Halloween Resurrection (2002)

 

When a group of teens win a contest to spend a night in Michael Myers' childhood home to be broadcast live on the internet, they believe they are in for a little fun and some free publicity. But, things go frightfully wrong and the game turns into a struggle to make it out of the house alive. 

Halloween Resurrection is the 8th film in the "Halloween" franchise and it blows.  I hate this film. It makes all the previous films in the series look like Citizen Kane.  I don't know which reviewer on the poster says, "One hell of a fun movie", but he needs to fired from whichever company he reviews for.

Here's the amazing plot of the film.  An organisation called Dangertainment, headed by the entrepreneurial Freddie Harris (Busta Rhymes) sends 6 contest winners into the old Myers house with cameras strapped to their head and broadcasts it over the internet.  Mike shows up and starts butchering everybody while the world watches online.  

Yes I will play Laurie one more time and die so I never have to do it again.

Jamie Lee Curtis is stuck in a mental institution to open up the film and Mike shows up to finally put her out of her misery.  The chase to kill Laurie is actually the lone bright spot of the movie.  It's all down hill from there.  We have Busta Rhymes running around and here's a spoiler...I don't even get to see his annoying ass get killed.  He lives and is the hero. Rock Rosenthal directed this nonsense.  He's the same guy that directed Halloween 2.  No wonder they handed the next movies to Rob Zombie to direct.  

Myers is stunned by the horrible acting he's watching. 

I don't know what else to say.  I could write 10 more paragraphs about how awful this movie actually is but I'll just also mention that Tyra Banks is in it.  That should sum it up perfectly. I think I'll just pretend this movie was never made.

KB 

Trivia:
Was first named "Halloween: The Homecoming", but producers wanted a title that said Michael Myers is alive so in February 2002, the film was officially named "Halloween: Resurrection."  

Was originally set for a release date of September 21st 2001, but producers at Dimension Films wanted the film to be stronger so re-shoots took place from September to October 2001.  

Director Rick Rosenthal previously directed Halloween II - 21 years earlier.

The name Jen Danzig is a reference to Glenn Danzig, the former singer and leader of The Misfits, whom wrote and sung the songs Halloween and Halloween II after the original movie was released. The two songs have little to do with the movies since their lyrics do not even touch the main plot. 

Tyra Banks' characters death was cut. You can still see the aftermath in the movie.

A picture of Josh Hartnett, who played Laurie Strode's son John in Halloween H20: 20 Years Later, can be seen on the wall above Laurie's bed in the sanitarium. 

Michael Myers is not given credit for any of the murders that occur in Halloweens' 4, 5, or 6. A sanitarium resident even notes that Myers was not heard from for the twenty years between the events that occur in Halloween II and Halloween H20: 20 Years Later.

Jamie Lee Curtis agreed to do her part, only to make sure her character, Laurie Strode (or herself) wouldn't appear in another sequel. 

The name of the psychology professor at Haddenfield University is Dr. Mixter. This was also the name of the doctor in Halloween II that treated Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) and was killed by Michael Myers with a needle in the eye.

Several new endings were written during production and the cast was never sure how the film was actually going to end. Four different endings were filmed, and the director wanted the studio to ship a different ending to each theater, a technique used before during the theatrical release of Clue. However, the studio disagreed and the endings now appear on the DVD and the Internet. 

Originally, the executives of Miramax wanted to continue the franchise by creating a whole new story of which didn't have anything to do with Michael Myers after the last film, in a similar manner to Halloween III: Season of the Witch. However, poll results conducted throughout fan websites proved to the producers that fans wanted Michael Myers to return again.

This is the second Halloween film to make any sort of reference as to what exactly Michael Myers eats. In the original Halloween, when Sheriff Brackett and Dr. Loomis enter the Myers house, they see something on the floor, which turns out to be the corpse of a dog. Dr. Loomis simply says "He got hungry." 

Body count: 10 (Plus one character presumed dead, but it's unconfirmed. If you count the bodies from the flashbacks then the body count is 14.)

Laurie Strode is only in the film for the first 15 minutes and only says 11 lines of dialog. 

Yeah baby...we're going to get Oscar nominations for this film.

 

Death Occurred Last Night (1970)

 

 

A chief police inspector investigates the disappearance of a 25-year-old, mentally retarded woman, the daughter of a lonely widower. After she turns up dead, the cops race to find the killers before the grieving father does. 

This a pretty good unknown Italian Giallo directed by Duccio Tessari.  In Italy a crime story is nicknamed "giallo", that is to say "yellow", because a very successful series of detective stories published before WWII by Mondadori had yellow covers.  The film stars Raf Vallone's and his performance as the troubled father is incredibly painful to watch.  Painful as in actually being able to feel his sorrow with his daughter missing.  Frank Wolff also does a great job as the police detective also searching for the missing girl.  This was one of his last roles.

A grieving father gets his revenge.

The story involves a mentally retarded woman being kidnapped and sold into prostitution. Both the father and the police search in every brothel in town looking for her.  The film has a slow burn approach, focusing on the dramatic and psychological impact on those involved.  Highly recommended if you can actually find a copy.

Let me sing you a song before going back out to investigate murder.