Movie Review: Halloween (2007)

Halloween is a 2007 movie directed by Rob Zombie. The movie is a remake of John Carpenter's original Halloween (1978) which is a great horror film. This movie stars Tyler Mane, Malcolm McDowell, Scout Taylor-Compton, and Daeg Faerch in the lead. Surprisingly, Rob Zombie's take on Halloween is actually a decent horror remake. This was actually an entertaining and good movie. The movie is not entirely a remake of the original. The first hour spends time on Michael Myer's backstory and then the second hour follows the events of the first Halloween film very closely. In that regard, I think this movie was actually successful in providing us with more information about Michael Myers. While the original was great, we don't get all that much information about who Mike Myers is as a person. In this film, we get a carefully constructed story that shows who Myers was as a kid. If you want more from the first film that you did not receive, you actually may like this film. I enjoyed that aspect because it made his character a lot more deep. That leads me to my next point which is how surprisingly well done the characterization was. All characters on screen are given enough screen time to establish them as people. That surprised the hell out of me because most horror movie remakes don't even develop anyone on screen. In fact, this proves to be one of the more carefully layered horror remakes in existence. The one thing that I didn't know what to make of was how this film's genre drifts significantly from the original Halloween film. This movie didn't scare me at all. There's not even one remotely scary scene. It's a gory slasher movie and that didn't pay homage well to the original. Halloween (78) which was a great film because it was dark, mysterious, and extremely suspenseful. This movie was all blood and guts and that is another dividing factor. It depends what you're looking for. Also, the performances in this movie were surprisingly good including my favorite performance: Malcolm McDowell. McDowell gives a fantastic performance in this film. In fact, I would bet he'd spent months and months upon even more months of research. This role was great for him and he also had a very good heartwarming side to his character. Are there flaws? Although this movie does have times where it departs greatly from the original film, I actually think most of the complaints with this movie will be from people who respond to one of the dividing factors that I've mentioned above. Of course this movie isn't Oscar material. In fact, I don't even think it's a great horror movie. I think it's a good, decent movie that is entertaining and enjoyable, but only as long as you don't compare it too much to the original. Overall, Halloween was a good horror movie remake and has endlessly entertaining scenes. Two stars