People will no doubt bitch about there being no Michael Myers in this movie. Boo-hoo, cry yourself a fucking river, you babies. Put on a diaper and shit yourself while sucking on your John Carpenter pacifier. So your boyfriend Michael Myers is not in the movie: GET OVER IT, geeks.
Anyway.
Tom Atkins, star of such excellent cinematic masterpieces as Night of the Creeps and The Fog, is at the height of his acting prowess here. He plays Dan Challis, an alcoholic doctor who is a hit with the ladies much to the dismay of his ex-wife played by the always-lovely Nancy Loomis.
What makes this film one of the most fucking brilliant of the 1980s is its bat-shit crazy concept. Think about it: An old Irish warlock stealing one of the stones from Stonehenge (with the help of his druid automatons) so he could chips pieces off it, put those pieces into Halloween masks, and sell them to children so their heads are crushed in a shower of blood and insects.
That’s brilliance incarnate, people.
Another spot of brilliance is that the previously mentioned druid automatons put on gloves before they murder as if the police could possibly get their fingerprints and trace them back to Santa Mira, California, home of Silver Shamrock Novelties.
And that brings me to Silver Shamrock Novelties. Is this not a social statement on how a powerful company can take over a town? (example: Walmart) Director Tommy Lee Wallace wasn’t just giving us an entertaining homage to Invasion of the Body Snatchers. He was warning us about the dangers of mass production, greedy children, and indulgent parents. The town of Santa Mira is an empty shell of a town thanks to the business but apparently they owe a lot to Silver Shamrock Novelties. You know, big businesses pump a lot of money into the economy so how dare you criticize the curfews and the surveillance cameras?
The “witch” (warlock?) of the movie is Conal Cochran. What makes him such a creepy villain is how fucking calm he is. He doesn’t run around like a maniac. In fact, his grandfatherly personality makes me wish he was MY grandfather. He’s a charming motherfucker. That’s another social statement: the smooth businessman infiltrating society in order to fulfill his own self-serving agenda. Evil? That guy? No way, he’s fucking sweet as pie. He might as well be Andy Griffith.
Another thing I like about this movie is the hospital. Tom Atkins is a doctor in one of the most empty hospitals I’ve seen outside of an actual abandoned hospital. That makes for a pretty spooky setting…maybe not spooky enough for my pal Garrett but, shit, Garrett ain’t afraid of nothing so how can he be the judge of that?
It’s an entertaining flick. Is the plot flawless? No, of course not. But considering the set-up, the plot pretty much bumps along the way you'd expect but with some slight twists and turns that make it pretty interesting. Which brings us to the ending.
The ending is brilliantly nihilistic. One of the best endings OF ALL TIME. It’s every parent’s worst nightmare: something seemingly harmless you buy your kid turns out to be the very thing that kills them. TERRIFYING.
So all your Halloween 3 haters need to take the silver spoon out of your asses and appreciate a somewhat campy but still creepy 80s horror movie.
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I'm going to write an article about the Best 5 Worst Films. This is obviously on the list, and always had been. It's right there with "Troll 2" and "Return of the Living Dead".
ReplyDeleteI actually agree with all the reasons Jordan explains why this film is cool. YES, it has a very original and interesting plot. YES, the Silver Shamrock company and Conal Cochran are great villians. YES, I jumped out of my seat when that woman got her face melted off at the hotel. Even the ending is cool as shit. I agree with all of that.
ReplyDeleteBUT what I can't ignore is the lack of motive. Okay, okay... I get that the company is getting bigger, stronger, more controlling. I get that. But why kill all the children? What's the point? Wouldn't it have been better to have the children go on killing sprees? Wouldn't it have been better to brainwash the children to become soldiers in the Silver Shamrock army? WHY KILL THE FUCKING KIDS?! That bothers me that there is no apparent reason why someone would even benefit from doing something like this. This is the reason why I have to disagree with it being a great film.
I could give a shit less about Michael Meyers being in the film. I understand what John Carpenter was doing and even thought it would have been a cool concept - to make the HALLOWEEN series into an anthology series. I'm not big on slasher films anyway. Sure there are some good ones out there, and yes, I am a fan of the original HALLOWEEN, but movies like HALLOWEEN III are a breath of fresh air. There is nothing out there like this film. There are hundreds of films similar to the first HALLOWEEN. So who cares is Michael Meyers wasn't in it? I sure don't.
Okay, and the last question I have (and something else that bothers me about the film): Why spiders? Why insects? WHY? That makes mo sense to me at all.
Ok, I'm finished. For now... :)
Oh and Tom Atkins' head is fucking HUGE. Did you see that monster? Next time you watch it, compare it to the people standing around him. That thing has to weigh 50+ pounds.
ReplyDeletehaha, i totally missed your comments, Willie.
ReplyDeleteMotive? Yeah, I guess they didn't really explain it but I think it had to do with his religion and how it was a sacrifice. and why snakes and spiders? Because that's what the SFX department had to spare.
You know why Tom Atkins' head is huge? it's because he's FUCKING AWESOME.