Halloween (2007) & Halloween II (2009) - Episode 95

The Rewind Movie Podcast

The darkest souls are not those which choose to exist within the hell of the abyss, but those which choose to move silently among us. It’s time to visit a very different Haddonfield, Illinois, with Rob Zombie’s controversial 2000s remake duology Halloween and Halloween II.

Expanding on the original film’s brief preamble featuring cherubic young Michael Myers’ murderous assault on his teen sister, 2007’s Halloween sees angry young Michael (Daeg Faerch) sharing his rundown house with his doting stripper mother (Sheri Moon Zombie), dirtbag stepdad (William Forsyth), flirtatious sister Judith (Hanna Hall), and baby sister Boo in a whirlwind of insults and abuse. The inevitable breaking point unleashes the killer within him, who we eventually see stalk and slash his way through the friends of young Laurie Strode (Scout Taylor-Compton), pursued by his pompous psychologist Dr. Samuel Loomis as Zombie tackles Carpenter’s original beats with added blood and guts.

The director’s second film from 2009 sees Laurie struggle to adjust to the life after the experience, while a near-mythical Michael wanders the outskirts of town following visions and portents on his way to a reprisal of his violent ways in a hallucinatory, brutal sequel.

The gang ponder Zombie’s uniquely grimy visual and storytelling style, and where the tension between creativity, commerce and reverence clash in these grittily rebooted entries into the cluttered canon of the series. A first watch for many of us, did Zombie’s breakneck heavy metal mayhem hold its own against Carpenter’s austere synthwave cool, or was it all sound and fury signifying nothing?

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