‘Halloween 2’ revels in dead bodies, signifies death of a franchise

The only thing worse than a pointless remake is a pointless sequel to a pointless remake.

And Rob Zombie has committed both of these cinematic atrocities in the past three years, comprising half of his full-length directorial career — not such a good track record.

While it might be a curse of remakes that plagues the goth-rock legend, Zombie might also want to avoid the Halloween holiday, because “Halloween 2” amounts to nothing more than an uneven, poorly-paced and un-scary entry into not only the slasher genre, but in the “Halloween” legacy.

Opening with a scene of young Michael Meyers with his mother, Deborah, in the sanitarium from the previous movie, the film immediately establishes a running theme of pop-psychology involving a white horse that never comes to fruition throughout the running time, no matter how much of it Zombie throws in the audience’s face.

After that, the film picks up supposedly where it left off in the first film: Laurie Strode (Scout Taylor-Compton) is wandering the streets of Haddonfield, Ill., after “killing” her brother Michael. Needless to say, Michael Meyers can’t be dead — who would brutally massacre all of the less-than-one-dimensional characters strewn throughout the sequel?

Without creating even the smallest amount of tension and heading Proxy-Connection: keep-alive

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raight for the violence in an overly long dream sequence, the film then flashes forward a year later, where the ever-hysterical Laurie is still coping with the traumatic events of the previous Halloween. Though she believes Michael is dead — or does she? — we as audience members know better and fully understand his machete will get a workout by the end of the film.

Also, Dr. Loomis (Malcolm McDowell) is releasing a book on Michael Meyers timed — surprise, surprise — with Halloween, and while McDowell does what he can with the one-note character (that note being an a**hole), there is never any motivation to care about his turmoil other than to ponder if he will eventually be killed off.

There are various other characters, mostly new friends of Laurie’s, but the only one worth noting might be Annie (Danielle Harris) from the previous film. In what might be the most garish display of cinematic nepotism in recent memory, Sheri Moon Zombie — the director’s wife — is given a ludicrous amount of screen time for a character that is supposed to be dead.

It’s hard to pinpoint why Zombie fails so miserably at creating characterization, tension or even the cheap jump-out scare. Michael supposedly has some strange psychological obsession with his mother and his “family” — which makes for a lackluster reveal two-thirds of the way through — but Zombie attempts to pull this tricky slasher maneuver off with the finesse of a dump truck.

By covering his actors and sets in shadows and oddly filtered lenses, Zombie seems to think that he is infusing “style” into the film, but really, the film represents the anti-stylish slasher flick. It is ugly, drab and poorly lit: There is no suggestion in the direction that we are supposed to be scared at any point, just that we have to endure the brush strokes of an artist painting with filth.

It would all be somewhat redeemable if the scare scenes were, well, scary. But unfortunately, all the audience gets is quick cuts and uncomfortably angled shots where Michael slaughters his victims in basically the same way every time.

This might have been an attempt at realism — and therefore “true horror” — but it is mainly just boring. Don’t be misled — this is a brutal film, and gorehounds might find plenty to love with the repeat stabbings (complete with the squishy sound effects), but for everyone else, the blood will only conjure up a yawn.

With so much emphasis given to Laurie and her psychological trauma, Taylor-Compton would have to turn in a startlingly good performance to pull it off, and while she isn’t awful, the actress spends so much time looking hysterical that she grows into a grating character, not one to sympathize with. Honey, you are no Jamie Lee Curtis — give it up.

Finally, while a horror movie script could be alotted a fair amount of leeway as far as logic, “Halloween 2” seems to have given up on the concept entirely. Throughout the film, Michael will just magically appear to terrorize Laurie and her friends, but there is never even a suggestion as to how he knew where to find her. PSP, perhaps — Psycho Sensory Perception?

It’s sad, especially for a devoted follower of the horror genre, to see such a misguided attempt at recreating one of the best franchises out there. Zombie obviously has potential to direct something frightening, but he needs to focus on something more in line with his style.

And he should probably stay away from anything holiday related. At least Black Christmas already received its crappy remake.