WARNING: THIS REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS! DON’T SAY YOU WEREN’T WARNED!
I hated this sequel when I first saw it. At the time, it felt nothing like the first two “Halloween” movies (the third is irrelevant), and there seemed to be nothing in it to make it stand out from all the other slasher movies of the 80’s. To see Donald Pleasance return as Dr. Loomis seemed depressing because it felt like an insult to see this great actor slumming in a movie that seemed so by the numbers. I also thought that the movie reeked of cheapness because of its low budget. Then again, these movies never really had big budgets to begin with. Indeed, John Carpenter’s original masterpiece is a hard one to top even by today’s standards, so maybe I was expecting too much from it. My impulse to see it came about because I wanted to know how the writers would explain how Dr. Loomis survived “Halloween II.”
What a difference a number of years and a whole bunch of embarrassingly awful sequels make. In retrospect, “Halloween IV: The Return of Michael Myers” is tone of the very best films in this long running franchise, and it did more than just drop a bunch of bloody good killings on us with little regard to everything else that makes a movie strong. There was actually some thoughtful work put into the screenplay, the performances are better than you would expect them to be for this genre, and it does have some very scary moments that the other “Halloween” sequels seriously lack.
I have really come to love how the “Halloween” movies have really come to defy the timeline of events it set up for itself from the get go. Despite the huge explosion that ended the first “Halloween II,” Michael Myers and Dr. Loomis somehow managed to survive. It never seemed all the bloody likely that either would come out of that alive with out serious debilitating injuries that would have ended their respective careers for good. “Halloween IV” starts with a couple of doctors assigned to transfer the seemingly comatose Myers back to Smith’s Grove where he should have stayed. But of course, Michael wakes up and thumbs his naïve caretakers who think this is just another prison transfer. These doctors also make the mistake of mentioning that Michael has one living relative left, his niece Jamie.
Going into a description of the plot is tiring for me, but you all know what happens from there on out. The one thing I should have admitted when I saw this for the first time is that it is genuinely scary at points. The first appearance of Michael Myers through the reflection of the mirror definitely had me standing up straight, and childhood terrors like the monster under the bed are exploited to strong effect. “Halloween 4” does play around with the clichéd moments of horror movies, but then manages to pull the rug out from under you. You think you have a good idea of what will happen, but the filmmakers smartly play on that to pull a fast one on you. The other sequels after this one didn’t even try to be as clever as this one to their own detriment.
“Halloween 4” was directed by Dwight H. Little who later went on to direct one of Steven Seagal’s best movies, “Marked For Death” (“hope they weren’t triplets!”). Dwight deserves credit for not just doing everything according to formula. What he does can’t be called new, but he pulls off something stronger than your average slasher flick. Instead of doing the usual opening with the pumpkin, he fills the screen with symbols of the October holiday that leads us into winter. With that, he perfectly sets the mood and atmosphere for this particular sequel. Dwight remains respectful of the original and does the right thing by keeping Michael hidden in the shadows like he was in the original. When that mask peeks out of the darkness, it becomes even more unnerving than his tilt of the head (that moment from Carpenter’s original still gives me the creeps).
The screenwriter for this one, Alan B. McElroy, managed to finish the script just mere hours before the writer’s strike of the 1980’s began. Listening to his audio commentary from the Anchor Bay Divimax remastered DVD, Alan makes it clear that he came to this film as a fan of the original, and he was not just out to throw the usual crapfest at us. Alan also gives us characters who we actually come to care about, and who don’t just do the usual stupid things we expect them to do while a serial killer is loose in the neighborhood. You even find yourself caring about that hunk of man named Brady (Sasha Jenson), and that’s even after we find him cheating on his girlfriend with the movie’s obligatory big breasted chick (and sheriff’s daughter no less).
One of the most important things to note about “Halloween IV” is that it was one of the last slasher movies made that featured actors who looked down to earth. After that, this genre was invaded by beautiful models with bodies that were taken care of or surgically enhanced. Whether or not they could act is another story altogether. This is not to say the main female heroine isn’t beautiful (she is), but she comes across the same way that Heather Legenkamp did in the original “Nightmare on Elm Street.” That type of character plays best in these movies over and over again. Ellie Cornell, who plays Rachel Carruthers, does Jamie Lee Curtis proud. We’re not talking Oscar winning performances here, but she gives us the kind of heroic female character we want to root for as she goes from being vulnerable to Sigourney (“Aliens”) Weaver tough.
This one is also not as bloody or gore dependent as the others came to be. Granted, there are a couple of nice gore shots inserted since Michael has become really good at killing people with his thumb. On top of him sinking his thumb into a doctor’s skull at the beginning, Michael also rips a big hole in a beer guzzling vigilante’s neck. Ouch!
Actually, this does lead to a weakness in the movie which is of a subplot involving these middle aged guys who are regulars at a local bar. They almost seem tossed in as an afterthought, and their own hunt with Michael leads them to do predictably stupid things. They end up disappearing from the movie for awhile to where you almost forget about them.
Watching Danielle Harris in this one is a little weird having recently seeb her as a completely different character in Parts I and II of Rob Zombie’s “Halloween” reimagining. She plays Jamie, the daughter of Laurie Strode who was said to have been killed in a car accident along with her husband. Curtis would later return to the franchise by way of “H2O.” I think you have to admire any young actor who does a horror movie at the age of 11 because it almost feels like you are asking this child to be emotionally scarred for life. On top of having a great set of lungs along with Ellie, she wins our sympathy even as the kids are incredibly mean to her at school. She also gives the movie one of its scariest images, but we’ll get back to that later. Danielle went on to become one of the biggest stars of the “Halloween” franchise and rightfully so.
And you of course have the only returning actor from the original “Halloween,” the late Donald Pleasance. Having miraculously survived the fiery explosion that flat out should have killed (were a highly profitable box office possibility not taken into consideration), Dr. Loomis has become almost as single minded in his pursuit to end the evil as Michael is in perpetrating it all over the quiet town of Haddonfield. Even if Donald was really slumming by doing this movie, he still played the part to the hilt and gave this particular entry a legitimacy that eluded future installments. Heck, it probably would have been seen as criminal to do a Halloween movie without Dr. Loomis, for he was as essential to this franchise as Michael Myers was. Looking at Donald’s face in the movie’s last moment (like I said, we’ll get to that later), he makes you feel Loomis’ horror as he comes to the horrifying realization that his fight against evil is far from over.
Actually, there is another “Halloween” veteran who returns to the fold here, and that is Alan Howarth. Along with John Carpenter, he scored the last two entries, and the two of them provided great scores for other films like “They Live,” “Prince of Darkness,” and “Big Trouble in Little China.” Howarth goes solo on this one as Carpenter pretty much retired himself from the world of Michael Myers for good. Even without Carpenter though, Alan turns out a memorable and atmospheric score that still has collectors hunting for the soundtrack which has been out of print for ages. Alan’s opening theme to “Halloween 4” is all his own, and it is one of the best pieces of music from any of the sequels.
Stunt performer George Wilbur takes on the iconic Michael Myers role in Part IV, and he does good work here. While no one can touch what Nick Castle did, it’s nice to see a Michael Myers that is a little more mobile than Dick Warlock was in “Halloween II.” George doesn’t really bring anything new to the role, but he does give Michael a formidable look that strikes terror even when he is not onscreen. The thought of Michael Myers in this one is just as scary as seeing these characters come face to face with him (or it as Dr. Loomis refers to him).
“You’re talking about him as if he were a man. That part of him died years ago.”
“Halloween 4” is in many ways the slasher movie you expect to see when you go to a movie theater, but when you look deeper into it, you will see that the filmmakers involved were not just doing this one simply for a paycheck. There was a strong effort made to be respectful of the original, and it shows. This sequel succeeded in reinvigorating the franchise which took a big beating after the previous Michael Myers-less entry, “Halloween III: Season of the Witch.” With that one, both John Carpenter and Debra Hill wanted to take the franchise in a different direction, having killed off Michael once and for all in the Rick Rosenthal directed sequel (whatever). While I do admire Carpenter and Hill for taking a risk with this established franchise, the end result was mediocre at best (and that is being generous).
DANGER! DANGER! SPOLIERS AHEAD!!!
Now is the time to talk about the ending of “Halloween IV: The Return of Michael Myers.” Michael has been shot dozens and dozens of times in a scene that feels somewhat lifted from “Predator” with Schwarzenegger and company blasting a forest to waste with their massive weaponry. Everyone is back home and safe, but then a scream erupts from upstairs. Loomis runs up the stairs to find that Jamie has stabbed her stepmother and is covered in blood, looking much like the young Michael Myers did. Like Pleasance, you find yourself screaming “NOOOOOO!!!!!!” Seeing it in widescreen with Danielle Harris right in the center holding those scissors, it still ranks high as one of the series most chilling moments. Indeed, the corruption of innocence is a terror that can be all too real onscreen as well as off of it.
I bring this up because this could have led the series in another direction, but the producers pussied out of letting Michael’s niece become the new killer, and they instead found a way (they always do) to bring Michael back from the dead. I guess the late Moustapha Akkad (may he rest in peace), having seen the damage done by “Halloween III,” felt that the fans would not accept any other killer except for Michael himself. Look, it’s not like we were begging to see that horrendously annoying Silver Shamrock song brought back, but this brilliant twist with the niece could have made the series even more frightening than before. But the profit motive always seems to win out in franchises like this one. What a shame.
SPOILERS END HERE. YIPEE!!!!
Still, with that all being said, “Halloween IV: The Return of Michael Myers” is still one of the very best in the “Halloween” series, and it was also the last good film in the franchise for years and years. Not as gore obsessed or filled with characters doing the most idiotic of things (not all the time anyway), it does feel in retrospect like the last of its kind before the series truly did turn to mediocrity. I couldn’t stand it when I first saw it, but upon watching it again, it is actually very well done once you get past the fact that you can’t recapture the power of the original.
***½ out of ****
