Rob Zombie returns to complete his re-envisioning of the Halloween series.

Unusually Dimension Films decided to release Halloween on August 28th in the US instead of the usual end of October spot. They put it up against The Final Destination and sadly Myers took a box office beating from Death. I've no idea what they were thinking as this is Michael's 10th movie so most people apart from core audiences have probably become tired. Personally I'm a Halloween fan so whether the 10th or 20th movie I was seeing this.

It is shot much in the same way as 2007's Halloween reboot. The story starts where the previous film left off. Michael Myers, presumed dead is being transported to a secure hospital by ambulance and under armed guard. As the ambulance drivers talk like rednecks to one another, typical dialogue of Rob Zombie films, an accident happens and yes you guessed it, Michael awakens and makes his escape with more brutality than we've seen him dispense before. In fact the whole film shows a lot more hate with Myers grunting with the force he rams his knife home into his victims over and over. Violence is ramped up sky high in this sequel. Myers goal? To kill his sister in order to bring the family back together, the rest of his family already having been killed by him directly or indirectly in the first one. Another departure for the series is a set of dream like sequences where Myers has visions of his mother standing next to a white horse guiding his actions almost like Jason Voorhees mother in Friday the 13th. After 10 films it seems strange to suddenly introduce mythology into it especially one that is so close to Friday the 13th lore. That mother/ son connection.

I really enjoyed this movie as it was quite shocking in parts but they have humanised Myers too much. In the original John Carpenter film Michael was a normal middle class kid with seemingly no reason to turn psycho, yet that is exactly what he did one night without warning. That was so much more scary the fact that he had no reason, he was just pure evil in his core. In Rob Zombie's version Michael comes from a broken redneck home and therefore has a reason why he turned out like he did. This makes it more believable but at the same less frightening. Malcolm McDowell reprises his role as Dr Sam Loomis who originally was played by Donald Pleasance in the original series. McDowell is wasted in this movie, all of his scenes occur outside of the main story line and he only joins in the fray in the final scene. A series of cut scenes where we are taken from the unfolding story and shown what Dr Loomis is up to, hawking his book 'Evil Walks Amongst Us', attending book signings etc. We see him frustrated by the fact that people don't take him seriously and are only interested in the gruesome killings of Michael and not why he behaves that way. It seemed such a waste to keep such a character at arms length. It killed the relationship between Michael and Loomis that we have come to expect on screen. Those are the the bad points, there are a lot of good points and this time there is a lot more action to keep audiences on the edge of their seats.

The last film was more for fans of the series as it delved into the psyche of Michael Myers, this one gets right into the action. There are already talks of the next Halloween being shot in 3D. This usually means the end of most series and is seen as the last resort of movie making. Also Rob Zombie is reported to not be returning for the next one and says that his vision is now complete as far as Halloween goes. The Wienstein brothers have also said that the next movie will follow the vision of another director who has his own take on the Halloween series. If that proves to be true then we will be on our third version of the Halloween series and the 11th movie to date. For now Michael seems unstoppable.