Review of Halloween II (1981) by Alexander R — 13 Jan 2010

While "Halloween" was literally one of the best horror films ever, "Halloween II" just seems so far away from the previous movie. It's nowhere near as good as the first film, and that's such a dissapointment.

But why wasn't this movie as good as the first installment? There are a few obvious reasons. First of all, the brilliant mind of John Carpenter is not present because he did not direct this movie. Instead we have Rick Rosenthal in the chair, and he doesn't do the same amazing job that Carpenter did. This is really frustrating to see.

It seems that with the success of the first film, this movie was put more into the mainstream playing field. The kills that Michael Myers makes are a little more gruesome this time around, and we see a lot more than we saw in the first one. People might like this, but I don't, mainly because I don't think this is how Halloween operates. I felt that the first one was a dark, slow moving chillfest, while in this one it's just blood and gore and random violence, which is really annoying to see in a sequel.

The acting in this film is almost identical to the first installment, although it doesn't have the same effect on me, mainly because I've heard these lines repeated over and over again, and it gets a little dull. Donald Pleasence keeps reminding us that Michael is just pure evil. I think that he did enough of that in the first movie, and that's why this movie get's a little dull at certain points.

"Halloween" had a huge impact on the horror genre, but this movie just falls completely short. "Halloween II" is very dissapointing.