When Rob Zombie remade Halloween, his version was clearly outclassed by the original, but to be fair, he wasn’t that far off the mark and there were certainly things to be appreciated about his adaptation. This time he doubles down and tries his hand at reinterpreting Halloween II because, apparently, he just wasn’t ready to leave Haddonfield yet. So, does this version beat out the original sequel or is he once again outmatched by a classic? Well, let’s discuss.

The plot of the ’81 version is very straight forward and picks up exactly where the original left off, continuing the events of that fateful Halloween night. Michael Myers continues his bloody quest through Haddonfield to find and kill Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) and eventually tracks her to the hospital she was taken to. As Dr. Loomis and the police search frantically all over town for him, Michael begins brutally dispatching staff in the sparsely populated hospital as Laurie tries desperately to evade him.

Over the years I had heard a lot of negative criticism of Zombie’s version of the sequel and when I finally sat down to watch it, I was surprised and frankly wondered what everyone’s fucking problem was. It seemed to be a pretty faithful adaptation that followed Michael on his bloody quest to finish off Laurie (Scout Taylor-Compton) in the hospital. The fact that it was true to the source material but featured top-notch, contemporary gore effects and a great visual style meant it was shaping up to be very stiff competition for the ’81 version. But of course Zombie just couldn’t leave well enough alone and about thirty minutes in…..everything changed.

Alright, spoiler warning here but just as the action in the hospital is really building in intensity, Zombie decides it’s time to pull out the most cliched device in filmmaking……it was all a dream. Yep, the film cuts to Laurie waking up two years later and it turns out she went to the hospital without incident and everything in the Halloween II remake we had watched so far was just her dream. What….the…FUCK! So, now we throw out everything we’ve seen so far to start an entirely different movie, one where Michael’s body is still unaccounted for, Laurie has PTSD but there is no immediate danger.

Currently, Laurie is living with her surviving friend Annie Bracket (Danielle Harris) and her father Sheriff Lee Bracket (Brad Dourif). The bulk of the remaining film that follows seems to be designed as an endurance test for the audience’s patience as we watch Laurie go to therapy, go to work, have emotional breakdowns….eat pizza, you get the idea. This is of course when we aren’t following around Dr. Loomis on his book promotion tour, a subplot so inconsequential to the storyline that it could have been cut out completely without anyone noticing. Zombie has also seen fit to transform his character from selfless vigilante to self-centered asshole who’s outlandish, rude behavior is supposed to supply some sort of comic relief.

Of course, Michael Myers does start to make an appearance here and there, popping up for some kills that are not at all relevant to the plot but at least provide some gory entertainment amidst the dull melodrama of Laurie’s story. “Where has he been the last two years” you ask? Apparently, just homeless, living in the wilderness and inexplicably killing time instead of people while he waits for his giant beard and Rob Zombie hair to grow out. He is also visited by visions of his mother (Sheri Moon Zombie) who eggs him on to kill although this seems like little more than a ham-fisted way for Rob Zombie to get his wife into more of the movie.

While the remake may be bloated with extraneous plot-lines and melodramatic characters, the ’81 version is the antithesis and presents a tightly paced, tense, engaging slasher that is arguably the best of the entire franchise. Considering how well that film still holds up today, there is really no reason to drastically alter the story and the only logical direction to take with a remake is to maintain the central plot and beef up the production value with slick visuals and modern gore effects. While the remake may have still felt unnecessary, it could have been more successful because gorgeous brutality is where Rob Zombie truly excels.

For all the issues with the story in his version I do have to give him credit for creating a film that is visually stunning, with amazing cinematography and vicious, realistic kills. Honestly, for the amount of sweeping changes he made, it’s confounding that he didn’t just make a completely different movie rather than another Halloween remake. Hopefully, in the future he will stick to creating his own beautifully deranged films and leave the classics alone.

I remember back when I first heard that Rob Zombie was doing a remake of Halloween and my initial thought was “How the fuck could anyone remake that?! That movie’s perfect!” However, nostalgia has a way of clouding memory so I was curious to watch them back to back with an open mind and see if the original was in fact as perfect as I remembered it being.

Both films follow the same basic plot in which a young Michael Myers murders his older sister and is subsequently locked away in an insane asylum that he escapes from years later. He is relentlessly pursued by Dr. Loomis, his childhood psychologist, who knows that Michael is returning to Haddonfield to find his other sister and kill anyone who gets in his way. Aside from some scenes in the remake that pay homage to the original that’s pretty much where the similarities end.

Some changes in the remake were relatively small like the fact that Michael is ten rather than six and that in the remake he also kills his sister’s boyfriend as well as his stepfather. Other changes however are so large that they fundamentally alter who he is as a character as well as his storyline as a whole. The biggest of these would certainly have to be the choice to spend multiple scenes establishing Michael’s home life as well as his progression into darkness and his time working with Dr Loomis in the institution. On one hand I respect that Zombie didn’t want to simply do a shot-for-shot remake and was trying to put his own spin on the mythology. On the other hand there were some significant problems with his approach, primarily centering on his interpretation of Myers as a character.

What makes Michael Myers so chilling in the original is that he is a representation of inherent evil, a seemingly ordinary boy that commits a murder for unknown reasons and then never speaks again. Having him be only six at the time makes it that much creepier as well. Zombie tries to establish him as more of a troubled, angry kid who is bullied (both at school and at home) and starts killing animals on his way to becoming a full fledged murder. We don’t know much about Michael’s childhood in the original but the fact that it seems to be a very ordinary, middle-class upbringing without any indication of abuse or trauma makes his sudden murderous turn and subsequent psychosis far more frightening and mysterious.

Furthermore, if Zombie is trying to sell Michael’s traumatic childhood as the reason for his psychotic behavior (a perfect storm as Loomis puts it) then we should have seen a far worse childhood than we did. Sure, his stepfather’s a dick but more of just an angry bully than anything else and nothing we see indicates he is actually physically or sexually abused. He also isn’t completely neglected since he has a mother that cares deeply for him. Truly there are people with far worse childhoods who don’t become murders and if you are going to approach it from that angle you really need to commit to it, not take a half-measure.

Now, I am no expert on mental health and I haven’t sat down and read the DSM from cover to cover but I do know enough to know that the remake presents a grossly inaccurate portrayal of what a true sociopath is. If he was an actual sociopath, he would be completely devoid of empathy and compassion at all times not just when it was convenient for the plot. In other words, the way he was presented in the original.

Speaking of the original I did happen to notice a few chinks in the armor this time around. It is of course an undisputed classic and a very important, influential horror film but that doesn’t mean there aren’t some areas where there is room for improvement. For instance, in the original Michael jumps into a car and is able to immediately drive it. He was six when he was put away and the throw-away line Loomis gives about someone at the institution probably teaching him doesn’t even come close to justifying his ability to do that or make any sense whatsoever. Neither does the fact that Loomis doesn’t think to report the highly recognizable car that Michael is driving as stolen even though he knows exactly where he is going with it. I would also knock the original for having Michael walking around in broad daylight in his super creepy mask without arousing suspicion but the same thing happens in the remake so I guess that aspect is a wash.

All in all I can’t say that the original is exactly perfect, but it gets the important things right in crafting a creepy, suspenseful slasher that is well acted overall and still holds up nearly four decades later. That’s not to say that there aren’t things to like in Zombie’s adaptation. He is, after all, an amazing showman and his version has enough blood, boobs and slick set-pieces to keep you entertained throughout (even if the scenes between Loomis and Michael as a boy do drag on way too long). So in and of itself the remake is fine for what it is but it’s over-the-top characters and excessive backstory make for a film that is easily outclassed by the haunting menace of the original.

When it comes to Hollywood mining the world for original films to reappropriate it seems no sub-genre is as over-plundered as the supernatural films of Asia, especially those from Japan and South Korea. In a way, this is somewhat of a curious practice since the remakes tend to fundamentally alter the style and tone of the originals to the point where they bare only the vaguest resemblance to their source material. Now, it’s been about a decade since I’d last seen the Pulse films but, in my recollection, the remake was handled better than most. I figured it was time to revisit these haunting films to see if that impression would still hold up under deeper scrutiny or if the remake would be yet another example of an Asian delicacy watered down for mass consumption.

Right away, there are certainly some areas where the films diverge, starting with the plot itself. The original follows two separate storylines that eventually converge involving a young woman working in a plant shop, Michi Kudo (Kumiko Aso) and college student Ryosuke Kawashima (Haruhiko Kato). After Michi’s friend hangs himself she finds strange, unsettling images on the computer disc he was working on and Ryosuke also sees similar disturbing images on his computer after performing an update. From there, both characters begin to have strange supernatural encounters as more and more people around them die or disappear.

Naturally, the plot of the remake is similar but instead follows college student Mattie Webber (Kristin Bell) in a single storyline. This time it is her boyfriend Josh (Jonathan Tucker) who commits suicide and the disturbing images are found by the tech-savvy loner, Dexter (Ian Somerhalder) who buys Josh’s computer following his death. As with the original, people start dying and disappearing mysteriously and it’s up to Mattie and Dexter to figure out why and to try to stop it if they can.

Despite the fact that these films are similar in terms of story, in other ways they couldn’t be more different and show a pretty clear example of what happens when you Americanize an Asian film. Instead of relying on CGI and jump-scares, the plot of the original unfolds slowing and deliberately, building tension and dread in an incredibly realistic and utterly chilling story. As someone who has seen a lot of horror I can safely say that this is one of the most unnerving and genuinely frightening films I have ever seen, with imagery that will fuck with your head long after the credits roll.

What makes it so effective is the way writer/director Kiyoshi Kurosawa presents the ghosts themselves. Instead of using an overabundance of CGI to try and make them look scary, Kurosawa primarily presents them as regular looking people but with somewhat altered movements, obscures them as shadowy silhouettes, or simply has them be in a place that people should not be. These scenes are also accompanied by haunting, otherworldly sound design that will make the hair on the back of your neck stand up.

By contrast, the remake presents the standard issue horror film ghosts popping out for predictable jump-scares and literally sucking out people’s souls like Shang Tsung in Mortal Kombat. Rather than allowing tension to build slowly like the original, the remake also follows the standard cliched formula of darkly lit “scary” scenes that alternate with brightly lit safe ones that make the scares feel more like a series of set-ups and payoffs rather than something woven naturally into the story. What’s perhaps the most irritating (but not at all surprising) aspect of the remake is the excessive amount of exposition from conveniently placed characters and the need to over-explain every aspect of the plot and the ghosts themselves. The original’s more ambiguous story was far more effective at giving the ghosts a more powerful, ominous presence.

So all in all, the remake wasn’t the exception to the rule that I had remembered it being and was just yet another example of a dumbed-down version with less interesting characters and less effective scares. Any positive aspects of the remake (like the famous water tower suicide) were simply scenes that were done better in the original and despite good lighting and sleek camera work there is just nothing about the remake to recommend it once you’ve seen the original. So if you haven’t done so, track down the original and experience it for yourself because anyone who lets subtitles be a deal-breaker for watching a film is missing out on some of the best and most interesting horror the world has to offer.