halloween 2

As John Carpenter tells it, he was up all night in front of a typewriter trying to come up with some ideas for the contractually obligated sequel to his super successful slasher movie, Halloween. Several hours and half a bottle of whisky later, Laurie Strode was revealed to be Michael Meyers’ sister, explaining exactly why she seemed to be the target of on his homicidal bender through Haddonfield. Carpenter would be the first to admit the whole thing was scarier without an explanation (see Rob Zombie’s horrendous remakes if you need further clarification), but his slightly inebriated plot point works as well as any. The director didn’t return, but Jamie Lee Curtis, Donald Pleasance and director of photography Dean Cundey did, which means the films looks and feels like a direct continuation of Carpenter’s work. The spooky suburban streets, however, are soon replaced by the sterile corridors of Haddonfield Memorial Hospital where Laurie is admitted as the only survivor of the Michael Myers massacre. Michael returns to finish the job, hacking up whichever nurse or security guard gets in his way. The script is a hatchet job, too, requiring poor Donald Pleasance to recite ominous nonsense (“You don’t know what death is!”) and confining Jamie Lee Curtis to a gurney for most of the running time. But the still-cool synth score and clever shot compositions (substitute director Rick Rosenthal manages to successfully copy Carpenter’s gimmick of having Michael pop up in the most unlikely places) make it the last of the “official” Halloween sequel you should even bother to pay attention to. Now out on Blu-ray with an alternate ending, deleted scenes and feature length Terror in the Aisles horror movie documentary.