Halloween: Resurrection

Plot

Three years after the events at Hillcrest Academy, Laurie Strode has been confined at the Grace Andersen Sanitarium, after accidentally killing a paramedic whom she had mistook for her brother Michael Myers. In the previous film,Michael had switched his clothes and mask for the paramedic's. Since Michael had crushed the larynx of the paramedic, he was unable to identify himself to Laurie and she beheaded him. As Laurie drove the coroner's van out of the school Myers, now dressed as a paramedic, was able to leave the school grounds and went into hiding.

On October 31, 2001, Laurie, pretending to be heavily medicated, prepares herself for the inevitable confrontation with her brother. Michael breaches the facility and kills two security guards, decapitating one and slitting the throat of the other as he makes his way to Laurie. After a chase, Laurie lures Michael into a trap; as she attempts to kill him, Michael feigns confusion and pretends to struggle with his mask. Unable to risk killing another innocent person, Laurie attempts to remove his mask to make sure that it is her brother. Myers quickly gains the upper hand and stabs Laurie in the back before sending her off the roof to her death.

The following year, college students Bill Woodlake, Donna Chang, Jen Danzig, Jim Morgan, Rudy Grimes, and Sara Moyer win a competition to appear on an Internet reality show Dangertainment, directed by Freddie Harris and his friend Nora Winston, in which they have to spend a night in Michael's childhood home in order to figure out what led him to kill. On Halloween, equipped with head-cameras as well as the cameras throughout the house, they search the house and separate into three groups. Sara's messaging friend Deckard watches the broadcast during a Halloween party. Meanwhile, Michael appears in his home and stabs Bill in the head, and kills a cameraman.

Donna and Jim begin getting intimate in the basement and a wall filled with corpses falls on them. Jim realizes the corpses are fake and the show is a setup. Jim leaves, but Donna notices a tunnel behind the fallen wall. Myers chases her through the tunnels before impaling her on a spike on the wall. At the party, Deckard and other partygoers witness the murder. Deckard realizes that the murder was real, but the others believe it is an act. Freddie goes through the house dressed as Michael, but is secretly followed by the real Myers. Freddie, mistaking Michael for Charlie (the cameraman who had been killed earlier), tells him to go to the garage and help Nora out; he goes to the garage and promptly kills Nora.

When Rudy, Sara, and Jim find Freddie in the Myers costume, he reveals the scheme to them and begs them to cooperate, telling them that he's set up a nice payday for all of them. When he leaves, the trio decides to gather up the other three and leave. But before they can, Jen discovers the body of Bill (who was stabbed in the head and vanished earlier) and is decapitated by Myers right in front of Rudy, Sara, and Jim. Rudy and Sara flee, but Jim stays to fend off Myers only to have his head crushed. Myers kills Rudy by pinning him to the door with kitchen knives before chasing Sara upstairs.

Locking herself in a bedroom, Sara begs for Deckard to help her. The other party goers realize that the deaths have not been staged. With Deckard messaging her Myers' location, Sara escapes and is found by Freddie. Myers finds and attacks them. Freddie is injured and Sara makes her way to the tunnels. She finds an exit near Donna's body and emerges in the garage, where Myers finds her and starts an electrical fire in the garage. Freddie returns and begins fighting Myers hand-to-hand. When he is overpowered, Freddie instead electrocutes Myers, tangling him up in electrical wiring before carrying Sara out of the burning garage. The Myers house burns to the ground.

Myers' body and the bodies of his victims are then taken to the morgue. As the medical examiner begins to examine Myers' body, he awakens.

Cast

Production

Halloween H20: 20 Years Later was originally to be a final installment in the series, but due to good success Miramax decided to make another installment. They, however, considered to take a different approach; according to the Halloween: 25 Years of Terror documentary DVD, Miramax wanted to take Michael Myers out of the film but Moustapha Akkad and the fans disagreed and insisted that it would be another "Michael Myers piece". Having learned this lesson with Halloween III: Season of the Witch, a movie that had experimented with a different story-line and failed to achieve expected success, Miramax had decided not to develop another sequel without the Myers character. The film's working title was Halloween: The Homecoming, but its producers wanted a title that said Michael Myers is alive, so in February 2002, the film was officially renamed Halloween: Resurrection. Also, the release date for the film was originally set as September 21, 2001, but producers at Dimension Films wanted the film to be stronger so re-shoots took place from September to October 2001. The release date was thus changed to April 19, 2002, then again to July 19 and moved one week earlier.

Both Whitney Ransick and Dwight H. Little were approached to direct the film but turned it down. Later Rick Rosenthal, the director of Halloween II, was chosen to direct. During the casting period of the film, producers considered Danielle Harris (who played Jamie Lloyd in Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers and Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers) for a role in the film. In post production Bianca Kajlich's screams had to be dubbed because of her inability to scream. The film's trailer was delivered on April 26, 2002, with the release of Jason X. Principal photography began in Vancouver, British Columbia in 2001 with the opening scene filmed at Riverview Hospital in Coquitlam, BC.

Halloween: Resurrection's delayed production and reshoots meant at least two alternative versions exist. The first workprint, titled onscreen as Halloween: The Homecoming, contained differences, some of which appeared on the DVD release including an alternative opening, multiple alternative endings, deleted scenes and an alternative score. Screencaps from a second workprint featuring deleted and alternative footage have been posted online, but copies are rare. This workprint is rumored to include the following deleted scenes, some of which are viewable on the retail DVD and YouTube.

Jamie Lee Curtis was contractually obligated for a 30-second cameo in the film, but reportedly was so interested in the story that she agreed to do a full four-day shoot and appeared in the entire opening sequence. However, later comments from Curtis would imply that this may not have been true.

The film's original director was Whitney Ransick, who was let go right before filming started due to the studio wanting a more experienced director.

Music

For this eighth installment of the series, Danny Lux created a genuine score relying upon the original instead of generating something new. He approaches the score with an electro-acoustic feel that dates back to the synthesizer scores of the '80s. The film also features several rap and hip-hop songs.

In direct contrast to general critical reviews of the film, some assessments of its sound and theme music have been praising. For example, critic Steve Newton complimented the film's "creepy" and "unsettling" revival of the original Halloween movie's theme while panning the film itself as well as the rap tracks included.

Box office

Halloween: Resurrection was released on July 12, 2002 in the US to moderate reception which did not change in its later international release. The film peaked at #4 on its opening weekend on US screens raking in $12,292,121 behind Reign of Fire, Road to Perdition and Men in Black II. It grossed $30,354,442 domestically and a further $7,310,413 for a moderate $37,664,855 worldwide gross.

Critical response

The film received highly unfavorable reviews from several critics. It has garnered a score of 12% on Rotten Tomatoes based on 59 reviews and a 13% among top critics based on 16 reviews, with the site's consensus being: "The only thing this tired slasher flick may resurrect is nostalgia for when the genre was still fresh and scary." Lou Lumenick of the New York Post said, "It's so devoid of joy and energy it makes even 'Jason X' look positively Shakespearian by comparison." Dave Kehr of The New York Times said, "Spectators will indeed sit open-mouthed before the screen, not screaming but yawning." Peter Travers of Rolling Stone magazine said, "Every sequel you skip will be two hours gained. Consider this review life-affirming." Joe Leydon of Variety said, "[Seems] even more uselessly redundant and shamelessly money-grubbing than most third-rate horror sequels." Glenn Lovell of the San Jose Mercury News was slightly more positive: "No, it's not as single-minded as John Carpenter's original, but it's sure a lot smarter and more unnerving than the sequels."

Potential sequel

Halloween: Resurrection concludes with the potential for another sequel to continue the story, where Josh Hartnett was originally planned to reprise his role as John Tate and seek revenge for his mother's death. Although there were plans for a new Halloween movie to continue after Resurrection, no such film has yet been produced to continue the original series. Dimension Films would instead produce a remake of the original Halloween in 2007, which was directed by Rob Zombie. A sequel to Zombie's remake was released two years later on August 28, 2009. Talk of some kind of a follow up to Halloween: Resurrection specifically has come up over the years but nothing has yet come of it. In December 2015, it was announced that Dimension Films no longer had the rights to the Halloween franchise. It followed in May 2016 that Miramax and Blumhouse Productions were developing a new Halloween film which they will co-finance. John Carpenter is set to produce the project and act as creative consultant. Carpenter said, "Thirty-eight years after the original Halloween, I'm going to help to try to make the 10th sequel the scariest of them all". On February 9, 2017, Carpenter announced that the new Halloween film would be released on October 19, 2018, and is going to be written by David Gordon Green and Danny McBride and will be directed by Green. The upcoming film will be a direct sequel to 1981's Halloween II. In September 2017, Blumhouse Productions confirmed that Jamie Lee Curtis will be reprising her role as Laurie Strode in the upcoming 2018 sequel.