I've decided that I want to watch the entire Halloween franchise this October, so I went ahead and moved on to Halloween II (1981) tonight.
This is such a great movie, and such a great follow-up to the original. As I was watching, I wrote down the phrase 'Bigger, Louder, and Meaner' and I think that sums it up pretty well. Everything from the score, to the sets, to the kills benefits from the significantly beefier budget that this sequel had over the original, without completely sacrificing the minimalist ethos that drove the first film. There is also a dark humor that feels much more like the rest of the 80's slasher crowd than the first flick, which had laughs, but mostly not at the expense of the victims. That's not to say that this is a mean-spirited or particularly transgressive film, just that the script has been fleshed out some and the universe feels a little less quaint and innocent than in the first movie. It feels more like a world that Michael Myers belongs in, rather than one he has invaded.
The plot picks up during the climactic ending of the first film, giving us an abbreviated version of events, and fairly smoothly transitioning into the continuing action. Donald Pleasance returns as Dr. Loomis, as does Jamie Lee Curtis as Laurie Strode, and Jamie in particular seems to have grown into her acting chops in the three years since the first movie was released. Donald Pleasance's beard visibly fills out as he emerges from the house three years older, which is kind of funny as well. I should mention that the song 'Mr Sandman' serves as both intro and outro to this movie, and it works so well, despite not being set in the 50s/60s when that song was actually popular. I vaguely remember it becoming something of a recurring theme in these movies, but I guess I'll find that out.
Dr. Loomis pursues Michael out of the house, after firing six shots into his chest and blasting him off of a balcony. As we saw in the original, Michael is already gone by the time Loomis makes it downstairs. From here we get to see Michael stalking through the neighborhood, in what I like to call 'Michaelvision', long POV shots accompanied by Michael's masked breathing. The mask POV is arguably done better in the original, with the small eyeholes visibly obscuring parts of the screen, but the overall effect, with the heavy breathing and unfocused edges, is still very strong.
While Michael roams the alleys and houses of the neighborhood, the town is beginning to discover what has happened already that night, and flocks of people begin to converge on the house. Loomis and Sheriff Brackett (Charles Cyphers) continue to search the streets, and Laurie is carted off to the local hospital. In the ambulance we are introduced to Bud (Leo Rossi) and Jimmy (Lance Guest), who recognizes Laurie as attending the same school as his younger brother. I'm pretty sure this chatter between them is just to establish who Laurie is for anyone who didn't see the first film, but it also gives us our first glimpse at the wider cast this one will employ.
Arriving at the hospital we are treated to the sight of a child with a razor blade stuck in their mouth, presumably hidden inside a halloween treat. I knew this was something the news would get up in alarms about every Halloween when I was a kid, but I think this is the first time I've seen it depicted, or implied to be a real thing that happens. It's a great practical effect, and one of the 'meaner' jokes I mentioned, as the situation is definitely played for laughs. This is what I mean when I say it feels like a world Michael belongs in; there's casual cruelty in the background, without him needing to be there to inflict it. We also learn that the only doctor available (Ford Rainey) has been drinking, which might explain why he sedates Laurie to give her a few stitches, as well as draws about half a liter of blood from her right after mentioning her blood loss.
Back on the streets, Loomis and the sheriff spot a figure that resembles The Shape (this time portrayed by the legendary Dick Warlock), walking down the street among the trick-or-treaters. He's even wearing a similar mask. Loomis gives chase, and the figure lurches out into the street, where a cop car fucking annihilates him. It's so sudden and unexpected, the cruiser comes out of nowhere and just explodes into a massive fireball, with the object of Loomis' pursuit slammed between the hood of the car and the side of a van that also explodes on contact. The person in the mask is incinerated in seconds, rendering it extremely difficult to confirm whether it really was Michael or not.
We are next introduced to Karen (Pamela Susan Shoop), a nurse at the local hospital who has been out at a Halloween party. We get a short scene with Karen and a friend of hers, that smoothly transitions into exposition via boombox, as a man walks by, the radio blaring out a news story about the murders, and broadcasting Laurie's location to the world. The film doesn't leave us hanging for long, and we get confirmation that Michael was not the boy killed in the explosion (It's later revealed to have been Ben Tramer, the boy Laurie has a crush on in the first movie) when he bumps into boombox-man. With his destination now known to him, Michael proceeds to the hospital himself. Ben Tramer's death is never mentioned again after it is confirmed that he was the one who died, and presumably the cop who killed him faced no consequences, as is tradition.
The rest of the film, more or less, takes place at the Haddonfield hospital. We are introduced to Karen's boss, Mrs. Alves (Gloria Gifford), as well as her fellow nurses Jill (Tawny Moyer) and Janet (Ana Alicia), and the hospital security guard, Mr. Garrett (Cliff Emmich). During one scene in the hospital cafeteria/break area we get my favorite exchange of dialogue in the film, between Bud and Janet:
Janet: "Every other word you say is either Hell, or Shit, or Damn!"
Bud (deadpan): "Sorry. I guess I just fuck up all the time."
Comedy gold. Bud also delivers the appalling line "Amazing Grace, come sit on my face" which is either genius or madness.
Jimmy is the first person to actually tell Laurie that the monster who attacked her is the same Michael Myers who killed his sister fifteen years prior, which seemingly unlocks some repressed memories, and we get our first big hint at the movie's big 'twist'. It has been pointed out to me that this movie is where I got the idea that Laurie is Michael's sister in the first film, because that is precisely what is revealed in this one, a little later on. It's been about twenty years since I watched any of these movies apart from the first one, and H20, which I saw in theaters just... oh god... stop thinking about the passage of time. Anyway, the idea that the two were related is something I had carried around, but I had forgotten that it was actually established as canon in this film.
The middle portion of the fim cuts between Michael eliminating the small staff on duty at the hospital one by one, with some pretty inventive kills thrown in, and Laurie desparately trying to hide and/or escape, while Loomis continues his search for Michael (I'm not actually sure why nobody thought to put even a single cop on Laurie-watch, or why they all thought he was done with her that night). Bud gets offed in the background of a shot focused on Karen, which is very artsy and cool, and then Michael drowns Karen in scalding water, which is a little less artsy, but still very entertaining. Mrs. Alves is exsanguinated off-screen at some point, and Garrett gets to experience Hammer Time. I'm honestly not sure if Jimmy is dead by the end of the film. He slips in a pool of Alves' blood and hits his head, but he makes it out to the parking lot with Laurie later on, only to seemingly die at the wheel. Maybe it was blood loss from the head wound? I don't think he shows back up in any of the sequels, but it was kind of odd how ambiguous his fate was left. I'll be very impressed if he does make a return. I won't spoil all the kills, there are a couple other great ones, and just about every moment that Michael is on-screen is impossible to look away from.
The run-up to the climax is filled with great moments, and Dick Warlock really escalates the super-human force of nature feeling given off by The Shape, frequently just walking straight through doors and exhibiting freakish strength. The mask continues to be an incredible choice, because it translates the blank emptiness of Michael's psyche into an outward persona in a way that even the most talented actor never could, and paired with Warlock's implacible physicality, the effect is deeply convincing. I want to be far away from Michael Myers at all times.
There is a short scene a bit earlier in the film with dialogue between Loomis and officer Hunt (Ben Tramer's killer) where Hunt (Hunter Von Leer) offers Loomis a cigarette, which he takes, and then a lighter which he also takes. The scene continues and Loomis notably does not light the cigarette, he only took the items handed to him because he was talking and didn't want to interrupt himself to explain that he doesn't smoke (or so I imagine) and he walks off with both still in his hands. This becomes important later.
Loomis (who has been ordered by the governor himself to return to the mental hospital) carjacks the Federal Marshal sent to escort him, once he learns of the connection between Laurie and Michael Myers, and the Marshal takes it pretty well, all things considered. He, along with a woman who I think is meant to be the nurse from the beginning of the first film (although I thought she was dead?) and the Marshal return to the hospital, just missing Laurie in the parking lot. A tense sequence follows where Laurie screams for help and pounds on the door to the building, Loomis letting her in at the last moment. This is one of the moments where Michael just ignores the existence of a door and walks through it without breaking stride, only for Loomis to plug him six more times with his revolver, with exactly the same efficacy as the first time.
The climax takes place in one of the operating rooms, and it is absolutely perfect. Laurie finally gets to take her own stand against michael, shooting him once through each eye. By this point Michael's supernatural durability has been well established and it comes as no shock when this does not put him down. Instead The Shape blindly slashes around the room with a scalpel until Loomis hatches a plan.
Loomis and Laurie begin opening the gas valves on all of the Ether tanks in the room, flooding the room with flammable gas (Which, if I understand Ether correctly, probably would have killed everyone in the room on its own. "There is nothing so helpless and irresponsible and depraved as a man in the depths of an Ether binge" and all that). This is where the pocketed lighter resurfaces, with Loomis shepherding Laurie out of the room and then igniting the gas, killing himself, and seemingly Michael as well. The Shape emerges from the roaring flames one last time, before collapsing and burning away. It would be a convincing end to Michael if A. he had not already had one immolation fake-out death in this movie, and B. you didn't know that there are 11 more movies in this franchise.
Overall this movie is a very solid follow-up to the first, and makes excellent use of the larger budget without losing sight of the original's minimalist charm. I'm going to give this one 5/5 as well, although I doubt that trend will hold throughout the rest of the series. The third one is pretty rough if I remember correctly (and also has absolutely nothing to do with any of the other films). My final thought is that for all the bad sequels billed as Something: Part 2, this is one film that actually is just a straight up Part 2, and they decided not to go with that naming convention for some reason, which I find odd.