's the Man in Black and all of the confusing mumbo jumbo that comes with it in this version is a major letdown to what was kind of an intriguing question in the previous film.

 

The Strodes, relatives of Laurie's adopted family, are quite an interesting bunch of people, especially the parents, John (Bradford English) and Debra (Kim Darby) (Farrands' tribute to John Carpenter and Debra Hill). While Debra is a very compassionate, if mousy and easily steamrolled, mother who genuinely cares about her children, especially Kara, John is a hateful, abusive asshole who seems full of contempt not only for Kara but everyone around him. He particularly despises

Kara for apparently running away from home years ago, only to show up with her son and, as John says, "Expects us to roll out the red carpet." He also tells her that college isn't going to make up for the mistakes she made and that, before she came back, everything was a lot better off. He's not only verbally abusive but physically as well, smacking her hard enough to make her nose bleed when she calls him out for the asshole that he is and threatens to do worse if she ever disrespects him again. And like I said, John seems to despise just about everyone else around him. He comes off annoyed by Debra's mere presence and doesn't seem to have much love for his son, Tim, yelling at him to stay out of it when he tries to stick up for Kara. In fact, he appears to hate kids in general, yelling at and threatening a group of them who placed a cardboard cut-out of Michael Myers on his lawn with an axe, then goes on to call them a bunch of "shitheads" and add that, in his humble opinion, kids are ruining the country. Even though it's meant as a joke, when Tim belches and John responds, "I rest my case," I take it as another sign that he despises him, especially considering what happens afterward. And as if that weren't enough, you learn that John moved his family into the Myers house without telling them (although, how could they not have known themselves, given how infamous Michael and his house are around town, especially at this point?) because his brother wouldn't have been able to ever sell it due to the original murder back in 1963. Regardless, Debra, after learning this from Dr. Loomis, tries to convince John to come with them when she decides to leave but he angrily refuses; she's then immediately killed by Michael. Fortunately, John has the most spectacular death in this version, especially when he comes home drunk that night and goes down into the dark basement after mocking "the Boogeyman."

As for Tim Strode (Keith Bogart), he's the typical teasing brother who likes to poke fun at his sister, saying she probably hasn't been horny in a long time and tells her to copy someone else's term paper when she can't find her own. However, as I mentioned earlier, he does stick up for her when their dad is being rough on her, particularly when he smacks her, and he seems to really like Danny. I like the part where he sees some drawings that Danny did of the entire family murdered, including

their dad, and he says, in a Beavis-like voice, "Huh, I think it's cool." And he's also not happy when radio shock-jock Barry Simms seriously disrespects his girlfriend, Beth, both on the radio and in the middle of a big fair in front of dozens of people. So, he's a decent guy overall... even if he does later have sex with Beth in Kara's own bed, which leads to them both getting killed. Speaking of Beth (Mariah O'Brien), she's sort of a modern day hippy, both in the clothes she wears and the Halloween fair she organizes in order to bring some life back into Haddonfield, which has become a dried out husk of its former self ever since the local government banned Halloween. I don't know how successful that was in the end, though, given how the guy she hoped would give them a lot of good publicity turns out to be an asshole who only cares about ratings, as well as that Michael himself is on another killing spree in town and kills Beth herself. That'd probably be more incentive for the government to never allow Halloween again. But at least Beth had some really good intentions and it's refreshing to see a character in a slasher movie who's interested in more than just sex... although, she does eventually partake in that when all else fails.

Oh, Barry Simms (Leo Geter)... as if John Strode wasn't enough of a douchebag, they also had to put in this loud, obnoxious, Howard Stern wannabe (the filmmakers actually wanted Stern himself to play this role). Barry perfectly exemplifies everything that I hate about shock jocks, as he's just an asshole who's unlikable in every way (I know that's the point, but I've never understood how someone could be so full of bile that they would do something like that for a living): he insults people left and right, both on and off the air, acts like a sleazebag towards Beth right in front of everyone in the middle of the Halloween fair, and ultimately goes against what she was hoping to do with it by planning to move the show to the Myers house and sensationalize it for the sake of ratings, whereas Beth was trying to tell everyone that Michael is gone and that Haddonfield needs to move on. As Barry prepares to do so, he makes it clear to Paul, the person he's talking with on his cellphone, that he's not at all thrilled with having to be in Haddonfield, calling the whole thing a, "Cheap shit country bumpkin outfit," and that his fans expect better. (During this scene, Farrands gets in a dig at producer Paul Freeman with Barry's line, "I'm taking this show to the real Myers house, where we should've done it in the first place!" It was his way of venting his frustration over Freeman refusing to shoot at the original Myers house in Pasadena.) I do like when he says he's going rip off his penny-pinching producer's balls and wear them as earrings, but because he's such a hateful douche, you know what this all means: he's dead meat. However, not only is there nothing to the kill itself but Michael has no reason to kill him, or to be there to do it, and it makes no sense how he manages to string his body up in a tree's decorative lights without anyone seeing him.

Even the way they handled the character of Jamie Lloyd in her final appearance was a total mess. First, there was what happened with Danielle Harris. After Halloween 5, she went on with her career, only to learn that they were trying to find someone who looked like her and was eighteen, as Harris herself was seventeen, to play the older Jamie. As she says in an interview in the Scream Factory Blu-Ray set, Jamie's Story, Harris, desperately wanting to play the role again, went through the trouble of getting herself emancipated so she could be considered an adult and work longer hours. But then, when she met the producers and Joe Chappelle and saw the script, she didn't care for how her character was treated, especially in how she went out. But she was only offered scale because her character died so early and so, Harris decided not to do it. Now, she kind of contradicts herself in this interview by saying she wasn't looking for an insane payday, whereas in Halloween: 25 Years of Terror, she says, "So then it became, if I'm gonna do this, I want to make a little bit of money," and others have viewed this as her having an ego and thinking she's so important "just because she was in some previous movies." But regardless, I do agree with her that the offer she was given was insulting, especially after how integral she'd been to the two previous films.

 

In her place is J.C. Brandy, who got a lot of grief from fans who wanted Harris back. While it is a shame that that didn't work out, and it would've made for better continuity between this film and the previous two, I don't think Brandy is that bad in the role. She may not look exactly like Harris, and at eighteen or nineteen, was a tad too old to play Jamie at fifteen, but I think it's acceptable enough. I also don't think Brandy does that bad in the acting department, either. In fact, I find her anguished screams at the beginning of the film, when she's in labor and being wheeled through those underground corridors, to be quite disturbing, and I feel bad about her anguish over not even getting to hold her baby after she delivers him. Thus, when she does escape while being pursued by Michael Myers, I do root for her and want her to get away along with her baby. Speaking of which, I like the little bit of bonding she has with him when they're hiding down in the bus station restroom, and that she hides him where Michael can't find him in case he catches her... which he, of course, does, killing her in a very gruesome way here. It's really sad to see this character, whom you've seen repeatedly chased and terrorized since she was a little girl, finally fall victim to her uncle, making the previous two films even sadder in retrospect. It actually makes me kind of glad it's not Harris. That said, I do prefer her fate here, rather than in the other version, where she lingers needlessly before being unceremoniously offed (not to mention the revelation of the baby's father, which we'll get into). Now, do I wish that Jamie hadn't died and actually lived to the end, defending her baby? Absolutely. But if she had to die, at least she went out in defiance towards Michael, telling him that he can't have baby, even after he impales her on some farm equipment. Plus, you can't say her death isn't memorable.

The sympathetic nurse, Mary, who helps Jamie escape, is played by Susan Swift, a woman who left acting after this film and I'm not surprised, because she has to be one of the worst actors I've ever seen. She almost never stops smiling! When she's helping Jamie escape, she has this big smile plastered on her face, even when they're running down the hallway, and when she shows her the way out, I guess she's supposed to be crying, but the smile and the way her voice sounds makes it come across like she's laughing! As I'm looking at this, I'm wondering if Joe Chappelle, at least at that point, really sucked in giving direction or if this lady just doesn't know the difference between being happy and scared. In the next scene, leading up to when she gets killed by Michael, she now has the right expression on her face when she hears an eerie sound in a dark hallway behind her but man, it's like she was high or something!

One last character who definitely deserves mention is Mrs. Blankenship (Janice Knickrehm), the old woman who runs the boardinghouse where Tommy Doyle lives. At first, it doesn't seem like she's going to be that significant: just a very hard-of-hearing old woman who doesn't say anything whatsoever in her first several appearances. But in the middle of the movie, we have a great scene where she tells Danny the real meaning of Halloween: "A long, long time ago, it was a night of great power. When the days grew short, and the spirits of the dead returned to their homes to warm themselves by the fireside. All across the land, huge bonfires were lit. Oh, there was a marvelous celebration. People danced, and they played games, and they dressed up in costumes, hoping to ward off the evil spirits. Especially the Boogeyman." Janice Knickrehm's delivery and the inter-cutting between her and the shots of Tommy wandering the Halloween fair make this one of the film's best scenes. Mrs. Blankenship also tells Kara about the voice that Michael heard when he was about Danny's age and that Danny himself is now hearing it. She adds that she was actually babysitting Michael the night he killed his sister (which doesn't quite fit with the original's opening, though), and this is very significant when it's later revealed she's part of the cult, as it suggests she herself was possibly the one who corrupted Michael. Though I don't care much for this curse angle, that is an interesting possibility in and of itself. Finally, Ms. Knickrehm herself was an awesome old gal. If you watch the entire Halloween 6 discussion panel on the DVD for 25 Years of Terror, you'll see that, even though she was almost 80 at the time, she not only was by far the most energetic and knowledgeable person there, but she actually recited her entire speech, without a script, and even added to it with an evil laugh! It made me wish that I'd been there for that. Sadly, though I wasn't surprised to hear, Ms. Knickrehm passed away in January of 2013, at the age of 88.

 

One of my favorite things about Curse is its look, and when it comes to the "Thorn trilogy," this is my second favorite in terms of visual style, behind Halloween 4. Like the previous two, it was shot in and around Salt Lake City, but this time, it was actually shot in the fall, with Daniel Farrands saying that principal photography might've begun on October 30th. As a result, I think this one, more than any other, really feels like it's taking place in late autumn in the Midwest. Not only do you see the expected pumpkins and Halloween

decorations everywhere but the leaves and grass, finally, are the appropriate color, and the sky is almost always completely overcast, with barely any sunshine (I think the scene with Kara, Tim, and Beth at Haddonfield Junior College is the only one). The color palette appears to be a bit muted, with a lot of gray, and when combined with how everyone is dressed in coats and sweaters, it gives off the feeling that it's very, very cold... because it was. Salt Lake City suffered a snowstorm during the first week of shooting, forcing them to move

what were originally some exterior scenes indoors. You really feel the cold in the nighttime exteriors, especially during Jamie's escape at the beginning, where it's pouring rain (poor J.C. Brandy almost froze to death wearing nothing but her hospital gown). Moreover, those scenes are often bathed in that familiar blue lighting, sometimes with a lot of swirling mist, contrasting nicely with the warm, orange coloring of the cult's chambers and the fairly cozy feeling of the Myers house interiors.

There are also a lot of interior scenes where it's very, very dark, with lots of shadows, and sometimes with the only illumination being an occasional lightning flash (which are very sporadic and feel a bit out of place, given how cold it must be outside). These settings, as always, are really good for Michael Myers to creep around in, making him feel a little more like the Shape than in the previous films (emphasis on a "little" more, though).

 

In this version, you can really feel the influence of the Weinsteins, not only in the extensive reshoots and added gore, but also in the editing. Once they took control of the film away from the Akkad camp, they went for a much flashier style, with the film opening up with a crazy barrage of imagery from throughout the movie, and also cutting to short bursts of this imagery here and there between cuts. The scene where Michael kills Beth while Kara watches from across the street, while more straightforward initially, was re-edited in dramatic

slow-motion here, with each stab accentuated by loud clanging sounds (which are prevalent throughout this version), and very quick flashes of close-ups of Jamie Lloyd, which have more context in the Producer's Cut, and Michael's knife, mixed in. And when Michael goes on a bloody rampage in the Smith's Grove operating room during the third act, there's a constant strobe effect that, while impactful, is best not watched in the dark (it also makes getting images of that scene ridiculously hard, let me tell you). There would also be extensive changes in the sound effects and music score, as I'll get into later.

 

Besides the way it looks, I love how this is one of the entries that really bathes in Halloween imagery, not just in the decorations and costumes, but also in some of the very locations, like the farm with lots of pumpkins and a scarecrow where Jamie crashes after Michael forces her off the road. It and the barn interiors also bring about that notion of harvest imagery we got in the previous two movies. The Halloween fair especially gives you the feeling of the holiday, with everyone dressed up amidst the pumpkins, decorations, bonfires, all set

to Mrs. Blankenship's story. Of course, we have all the Druid imagery and runes, bringing it back to its Celtic roots in a manner not seen since Halloween III. And at the end of both cuts, we end on a close-up of one of the most evil-looking jack-o-lanterns ever, far more threatening than those we've seen in the franchise before.

On the subject of Haddonfield itself, one idea I like that this film touches on is the effect that Michael Myers' killing sprees have had on the town. After his murder of Judith back in 1963 and three Halloween night killing sprees, two of which occurred in as many years, the local government, despite Michael having not been seen since 1989, has banned the holiday outright. Six years of this has really hit hard and according, to Beth, the town is dying due to all the repression and bad word of mouth; like a vampire, Michael has almost literally

drained Haddonfield of life. Being as big of a fan of the series as he is, I'm sure Farrands knew that this concept was part of Dennis Etchison's idea for Halloween 4, and given that Tina made an off-handed remark in 5 that Halloween should be banned, that can't be a coincidence. Now, it's little more than a minor plot-point here, but I like that we got to see a little bit of that discarded concept come to fruition. And again, can you imagine what must have happened after the events of this film? I'm positive Halloween was banned in Haddonfield permanently from this point onward.

While Farrands may have been frustrated with the producers' unwillingness to use the original Myers house in Pasadena, the house that they found in Salt Lake City, though not an exact duplicate, is infinitely closer than what we saw in Halloween 5. While no longer the eerie, abandoned husk it was before, it does still look pretty spooky at points, like in the exterior nighttime shots and any of the scenes where somebody is inside, all alone, like when Debra Strode is doing her daily routines and when Kara comes home, only to find that there

doesn't seem to be anyone there. In fact, that latter scene genuinely gave me the creeps the first time I saw it and it still kind of does. Kara walks around to the back of the house because the front door's locked and when she goes inside, it's absolutely dead quiet, and she gets no answer when she calls for her mother. This comes right after Michael has murdered Debra, so you're sure he's somewhere in there, ready to attack. After finding no one downstairs, Kara goes up to Danny's room and finds both him and Tommy there. Tommy then

hints that this was Michael's room, and I like the idea that, not only is Danny being influenced by evil like Michael but he's, in fact, staying in his very bedroom. Despite how creepy the atmosphere sometimes is, the place's interior looks fairly innocuous, save for the basement (which also serves as a laundry room), especially when the lights go out. In fact, the whole house is much creepier after Michael kills the power, as it's just so dark, save for the lightning flashes, and, again, the

blue light coming through the windows reminds me of the original film. Finally, I like how the house has a very lived-in feel to it. It's easy to buy that the Strodes have been living there for a long time, with the front yard and porch so cluttered and full of junk, and the house's exterior looking a little weathered, with plastic sheets around a window on the second floor. It also feels like it might be uncomfortably crowded there, since you have Kara and Danny now living there along with John, Debra, and Tim.

 

For that matter, other locations in the film have that feel to them, especially Tommy's room. The rest of the boardinghouse, particularly Mrs. Blankenship's den on the first floor, looks fairly nice, but his cramped room is most definitely a manifestation of his obsession with Michael Myers, with all the newspaper clipping and photographs covering his walls, his computer, his big tape recording machine, and so on. Dr. Loomis' small cottage in the countryside, however, is a completely different story, as it's clear he's living quite comfortably in

retirement (most notably, he's got a lot of booze and a minibar). Also, while it's only in one scene in this version, we get to see the interiors of Haddonfield Memorial Hospital again, this time when Tommy first meets up with Loomis, and it's not as cold and clinical, or as dark, as it was in Halloween II. And you wouldn't think they could make a bus station look creepy but they actually manage to pull it off, especially the restroom, which, believe it or not, is whiter and more clinical than the hospital interiors, not to mention rundown and nasty-looking, with blinking lights.

Unless you count the added footage for the original's TV version, this movie marks the first time we see the interiors of Smith's Grove Sanitarium. It's a pretty interesting place, design-wise, with lots of long, white hallways, reminiscent of the production design in a Stanley Kubrick film; a darkly lit, creepy-looking medical ward whose operating room, what little you see of it, along with the medical instruments, really give off that cold, clinical feeling from Halloween II; enclosed, claustrophobic hallways with pipe-lined walls and

a red/blue lighting scheme, like something you'd see in Aliens, with a random, barred door near the head of it; a big sort of laboratory that's filled with the equipment Wynn has been using for his genetic research, as well as remnants of failed previous experiments, like those aborted fetuses in test tubes, and medical instruments, chains hanging from the ceiling, and fans in the back with shafts of light running through them, giving off an inevitable Blade Runner vibe; and the rooms dedicated to the

Thorn cult. The latter, which you see more of in the Producer's Cut, are the most grandiose in design and feel, with all of the candles and torches giving them a glowing, orange look, granite walls, the omnipresent Thorn symbol, and the main room feeling kind of like an amphitheater. The room where Jamie gives birth at the beginning has a similar feel to it, albeit on a smaller scale. Also, in an interesting contrast, they're connected to modern, industrial-looking hallways and tunnels. Really, the only normal-looking room in this place is Dr. Wynn's small office.

 

Being the huge fan that he is, Farrands put a lot of nods to past films, particularly the original, in the script and, surprisingly, despite the inordinate amount of drafts it went through, many of them were retained. Besides the names of John and Debra Strode, Marianne Hagan also looks a bit like how Jamie Lee Curtis did in the original, and is even dressed similarly. The first kill, where Michael picks up Nurse Mary, impales her in the back of the head, and leaves her hanging on the wall, is an ode to Bob's death, complete with

Michael standing and looking at the body for a few seconds (he doesn't do the head tilt, though). Jamie escaping Smith's Grove out into a thunderstorm is akin to Michael's own escape at the beginning of the original, and the same goes for the establishing shot of Haddonfield, where the subtitles "HADDONFIELD" and "HALLOWEEN" come up (although a lot of the movies do something similar). A scene where Debra is talking to John on the phone and we see Michael appear and then disappear behind her as she paces is like when

Annie was talking to Paul, and the same goes for the moment when Danny looks out Tommy's window and sees Michael standing in the yard, only to disappear between shots, like how Laurie saw him. Speaking of Danny, Tommy causing him to accidentally drop and splatter the pumpkin he's carrying is like when the bullies tripped young Tommy and caused him to crush his own pumpkin. I don't think you have to be an expert to know what the moment where Kara and Danny run across the

lawn to the boardinghouse and frantically bang on the door to be let in, while Michael stalks toward them, is referencing. Mrs. Blankenship's name is a reference to a character mentioned in Halloween III, and Farrands wanted her to be watching that on TV as another callback, but they opted for the original Phantom of the Opera, since it's public domain. And outside of the series, Farrands references The Fog with the "stomach pounder" Tim gives Danny, Danny's name is meant as a reference to Danny Torrance from The Shining, and Kara watching Beth get murdered while she's on the phone and from Tommy's window is both a reference to Rear Window and When A Stranger Calls.

As I said before, I think Michael Myers feels a bit more like the Shape this time around than he did in the previous film. There are quite a few effective moments of him stalking people from the darkness, like in the barn with Jamie Lloyd, or the scene in the Myers house where he slowly walks through a dark hallway towards Kara, lightning flashes illuminating him both times. Like in the original, he tends to appear and disappear very suddenly, like when he first comes out of the darkness to attack Nurse Mary; when he appears behind Debra and, later, John; when Debra is attempting to escape through the hanging sheets in the backyard and he suddenly appears in front of her when she yanks one of the sheets down; the aforementioned nod to the original where he appears outside the window and disappears between cuts; and in the Myers house, when he appears behind Kara after she finds Danny. And finally, I cannot emphasize enough how creepy he is when he's calmly walking around in the dark, with only the sound of his breathing, which sounds particularly creepy here, as it's very soft and raspy. Such moments include at the beginning, when he slowly walks down the stairs to the bus station restroom where Jamie is hiding, when he's stalking Kara in the Myers house's bedrooms and hallways, and the part near the end, where he's walking towards the operating room.

All that said, though, Michael does still feel a bit like a Jason Voorhees clone here. Since Moustapha Akkad really liked him before, George P. Wilbur returns to the role (at least, during the initial filming), meaning that, yet again, Michael is very bulky in stature, and able to perform superhuman feats like breaking a guy's neck with his bare hands or lifting a big guy like John Strode up with just his butcher knife. What also makes him feel a lot like Jason, not only in this movie but in the past two, is the sheer amount of weaponry he uses. In the

original Halloween, he either used a butcher knife or strangled his victims, and in Halloween II, he mainly used the knife he got from the Elrods and then the scalpel at the hospital, as well as strangling (although, to be fair, he did kill some people in other ways in that movie). In these movies, he's used anything he can get his hands on and to me, although his iconic weapon is his machete, that's more Jason's modus operandi, whereas Michael mainly uses one weapon, be it a

butcher knife or something similar. Speaking of machetes, Michael actually picks up one before going on the bloody rampage in the operating room! I do love that part, mind you, but again, it just doesn't feel like him. That's ironic, too, because that was in the reshoots, where Wilbur was replaced by A. Michael Lerner, as Joe Chappelle decided he was too bulky for the role. Lerner is a much slimmer man than Wilbur, so not only does Michael suddenly look like he lost a lot of weight 

during this version's third act, but he's now closer to the physique he had in the first two films, although he's still killing like Jason. Lerner also tends to fast-walk during the third act's later parts, specifically after the operating room rampage, something else that feels rather out of character for Michael, especially given how he was moving slow earlier.

 

Michael's bloody rampage throughout Smith's Grove during the third act gets into why I prefer this version's depiction of him: despite whether or not the curse of Thorn applies here, he's still an uncontrollable killing machine, despite Dr. Wynn and the others' attempts to bring him to heel. In the Producer's Cut, as we'll see, he's little more than a pawn of the cult, which is disgraceful and pathetic for a character who was so powerful and terrifying before, but here, he's killing absolutely anyone he comes across, and not even those who seemingly worship and respect Thorn's power are spared. Sure, at the end of the day, Michael is still demystified, which I don't like, but at least he's still the unstoppable, bloodthirsty monster he's always been.

 

Michael also tends to have some very interesting mannerisms and tics here, and I have to say, I do like them. One that's especially cool to me is when, after he slams Jamie onto the corn thresher, she holds her arms out to him and he responds by holding his out as well, like he's suddenly turned sympathetic and is going to help her, only to then jam her further down onto the blades. It initially reminds me of that moment between the two of them in the previous film, only to then suggest that there's no humanity left in Michael and her trying

to reach out to him doesn't work anymore. As if that wasn't awesome enough, when Jamie tells Michael that he can't have the baby, Michael gives her his own version of the middle finger by turning the corn thresher on and heartlessly walking away! Another moment comes when Tommy is trying to break Kara out of a locked room in Smith's Grove, when Michael suddenly appears out of a doorway down the hall. Instead of immediately going after him, Michael stares at him, and when Tommy

makes that motion with his head, only then does he start walking towards him. Later, when Michael picks up the machete for his big killing spree, his hand initially goes for a smaller blade but he seems to decide, "Oh, this is better," and picks the machete up. Of course, Michael also does his trademark inquisitive head tilt when it seems Tommy is going to hand Steven over to him and, instead of attempting to kill Tommy, he actually holds his hands out for the baby. And after Tommy pumps him full of toxic chemicals, Michael pulls the syringes out and just shakes it off, which is kind of funny.

I really like the mask in this film, as well. While it's not perfect, it does look very similar to the original (John Carl Buechler said Akkad instructed him to base the design on the Halloween 4 poster) and, for me, it's a major improvement over the last two masks. The hair's a lot browner than I would prefer and it often looks like he's got a case of bedhead (I also don't get why his jumpsuit is suddenly gray instead of black or dark-blue, like it usually is) but, on the other hand, I like that it has a very worn and dirty feel, suggesting he's had this

one for quite a while. Weirdly enough, in the scene near the end, when Tommy attempts to fool Michael into thinking they've given up, the mask looks like it's smiling! That's something I've heard that this mask tends to do, that it looks threatening in some shots and more benevolent in others, depending on the lighting. Sure enough, after Michael hears baby Steven cry nearby and turns back to look at Tommy upon realizing he's been tricked, the mask now looks angry.

As much as I do get some personal enjoyment out of it, I agree that the biggest problem with either version of Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers is that they do explain the reason and motive behind Michael's killing sprees and his apparent immortality: he has the curse of Thorn, which compels him to murder his family members on Halloween night, and he's protected and harbored by a Druid-like cult who cursed him in the first place. First off, as has been said many, many times in my reviews alone by this point, that's not good

for a character like Michael, whose scare factor comes from how little you know about him. The reason why he was so frightening in the first couple of films is because you didn't know why he was going around, murdering people, why he just wouldn't die, or how he seemed to be able to appear and disappear at will. Some would argue that Halloween II's revelation that Laurie was his main target because she was his sister ruined the character way back when but, as I said in that review, I've always felt it worked because it was

simple, you still didn't know what his motive was for wanting to kill both of his siblings, and he still was murdering anyone else that he came across. Here, the explanation that he suffers from an ancient Druid curse, as well as that his appearances on Halloween night are timed with the Thorn constellation, take away everything that made him so scary and interesting in the first place. Another strike is that this whole concept is just kind of lame. I know it's rooted in the Celtic origins of

Halloween itself, and it's not as utterly stupid as stuff like Jason Voorhees having a demon slug thing inside him or Freddy Krueger having been given his powers by some stupid-looking dream demons (why does it always come down to demons that look like worms?) but still, cults and curses? Isn't that clichéd and old hat? Maybe in Daniel Farrands' original script it was handled better and was more terrifying but, after all the drafts the script went through, it came out as very hackneyed,

especially in this version, where it's all but discarded in the final act in favor of Dr. Wynn's genetic experiments. Plus, and this is just a personal thing, but with few exceptions, I've never found cults in movies to be that terrifying. In real life, they're scary as hell, but in movies, not so much, at least to me.

For the makeup effects, John Carl Buechler and Magical Media Industries were brought back and, according to Buechler himself, one of the Weinsteins (probably Bob) asked for a big makeup effects extravaganza. But Paul Freeman made it clear he had no intention of allowing any of what Weinstein wanted, and throughout the initial shoot, Buechler's team were unable to do little more than just typical stabbings, which was frustrating for them. But during the reshoots, they were able to come up with some much more elaborate and

gruesome kills, making this among the goriest of the series and one of the most brutal and mean-spirited, at least until the Rob Zombie movies. I think that's another thing about this version that I like, as the violence and viciousness give it a nicely savage tone. Some may argue that it's more befitting of a Friday the 13th film (how many references to that series have I made by this point?) and that may be true, but I just can't help but enjoy it and I think it works when combined with the genuinely creepy moments the film also has.

The first kill, Nurse Mary, is, again, similar to Bob's death in the original, as grabs her by the throat, picks her up, and impales the back of her head on a spike protruding from the wall. No gore, but the death is very vicious in its execution and you can subtly hear Mary's death rattle as Michael stands there, looking at her. Afterward, as Michael chases Jamie outside, we get a quick but nasty kill where he grabs the head of the guy whose truck Jamie takes and snaps it, breaking his neck wide open and giving us a brief, nasty close-up of part of

his spine sticking out. But these first few deaths are nothing compared to that of Jamie herself. After a small car chase, Michael corners her in a barn and throws her onto a corn thresher (for a while, I didn't know what this thing was exactly, but that's what everyone says it is, so I trust them). It's really nasty, as we can see the blades sticking out of her torso and blood running out of the side of her mouth, as well as hear some gross gurgling sounds. It doesn't end there, as Michael proceeds to jam her body further down onto the blades and then turns

the machine on the thresher, grinding her up as he walks outside. Debra Strode's death is much less gruesome: Michael appears in front of her with an axe while she's trying to escape through the backyard, he swings, and we just see some blood splatter on one of the sheets. However, during the chase in the Myers house later on, Debra's body tumbles down from the attic with the axe sticking out of her torso, which Michael removes with a nasty crunch before continuing to pursue Kara. But

the best kill is when John Strode drunkenly returns home that night and goes down into the basement when he hears something after the lights go out. After finding Debra's blood-covered sheets in the washing machine, which is somehow running even though the power's out (they don't explain that), Michael appears behind him, stabs him in the gut with his knife, lifts him up, and shoves him into a fuse-box. John is then slowly and agonizingly electrocuted, his body is fried, and he swells and

foams until his damn head explodes in a bloody mess! Gratuitous sight-gag that makes no logical sense? Yes. Bad-ass and well deserved death for such a hateful character? Hell, yes! It's so awesome that the next one, Barry Simms, not only can't compare but doesn't even try. It's just a simple stabbing, with Michael putting the knife down into his gut offscreen, but with some loud, nasty crunching sounds. Though it, again, is a needless kill on Michael's part, and the body's eventual

reveal to everyone else has no logistics, it does have a clever build-up, where Tommy hears a little girl comment that it's raining red (this is better than in the Producer's Cut, where she annoyingly sings, "Mommy, it's raining. It's raining red,"). He walks over to her, sees blood on her outfit, and then looks up to see Barry's body, with a bunch of lights tied around it, before it falls out of the tree and causes a panic at the fair.

Although his death is a simple throat slash after he gets out of the shower, Michael killing Tim Strode  has always made me wince, as he not only cuts his throat but, because Tim's left arm is reaching back, trying to grab at him, a little bit of the arm's underside gets cut as well. Beth is killed right after that, with Kara watching from across the street as Michael walks into the room behind her and stabs her to death, in slow-motion. When she goes into the house afterward, Kara finds both Beth and Tim's grisly remains under her bed's cover. One

character who they randomly throw in during the re-edited third act is this female patient who suddenly appears out of a dark doorway, scaring Tommy, and is revealed to have a bloody stab wound in her stomach. For a long time, I thought this was Mrs. Blankenship for some reason, probably due to the dark lighting and the not so good VHS quality, as well as because I could tell it was an elderly woman. Finally, we have all the carnage Michael causes in the operating room with that machete. With the fast editing and bright

strobe effect, you get some very quick and somewhat obscured but still gruesome close-ups of Michael stabbing and hacking people up (one of them is George Wilbur, showing he had no hard feelings about being replaced as Michael in the reshoots). The final kill here, of the poor guy who runs out of the operating room and is left behind to be killed by Michael (A. Michael Lerner's father, Fred Lerner, a veteran stuntman and coordinator himself), is similarly nasty: Michael smashes his face into the grated door in the tunnel, then shoves it into the bars until he breaks the door down in the process. Michael then just walks over his smashed head, underneath the grating, as he continues his pursuit of the others.

Sadly, this movie does not uphold the series' tradition of awesome opening credits sequences. While the initial titles are definitely memorable, with the screeching montage of random images, and the title itself coming at the screen and hitting with a loud clang, the rest appear in the lower right-hand corner of a shot that begins overhead and slowly pushes in towards baby Stephen as he lies on an altar, while the Man in Black performs a type of ceremony. The first chase sequences occurs

immediately afterward, when Jamie manages to escape from Smith's Grove with the help of Nurse Mary. After he kills Mary, Michael is in pursuit, as Jamie runs outside, into the thunderstorm. She manages to crawl through a large hole in a chain-link fence and runs to a nearby pickup truck. The owner, who's drinking nearby, stumbles towards the truck, drunkenly yelling, while Jamie tries to warn him of Michael. He's unable to hear her because the windows are rolled up, and he gets his

neck broken before he knows what happened. Jamie drives away and eventually makes it to a bus station near Haddonfield, where she calls in to Barry Simms' show to plead for help over the radio, hoping Dr. Loomis will hear her by some miracle. She's cut off by Barry, though, and runs downstairs to the restroom. She cradles her crying baby, when the lights suddenly go out. Looking outside the door, she sees Michael's shadow on the wall as he comes down the stairs. She ducks back

in and hides inside one of the stalls, as he enters the restroom and opens them one by one, each loudly creaking open. When he gets to the last one, he finds it's empty too, but then sees that the window shutters are open. Jamie drives on down the road but doesn't get very far before Michael, driving a van from Smith's Grove, catches up to her. He slams into her rear end, then gets alongside and swipes her, sending her off the road and into a barnyard. She crashes through a wood fence and a

patch of pumpkins, before coming to a stop. With her truck now disabled, she gets out and limps into the barn, but realizes Michael has followed her, as she turns and sees a glimpse of him in a flash of lightning (J.C. Brandy looks notably different here, another sign that this scene was re-shot). She attempts to make her way back around to the door, watching Michael roaming in the dark behind her, but when she steps on a piece of straw that snaps loudly, he's immediately on her, grabbing her and throwing her onto the corn thresher. After turning 

it on and leaving her to her gruesome fate, he walks back outside to the truck and removes a bundle which he thinks is the baby from the seat, only to find she tricked him, as it turns out to be a roll of paper towels from the restroom.

After she's visited by Dr Loomis, and has her last, tense phone-call with John, Debra comes downstairs with a packed suitcase. But when she nearly reaches the bottom, she looks at a bucket she brought in from the front porch earlier and sees that an axe inside it is now missing. The phone in the kitchen then rings and, when she answers it, the Man in Black's voice comes over, saying, "We want the child." She asks who he is but the line clicks, and she turns around to see Michael, who

was standing behind her. Debra rushes out into the backyard, only to find a fence blocking off the back, forcing her to run to the front. When she does run for it amid the sheets she has hanging out there, she turns around, frightened that Michael might be following her, only to trip and fall. She momentarily loses her glasses, but puts them back on and crawls across the ground, pulling back the sheets. When she pulls back the last one, she's faced with Michael, wielding the missing axe, and he swings it, splattering the sheets with her blood.

 

Following the deaths of John, Barry, Tim, and Beth, the next major sequence starts when Kara, after witnessing the latter's murder, realizes Danny is walking towards the house. She follows him over there and walks through the door in time to see him heading upstairs. Grabbing a fireplace poker, she follows him and wanders into her bedroom, where she finds Beth and Tim's bodies. She sees Danny sitting in the next room and manages to shake him out of the Man in Black's

control. But just as she does, Michael appears behind her in the bedroom and starts moving towards them. Kara tells Danny to run, while she slowly backs away from Michael, holding the poker out defensively. She slams a door shut on him as she backs down the hallway, keeping her eyes on the door. Suddenly, Debra's body falls from the attic hatch, with the axe sticking out of her. Kara screams, while Michael yanks the door open and closes in on her. While she runs for the stairs,

he pulls the axe out of Debra's body before continuing on. Kara, however, manages to trick him, as when he starts downstairs, she comes up behind him and whacks him in the back of the head with the poker, sending him tumbling to the bottom. With Michael lying unconscious on the floor, Kara goes down and creeps around his body, searching for Danny, then sees that he's standing in a doorway right next to Michael. Telling him not to move, she gingerly steps over Michael's body and manages to pull Danny over to her side. Just when

she does, Michael's hand grabs her ankle, and you hear her bones twist as he squeezes. She falls back against the wall but makes him let go by smacking his arm with the poker, and she and Danny run out the door and across the street, back to the boardinghouse. Michael is right behind them, brandishing his butcher knife, and the two of them frantically pound on the door, Kara yelling for someone to let them in. As is always the case, Michael is almost on top of them by the time both Tommy and Dr. Loomis get to the door and let them in.

The entire third act at Smith's Grove is made up almost entirely of various chase and action scenes. After Loomis is incapacitated by Wynn's men, Tommy wanders into a maximum security ward and, after encountering the fatally wounded patient, finds Kara inside a locked room (why they kidnapped her is never addressed in this version). He grabs a fire extinguisher off the wall and starts hitting the doorknob, attempting to smash it off. That's when Michael appears in a doorway down the hall and, after they stare each other down for a

bit, he slowly walks toward Tommy, who continues trying to break the door down. Like in the original movie, you kind of feel like Michael is just toying with Tommy, and that he could really hurry up and kill him if he truly wanted to. It also makes for an interesting twist on the scene with Kara and Danny earlier. Tommy manages to break the door down right when Michael is about a foot away from him, and he and Kara run through this barred door in the middle of the hallway. But even though they close

it behind them, Michael manages to stick his arm through the bars and grab Kara's neck. He pulls her back against them, with Kara screaming like mad, until Tommy grabs a type of large gun off the wall, sticks the barrel up through the bars, against Michael's chest, and pulls the trigger, blowing him back onto the floor. Tommy and Kara run further into the facility, while we, of course, see Michael's hand move. That's when Tommy and Kara find the operating room, as well as Danny and baby Steven,

but take cover when Michael appears. There's a nicely eerie part where he walks past where they're hiding, only to then hear a noise. He walks back to see what it was, but when he finds nothing, he heads on down to the operating room, while Tommy and Kara are now hiding where Danny and the baby are. Michael proceeds to pick up the machete outside the operating room (don't know why that would be there) and uses it to brutally slaughter everyone inside. After watching the

mayhem, Tommy and Kara flee, along with Danny and Steven, with Michael in hot pursuit. After Michael kills the one surgeon, Tommy, Kara, and the kids make their way back to the main part of the building but Michael cuts them off, forcing them to run the other way. With no other choice, they find their way into that enormous, laboratory-like room.

Michael manages to tear the door open, sending the others hiding. He slowly walks inside, as Kara hides behind one of the machines, brandishing a metal pipe for protection. Tommy then attempts to fake Michael out by acting like he's going to hand Steven over to him. The plan almost works, when Steven suddenly cries from another part of the room, making Michael realize he's been tricked, but it gives Tommy enough time to pump him full of toxic chemicals with multiple syringes. Michael isn't fazed by this, though, and manages to grab

Tommy by the throat, lift him up, and toss him aside, before pulling the syringes out and continuing on. That's when Kara attacks him with the metal pipe and manages to get some good licks in, but he gains the upper hand by grabbing her by the forehead, forcing her down to her knees and dropping the pipe, then slams her down onto a table, where he tries to strangle her. He almost manages to kill her, as she uselessly pulls at his mask, but Danny yells and gets his attention. Seeing that he's hiding between two large, and is

the one who has Steven, Michael walks over and attempts to wedge himself between them, reaching down at Danny. That's when Tommy comes back with another syringe and, after injecting Michael again, in the back, repeatedly whacks him with the metal pipe, as Kara and Danny escape with Steven, and with Loomis' help. Tommy continuously pummels Michael, knocking him to the floor, and goes as far as to give him another whack for good measure when it looks as if he's finally given out.

This causes another instance of crazy, bizarre editing, as we see Michael's face convulsing with green goo splurting out of his mask's eye-holes. You'd assume it's the chemicals that Tommy pumped into him, but when Michael loses consciousness and Tommy throws the pipe down and walks away (again, without finishing him off), the mask is perfectly clean. So, I don't know what that was about. Tommy was also supposed to hoist Michael up with the chains you see hanging in there, but when shooting overran well into that night, the crew decided to hell with it and just wrapped.



No matter what version of Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers you watch, one thing remains the same: the ending sucks. In this case, it's just lame and insulting. After they've escaped, Tommy and the others plead with Dr. Loomis to come with them but he refuses, saying he has some business to attend to. They drive off, leave him there by himself, and we cut back to the room where Tommy beat Michael into submission. Now, all that's lying on the floor are his mask and the one syringe, and we suddenly hear Loomis screaming

and gasping in the background (a sound taken from the Producer's Cut). We cut to the Myers house one last time and a shot of that evil-looking jack-o-lantern, before the credits start rolling. All we can glean from this is Michael finally managed to kill Loomis, and not only does that suck, but what's worse is that we didn't get to see it. How crappy is it that, after all of their epic confrontations across the years, we never got to see the final one? It just makes me wish that Donald Pleasence hadn't died so they could've filmed one last face-to-face scene between Loomis and Michael. He wouldn't have been able to do much due to his poor physical condition, but it would've been nice to see something.

Once again, Moustapha Akkad called on Alan Howarth for the score, but during the reshoots, the music was reworked considerably by music editor Paul Rabjohns, although Howarth has said he was still involved. While his first score, which you can hear in its entirety in the Producer's Cut, was more traditional and subdued, the theatrical version's score, though retaining some of his initial work, is often bombastic and grunge-inspired. I have to admit, though, that I do kind of like this score and prefer it to that of Halloween 5. Interestingly, the main Halloween theme is used rather sparingly here. I can only think of four times when you actually hear it, and in a few different versions, too. The first, when Jamie is escaping from Smith's Grove and is later being chased by Michael in the pickup truck, is played on an electric guitar, an interesting choice but a sound that, I must say, I quite like. Also, that second time has a nice build-up, with soft, suspenseful music when Michael stalks Jamie down in the bus station's restroom, transitioning into another, cool-sounding guitar bit that then becomes the Halloween theme as Michael attacks her on the road. The other times you hear the theme, which is when Debra is attempting to escape the house, and when Kara sees Beth get murdered and follows Danny, is from the Producer's Cut, a soft but quick version played on a piano, counterbalanced here with a bunch of shocking and freaky sound effects.

During the establishing shot of Haddonfield, you hear a rather somber and ominous version of Laurie's theme, and during the chase scene in the Myers house, you hear the theme from the original known as Michael Kills Judith, which is fitting. Both of these are from the Producer's Cut. What's definitely not, though, is the Shape Stalks theme, which is done as a loud pounding, accompanied by an electric guitar whose strings sound like they're being completely mutilated in the background. Again, though, I must admit that I do rather like it. The theatrical version also contains a number of sound effects meant to either make you jump or give you the creeps. There are a lot of loud metallic slamming sounds, some lower banging ones, akin to thunder, horrific screeches, and very eerie, atmospheric ones like a creepy wind blowing. Most memorably, when Kara finds Tim and Beth's bodies underneath the bed sheets, you hear an absolutely demonic growling/roaring combo as she reaches for the cover. As for the rest of the original music, most of which is in the third act, it isn't exactly memorable, with most of it being little more than a constant drum rhythm, but it keeps the pace going. There's also this soft, warm-sounding guitar theme that plays when Tommy first brings baby Steven to his apartment, gives him his name, and wipes the bloody Thorn symbol off him, and the movie ends with a somber piano bit that fits with the notion that this will be the last time you see Donald Pleasence in this role.

This is the only Halloween movie, save for Halloween III, where no version of the theme plays over the ending credits; instead you have the song And Fools Shine On by the band, Brother Cane. Several other of their songs, all from their album, Seeds, is featured in the film, but this is the only one I remember, as you clearly hear it both during the actual film and then over the credits. I don't mind the song, actually, as I think it has a nice sound to it, but I do question its placement in a film like this. I get that they were a big band at the time and all, but what does their music have to do with Halloween? Actually, let me answer my own question: nothing. The Weinsteins just decided it would generate more revenue.

As much as I personally enjoy it, I do get why the theatrical version of Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers is a tough movie for people to embrace. It has all the hallmarks of a troubled production: a completely re-shot third act and a reconfigured music score, a plot that is quite confusing when you try to rationalize it, and an ending that is head-scratching, to say the least. Moreover, Donald Pleasence has little to do in his final turn as Dr. Loomis, Dr Wynn is not frightening and his motivations and abilities clash with each other horribly, and, worst of all, the story completely demystifies a character who started out as a truly terrifying and unknowable villain. But, at the same time, I think it also has a lot to offer: some likable main characters, a great Halloween feel about it, some nicely gruesome and brutal kills that give it a fearsome tone, Michael Myers, despite being demystified, still being an unstoppable killing machine, and a pretty good music score. I know this is a controversial take but, for me, the merits more than make up for the serious faults and I am able to watch and enjoy it as a result.

 

Producer's Cut

Like I said back at the beginning of this, by this point, very long review, I learned of the Producer's Cut about the same time I learned of both this movie and the entire series in general. The website The Life and Times of Michael Myers, where I got most of my initial info on the series, had plot synopses for both versions but, again, I didn't look into the Producer's Cut because, being just twelve years old, I didn't understand what that meant. I had no way of comprehending the behind-the-scenes turmoil that happens sometimes, how directors and producers sometimes don't agree, how things have to be changed due to the ratings board, the effect that test screenings can have, and how stifling it can be to work for the bigger studios. But as I got older and learned more about the politics of filmmaking and the movie business, it made a lot more sense to me. Also, while it wasn't something I obsessively pursued, I did learn more about the Producer's Cut over the years and how it was rumored to not only be much different than the theatrical version I had on VHS but was supposedly better and was a very sought after item on the bootleg market. But wasn't until I watched Halloween: 25 Years of Terror and saw some actual clips that I became interested in the Producer's Cut. Plus, not only did you have Daniel Farrands saying it was a better version but you also had someone from Dimension saying they were attempting to give it an official release. Upon hearing that, I thought to myself, "I guess I'll actually get to see it pretty soon." Well, the Producer's Cut, of course, did finally get an official release, but it wasn't until Scream Factory's big box-set in 2014, and by that point, I, like a lot of fans, had already seen it.

 

Like the Star Wars Holiday Special and the Roger Corman Fantastic Four movie, even though it wasn't out officially, the Producer's Cut wasn't all that hard to find, be it on websites like eBay or dealers' tables at conventions. So, odds are, if you had a desire to see it before 2014, you probably did. Once I started going to horror film conventions in 2009, I began seeing copies of it everywhere, and yet, as is often the case with me, I was a big Johnny-come-lately, as it wasn't until the fall of 2011 when I finally bought it at a convention in Gatlinburg and watched it later that week. Since this was mainly just for the sake of curiosity and not something I busted my ass to get my hands on, I didn't have any preconceived notions of how it would be when I went into it. I had heard both sides of the argument, from the version's staunchest supporters to its biggest detractors, who felt it was needlessly talky and far too boring, but at the end of the day, as with everything else, the only person whose opinion mattered was my own. And after I got done watching the Producer's Cut, my first thought was that it was certainly interesting. It's always rather neat to see an alternate version of a film you're very familiar with; like film historian David J. Skal once said, it's like finding some new rooms in an old, familiar house. I did like the majority of the new scenes, as there were some character moments I really enjoyed, especially with Dr. Loomis, and I did think the story flowed better and was, at the very least, much more cohesive than the theatrical cut. So, on that level, I agree that it is superior. But, also like the theatrical version, there are things I don't like at all, and most of it comes together during the third act. Moreover, while there are specific issues that occur in both, this one has all new and, in my opinion, worse ones in addition.
 

By the way, have you ever heard the term "Producer's Cut" before? I haven't. Typically, you hear about a "Director's Cut" or an "Unrated Version," but I've never come across any other alternate version called a Producer's Cut. As James Rolfe said in his Cinemassacre Monster Madness review of these films, a Producer's Cut is typically what ends up in theaters. In this case, though, when this initial version went over poorly at the test screenings in early 1995 (screenings that, I might add, were primarily made up of 14-year old boys, according to Marianne Hagan; yeah, that's a demographic you'd want to listen to), and Joe Chappelle did all of that re-shooting and -editing, he was perfectly fine with what went to theaters, especially since he wasn't all that interested in the Halloween franchise anyway. The only alternate version that you could really call a director's cut is another bootleg that has some bits of gore they had to cut for an R-rating (I don't think I've ever seen that available at a convention). The Producer's Cut became known to Halloween fans not too long after the theatrical version was released in September of 1995 and they were the ones who unveiled it to the world at large. 

For me, the Producer Cut's greatest advantage is that Dr. Loomis has much more of a presence here. Again, Donald Pleasence's frail physical condition and strained voice make me cringe and feel he should've possibly been left out of this one, but nevertheless, he's as great as he always was and it's nice to see him have more of a role in his final film. For starters, Loomis delivers the opening narration about Michael Myers here, whereas it's Tommy Doyle in the theatrical version, and this makes it feel more like a Halloween movie from the get-go. While the first half of the speech is basically the same as what Tommy delivers, in the second half, Loomis, rather than speculating that somebody hid Michael and Jamie Lloyd away (something he alludes to in the film itself), tells us how Michael overcame all attempts to kill him, then disappeared, and that, while everyone else thinks him dead, he himself isn't so sure. There are also many more scenes with Loomis and Dr. Wynn, better getting across the idea that they're old friends. The first scene between the two of them at Loomis' cottage is much longer, and it's made clearer that Wynn is retiring from his job as chief administrator at Smith's Grove and wants Loomis to replace him, a declaration which takes on a more sinister note during the third act. We then learn that the reason Loomis himself retired was due to a stroke he had six years before (he also notes that he had skin grafts for his burn scars), and he goes on to say, "They practically had to hold a pistol to my head to get me to retire. But... things are different now. I'm different. I've buried the ghosts, I've buried them in this manuscript. I don't want to practice medicine anymore." It gives you a better sense of just how broken Loomis is by this point and that he just wants to wait out his few remaining years in peace. But when he hears Jamie Lloyd's pleas for help over the radio, he's compelled to take up the hunt once again, leading to an awesome moment where he pulls out a gun in preparation. 

 

Speaking of Jamie, Loomis' feelings about her here manage to redeem the lousy way in which he was portrayed in Halloween 5. He's genuinely distraught when he sees her being taken away on a stretcher, hanging by a thread, and follows when she's taken to the hospital, despite Wynn telling him there's nothing he can do for her. And he's quite inconsolable when she eventually is killed, saying, "I've let you down again... I never should have left you," and is furious with the doctor on

staff for letting this happen. Also, his being at the hospital for Jamie is why he runs into Tommy Doyle when he brings in baby Steven, whereas in the theatrical cut, he seems to be just randomly standing around there. Their scenes are a bit longer, adding more weight to their initial meeting (though I don't know why he refers to Tommy as an old friend), and when they arrive at Smith's Grove at the end, Tommy finally gets to tell Loomis his theory about Michael, and Loomis reveals he knows of Thorn, having seen the symbol at the barn where Jamie was found.

 

Above all else, Loomis, as always, has some very memorable lines of dialogue and delivers them so wonderfully. Following their first scene together, he and Wynn are next seen at Smith's Grove, where Loomis insists, "I tell you, Michael is alive. I can feel his evil heart beating. I can see him, just as I did all those years ago, behind these very same walls, staring, staring, always growing stronger." He then pleads with Wynn to help him, saying he can't go through this alone. Later, after Jamie is

removed from the barn, the sheriff tells Loomis and Wynn to leave immediately, that they have no business there, but Loomis retorts, "Michael Myers is my business." The sheriff then says, "It's been quiet here for six years and that's the way it's gonna stay. I mean, the last thing I need now is you goin' around, spoutin' off ghost stories, " but Loomis comes back with, "I suppose it was a ghost who did all this. I... it was a ghost talking on the radio last night! And that's a ghost being carried out here right now?!" And in his scene with Debra Strode, there's some dialogue where he forlornly calls his obsession to learn what drives Michael, "My life's work, and my ultimate failure."

As I mentioned earlier, another major difference is how, in this cut, Jamie Lloyd survives her encounter with Michael in the barn. Here, he simply stabs her in the gut and she collapses to the ground. She still tells him that he can't have the baby, and the scene where her body is found is here but now, we see her being taken away on a gurney, barely alive. We later see a bit of the surgery that's performed on her, including their removing the knife, which Michael left sticking in her, but she

remains comatose in the hospital, having dreams about when she was kidnapped by the cult and what they did to her, until the Man in Black enters her room and shoots her in the head with a silenced pistol, saying, "Your work is done now, Jamie." While it gives you a clearer picture of what happened in-between films and the lead-up to this particular story, I still find it pointless for Jamie to linger around, only to be killed off in such an unceremonious manner. As I said in my review of the theatrical version, while I would prefer her to live, if she had to die, then I'm glad they got it out of the way immediately and moved on.

 

The Producer's Cut also bridges the gap between this film and Halloween 5, a connection that the Weinsteins intended to suppress when they took control (that's like why the number 6 was removed from the theatrical version's title). During the opening, there's a black-and-white flashback to the previous movie's ending, showing the Man in Black breaking Michael out of jail and Jamie wandering around amid the carnage, hearing him calling to her. Then, we get into some new footage

where we see her wander outside and see Michael being placed into the back of a van, before the Man in Black abducts her. Another connection between the two is how we get shots of the Man in Black's feet and see the same silver-tipped shoes from before, which were removed from the theatrical cut. Speaking of flashbacks, when Jamie remembers what happened to her while she's in a coma, not only is it in black-and-white again but it's done in a surreal manner, with almost no sound except for the score, and some of the imagery is

sped up to come off as dream-like, namely a shot of the Man in Black leading the way down a corridor, as Jamie is wheeled on a gurney. This leads into a shot of Jamie tied to a large altar surrounded by candles, when Michael rises up beside it and seems to circle around her, given what appears to be his POV. Unfortunately, this ties into the very disturbing revelation about Jamie's baby, and some of those camera angles from Michael's POV can really make your skin crawl in hindsight.

Up until the third act, a number of the scenes you see in the theatrical version are present here, although they often feature different camera angles and takes of actors' performances; other times, they're extended with previously unseen material. The scene where Nurse Mary helps Jamie escape has shots from Michael's POV as he stalks the hallways and corridors, as well as shots of his shadow and feet, leading up to his first appearance onscreen when he kills Mary. Kara and Danny's

first scene, where she comes into his room after he sees and hears the Man in Black, has an added moment where, to alleviate his fears, Kara recites, "Stay away monsters/Stay away ghouls/Stay away from Danny/You jerks know the rules." After John Strode slaps Kara, Danny hears the Man in Black's voice, walks to the window, and sees a vision of Michael standing outside, partially obscured by the flowing curtain, which leads him to point that small knife at John. Speaking of John, there's a

moment after Kara and Danny head out to where he's watching through the window and tells Debra, "Just can't live with her anymore... She's not my daughter anymore." There's another moment, after John talks with Debra on the phone and he's drinking, where he looks at a picture of Kara and says, "Happy Halloween, baby girl." It not only gets across just how he can't bring himself to forgive Kara for whatever mistakes she made, making you dislike him even more, but there's also an uncomfortable undercurrent to that latter

moment. And after Kara discovers Danny's gruesome crayon drawings, she walks around her college campus, feeling likw she's being watched, and when the scene ends, we see that Michael is, indeed, there, watching her (though, like when he kills Barry Simms, there's really no reason for him to be there).

There's a lot less gore in this version, which, as per usual with Moustapha Akkad, goes more for the bloodless suspense of the original Halloween. Up until the third act, all the people who die in the theatrical cut die here as well and basically in the same manner, like Nurse Mary getting the back of her head impaled, Debra with the axe (the shot of the blood splattering on the sheet is still here and likely the most gore you see in this version), Barry getting stabbed in the gut and strung up, and Tim 

getting his throat slashed. While those are virtually unchanged, the others are not as gruesome as they would become during the reshoots. Michael still breaks the truck driver's neck at the beginning but it's shown from a different angle, with no close-up of a graphic makeup effect, and while John still gets stabbed against a circuit breaker and is shocked to death, it plays out differently. Here, he falls to the floor after finding the bloody sheets in the washing machine, Michael comes in, grabs him by the throat, lifts him up, and slams him against

the breaker before stabbing through him and into it. While his head doesn't explode here, it's still a pretty violent and brutal kill. However, I think Beth's death is very weak in this version, as it happens too fast, the stabbing sounds are very soft, and both Mariah O'Brien and Marianne Hagan's acting are really bad.

 

Thematically, the biggest difference between the two versions lies with both the cult and Michael's curse. Here, we get more into Tommy's theory about Michael being under Thorn's influence and how it compels him not only to kill every member of his family but also anyone living in his house, as they're also his family in his mind. He also goes into detail about how every one of Michael's evil acts, from his murdering his sister in 1963 to his killing sprees in 1978, 1988, and 1989, has coincided with the appearance of the Thorn

constellation on Halloween night. And he also explains that, once Michael makes his final sacrifice, his power will dissipate and the curse will be passed on to someone else to begin the cycle again. When Tommy tells Loomis of his theory, he also mentions runes of light and protection that could destroy the evil of Thorn within Michael, leading into part of this cut's ending. Finally, Dr. Wynn and his followers make much more sense this time around. Here, they truly are a cult, with Wynn himself having supernatural

abilities thanks to Thorn, and he's grooming Danny to become Michael's successor by making his own mother his first sacrifice, which is why Kara is abducted. When Loomis confronts him in his office, Wynn, this time wearing his red and black robe and coming off as much more sinister, tells him, "Look around you, Sam: madness everywhere. Famine, war, a great plague. These are signs that we must restore balance to the natural order of things. We merely provide the means... 

We've given him the power, the gift of Thorn. I am its deliverer. I follow it, act as its guardian! I protect Michael, watch over him! And... now it's time for another. Now it's time for you, Dr. Loomis." (It's very similar to Conal Cochran's motivation in Halloween III.) Loomis is then knocked unconscious and Wynn decides to leave him there, telling the one who did it, "It's his office now." But, as much as this scene makes Wynn's desire for Loomis to take over as head of Smith's Grove much more sinister in hindsight, it's also full of its own plotholes, which I'll get into shortly.

As I've said, while I do agree that the story makes more sense in the Producer's Cut and the Thorn concept is carried completely through, there is so much in this third act that either makes no sense or I just don't like, and most of the latter has to do with Michael Myers himself. I know I sound like a broken record with this but, to reiterate, I hate the idea of Michael being under the control of Wynn and the cult, especially here, where he's just standing around during the ceremony, taking orders from Wynn when he tells him to make his final

sacrifice. It destroys the scare factor he had before, especially in the original, if you know he was doing everything because somebody was manipulating him like a puppet, and it's why I prefer the theatrical cut, where he's still an uncontrollable killing machine. Even worse is the revelation that he's the father of Jamie's baby! Granted, they never come right out and say he flat-out raped his own teenage niece (although, like I said, some of the camera angles in Jamie's flashback are very suspect) but even if it was

artificial insemination or something he was forced to do against his will, the idea is still just sick. Daniel Farrands has defended this by saying he sees Michael as a sexual deviant because of how he's always stalking women but I've always thought that was just for the kill, as it is whenever he does clearly get excited. Also, in context of the story, what was the point of producing this kid if Michael was just going to kill him after he was born? Couldn't they have just had him kill Jamie

when they kidnapped her and be done with it? What, was this to buy time until Wynn could arrange for Loomis to take his place? And finally, the way Michael is stopped before he can kill Tommy is really lame. I know he explained how these runes would cancel out Thorn's power but still, the idea of Michael Myers, the murderous, masked, unstoppable bringer of death, being defeated by a bunch of rocks on the floor, unable to move amid them, is embarrassing. I echo Wynn's sentiment when he comes up and asks, "Michael, what have they done to you?"

 

And, just like the theatrical version, the ending sucks, and what makes both of them so bad is that they involve Dr. Loomis, a character we've loved and wanted to see persevere throughout all these films, getting royally screwed over in some way. Here, after Loomis tells Tommy and the others he has to stay and attend to some business, he walks back into Smith's Grove and finds "Michael" lying on the floor where Tommy stopped him. Telling him it's finally over, Loomis removes the mask, only to reveal Dr. Wynn. Loomis, needless to say,

is shocked and Wynn, who doesn't seem to know what happened himself, tells him that Michael's gone. He then grabs Loomis' wrist, telling him, "It's your game now," and after he lets go, Loomis watches as the Thorn symbol appears on his arm. He screams and gasps, as we see a figure dressed in a cloak and hat, walk off into the night. Had Donald Pleasence lived, maybe they could've followed this up in a manner that would've made it worth it, but as it stands, Loomis' last appearance involving him being cursed with taking Wynn's

place as Michael's guardian, after all the years he spent trying to destroy him, is not a good sendoff. In fact, why did Wynn want Loomis to take his place to begin with? Because he was closer to Michael than anyone else? Fair enough, but shouldn't he have gone for someone a lot younger? Again, how many more years did he think Loomis had in him and what's more, how could a feeble old man like him be Michael's protector? One could argue that the same way Thorn seemed to give

Wynn supernatural abilities, it would be the same for Loomis, but still. Also, since Michael's cycle was meant to end with the death of baby Steven and Danny was to take his place, I'm guessing Loomis is meant to become Danny's guardian, at some point. So, is Loomis supposed to guard Michael until he finds Steven and then make his final sacrifice, and then Danny truly takes Michael's place? Or would they then get somebody younger for Danny? And why did Michael switch clothes with Wynn to begin with? Ugh, this whole thing is so confusing and makes my head hurt trying to figure it all out. It's really no surprise that, following this, they ignored this storyline entirely, especially with Pleasence gone.

Besides everything I've already said, this cut's finale is not at all exciting or thrilling. All we have is Kara tied up on a sacrificial altar in the middle of the ceremony, Wynn telling Michael to make his final sacrifice and that Danny's journey will then begin, Kara telling Michael that he doesn't have to do it and that he can go against Wynn, Tommy sneaking in, dressed as one of the cult members, putting a dagger to Wynn's throat and forcing the others to untie Kara, all of them running out, with Michael chasing them, and Tommy using the runes

to stop him, while Loomis gets Kara and Danny out. After activating the runes (which shouldn't even work because he says "Samhain" as part of the ritual but mispronounces), Tommy escapes himself, leaving Michael standing there like a moron (and like in the theatrical cut, he doesn't take advantage of the situation and defeat Michael once and for all). As nonsensical as it is, I prefer the theatrical version's operating room massacre and the chase throughout the sanitarium.

When you watch the Producer's Cut, you really get a sense of just how much Alan Howarth's original score was changed for the theatrical version, as it's much more traditional and minimalistic here. The version of the Halloween theme here, which you also hear at points in the other cut, sounds like it's being planned on a piano, with some synthesizer added in. You hear it in all its glory during Jamie's escape from Smith's Grove and over the ending credits and, just like the electric guitar version in the theatrical version, I rather like it. The version of Laurie's Theme you hear in the theatrical version is carried over from here, but you hear it a whole lot more in this cut and it seems to act as something of a theme for Tommy, as it starts playing when Beth tells Kara about how strange Tommy is, and continues on all the way to when he finds Jamie's baby. By contrast, the Shape Stalks theme is much more like what you're used to, sounding a bit like it did in Halloween 5 when Michael awakened in the hermit's cabin, and you also get a rendition of the Myers House theme here in scenes like when Kara, Beth, and Tim arrive at school and continues as Kara walks around the campus and feels like she's being watched. It's a fair enough version of that theme, but I've heard better. The most notable original piece of this score is the theme for the cult of Thorn, which is very ethereal and otherworldly, with a lot of distant, vocalizing voices (it kind of reminds me of a piece from Werner Herzog's version of Nosferatu). Howarth also creates some music stings that sound very similar to some of the music in Halloween 4, and there are a few from Halloween II that are reused as well. In conclusion, the score to the Producer's Cut is fair for the most part but also nothing spectacular. This would mark Howarth's final involvement with the Halloween franchise, as a new composer would be brought in for H20.

The Producer's Cut of Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers is interesting to see, and it's nice that it's now available in a really good-looking print. On the plus side, it gives a bit more meat to the characters, you get a lot more scenes with Dr. Loomis, the story flows much better and is more cohesive, and what didn't make sense in the theatrical version does here. However, it still suffers from the problem of demystifying Michael Myers; in fact, I think it's worse, with him being completely under Dr. Wynn's control, having impregnated his niece, and being stopped by a bunch of stones, magical or not. In addition, there are plotholes involving Wynn's plans for both Danny and Loomis, some of the kills aren't as impactful, and the third act isn't that exciting. In the end, it's as mixed a bag as the theatrical version, and while I will always have a soft spot for that version, despite its problems, it is a shame that they didn't finish the movie properly, as Daniel Farrands and company hoped they would.