Halloween reimagination

When I was eight years old, my mother introduced me to a little flick called "Halloween." From beginning to end I was captivated and enthralled. The simplicity made it watchable and the story made it terrifying. There are few things scarier than a six year old boy who up and murders his sister out of nowhere. Here's the basics in case you're not familiar:

After the incident, he was sent to a mental hospital called Parkgrove. Dr.Sam Loomis was assigned to him, but Michael never spoke. He just sat in his cell and waited for 15 years. He escaped and went back to Haddonfield and terrorized the quiet neighborhood Laurie Strode was babysitting at. At the end, Loomis shoots him six times and he falls off the balcony. When Loomis went to check, his body was gone.

It spawned seven sequels and I watched them all, over and over. Twelve or thirteen years after seeing it for the first time, it still gives me chills. The story, more than anything, is enough. The idea that it happened in a regular old neighborhood is scary the same way the original "When a Stranger Calls" was scary. It could happen to anyone. Where can you be safe if not in your own home?

Twenty eight years after its premier into the world, a young filmmaker by the name of Rob Zombie decides "Hey, I'm going to 'reimagine' this movie and give it a backstory". Naturally, being an avid "Halloween" fan[and a Leo], I was enraged. Lots of remakes had been going on at the time, but I didn't think anyone would touch that one. Any movie but "Halloween", please. But alas, it was done, and there was nothing I could do....except watch it.

I tried to set aside my personal problems and just watch the movie. Still, I couldn't help my preconceived notion that it was going to be bad. I was wrong. It was really bad. If you wanna make a movie about some kid who has a bad home life, gets picked on, tortures animals, and grows up to be a serial killer, fine. But you can't do all that and say you "reimagined" a movie that already exists. The character has already been developed.He's got his own story, Zombie just had to fill in the gaps-and not with nonsense.

Remember those basics we talked about? Here's what is different: His age, his haircut, his size, his general way of being, and gives him a fixation with masks. Again, if he was making a new movie, I wouldn't even care. But you can't just change....everything. Even prudent babysitter Laurie Strode fell victim to this storyline. Her character is a quiet bookworm. She has friends and they make dirty jokes, but she doesn't do things like that. She's the voice you hear in a group of friends going "You guuuys". In the "reimagination", she is raunchy as they come. The idea is that you wouldn't expect her to be able to stand up for herself, let alone stab a man-but she does, surprisingly enough.

In Zombie's version, Michael and Loomis talk all the time when he's committed. He's just whatever about the whole thing. The idea behind Michael Myers is that he snapped one day, and just never came back from it. He grows up into a man that could be anyone with his mask off. Average height and all that. But when you cast someone who is seven feet tall and has super long hair, he doesn't blend in very well and it's hard to take seriously as something scary. At six years old is when the movie starts. But in the "reimagination", he's about twelve with long blond hair instead of short brown hair. In the original, his parents seem like...anybody's parents. In the remake, they're very obscene and hard to look at.

At the end, you find out that Laurie is actually his sister and he carries a photo of them around with him. Two issues: that info doesn't come til the second movie, and he's not a sentimental man. Since Rob Zombie "reimagined" the second movie, too, one would think that he could have waited to tell everyone.

The gore in the remake was over the top and a little annoying. Michael Myers doesn't spend time killing people. He just does it and moves on. The remake would have been so much shorter if he had gotten to the point instead of wasting time on body count.

Maybe I just pay too much attention to the little things, but I think if you're going to "reimagine" a movie, you should stick to the actual story and roll with the characters the way they are. I've been wanting to rant on this for a couple years. Thank you for listening.