Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers

Rating:
Summary: The Boogeyman's back and you're gonna be in trouble!
Review: Michael Myers has been comatose since November 1st, 1978, after he and Dr. Loomis were nearly killed in the raging inferno that destroyed the Haddonfield Memorial Hospital at the climax of Halloween 2. It is now 1988 (the year this movie was made ironically) and, while being moved (against the recommendation of the phsyically and emotionally scarred Dr. Loomis) from one facility to another, Myers hears that he has yet another surviving relative. He again escapes and heads for Haddonfield, Illinois to conduct his unique form of family tree pruning, Dr. Loomis, once again, in hot, Cassandralike pursuit.

Although nothing new was added to the formula (despite all the bell and whistle set dressings that hint that it will) Halloween 4 delivers the goods. The script by Alan B. McElroy is tight and true to the Halloween format and director Dwight H. Little drapes the movie in gothic shades, adding a little visual chill to even the dialogue scenes. John Carpenter's former composing partner Alan Howarth also contributes a spooky score. Recommended.

Rating:
Summary: the best since one
Review: this is my second fave halloween movie. the frist of course number one. this one iss good because it matches the creepnies of the oringal with out being to overly bloody. i like the girl who played jami its intresting how some sence in this parell the frist.

Rating:
Summary: Skip the Limited Edition, Get the Standard One
Review: I got my Limited Edition Tin Box yesterday. The packaging says a 5x7 booklet...which I assumed would be similar to the one included in the Halloween 5 LE DVD. Wrong. It is nothing but 2 pages of liner notes, the tin box cover art, and chapter stops. (Unless I got cheated and the booklet was left out of my copy).

The new documentary is too similar to the one on the H5 DVD...of course they are similar movies, but they actually took the same interview edits from the one on H5 and put them in this alleged "new" documentary for H4. Despite a few of the same comments made in both, it is a nice addition to the H4 DVD.

If you are a fan, it is a good DVD to have.

Rating:
Summary: They Should have brought back Jamie Lee Curtis!
Review: This movie was good but not good enough! Jamie Lee Curtis made the movie. Here's my storyline: Laurie ten years later is living with her daughter Jamie and her husband Jimmy Lloyd. They all know about Laurie's past. Michael shows up and Laurie, Jimmy and Jamie fight Michael Myers.

Rating:
Summary: thebest
Review: I thought this movie was sooo good. I love Daniel Harris. She is one of the best actors I have ever seen, the same with Ellie Cornell. I love them both. There both very hot. I have watchd this movie so many times. Once evey day for the month of September.

Rating:
Summary: Michael's Return Is Very Welcome
Review: Halloween 4 came 6 years after the mistake that was the shapeless Halloween 3. Part 4, while a usual slasher film, is quite good and effective. It's a worthy follow up to Part 2(maybe even better than 2)and a nice continuation piece. Michael Myers escapes from a mental institution and heads back to Haddonfield to track down his niece Jamie LLoyd, who is Laurie Strode's daughter. Donald Pleasence returns as Dr. Loomis. He is even better here than he was in the first two. He's more mad. More driven. Danielle Harris, as Jamie, is an extraordinary actress for her age. She is very, very believeable. You cry and root for her. She is very good. One of the best heroines in horror films in years. Michael himself is still quite scary. The mask is totally different. That's because he lost his old one in the fire. George Wilbur is a truly frightening image of Michael Myers. Ellie Cornell, as Rachel, is a beauty to look at. Her performance is routine, but good. Sasha Jenson, as Brady, is just there as eye candy for the girls. Nothing new. The film is sharp and tight, and has a great look and feel to it. The only thing that sort of ruined the mystique of Michael Myers was how he turned into a killing machine with some savage murders. Michael doesn't do that. They could've toned that part down. In the end, this is a solid and entertaining follow-up to the previous two. It all went down hill from here until H20.

Rating:
Summary: Hockey Horror Sequel..?
Review: Halloween 4: -The Return of Michael Myers. -Is the best shocker since the Original. -Halloween 5. -Was great. -I
felt cheated when I saw this movie when I saw the Advertisement
comercial's on T.V.

But I enjoy it. -Even on DVD Today.? -I wish they do more
with the DVD. -With Deleted Scenes in the Movie.

But it's great Entertaiment.? -I like the Town's new Sherriff
Sheriff Meeker. -He looks like a Spinning Image of. -Clint
Eastwood. -He is Care Free. -And Helps. -Loomis. -Donald
Pleasense. -Ben Meeker. -Bue Star.

Helping Rachel's Step Sister threw her Horrible Halloween
night with Michael stalking her at every turn.? -And kill's
every one like in. -"Halloween II."

The VHS been great. -Now I have it on. -DVD. -It's a classic campy and Hockey Sequel.

Rating:
Summary: Michael Myers Returns
Review: In the late 80's horror sequels flodded the market. With all the "Friday The 13th" movies comming out it was nice to see the return of the boogey man in Halloween 4. While Jason slices and dices without suspense, our man Mikey actually manages to scare us before he does it. The 4th part in the venerable "Halloween" series is not as good as the first 2 but comes pretty close.

The film completely ignores the debacle which was "Halloween 3: Season Of The Witch" and continues where H2 left off. Michael survived the fire and has been ina coma in an asylum ever since. I love how screen writers think up ways to negate the previous films endings. But in this film it actually works. Of course we all know Mikey wakes up to wreak some havoc. He returns to his stomping grounds "Haddonfield" to now chase after his neice, Jamie Lloyd, (Jamie being an homage to the absent Jamie Lee Curtis) finely played by the young Danielle Harris.

There are cool death scenes, like the one where Mikey impales Kathleen Kinmont onto a wall with a rifle. And great chase sequences, the trapped in the house sequence is a highlight.

What takes away from the film is the way nothing is explained fully, horror genre fans watch these movies and love to connect the dots. We don't know how Michael really knows Jamie Lloyd (Danielle Harris) is his neice. Also how did Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) die? There are some continuity problems too, e.g. the way Myers paleface mask seems to change from scene to scene. Also the film rehashes some of the originals scenes, like Jamie's scene where she is screaming down the street "Somebody Help Me Please!", the same way Laurie did in H1.

But the film has one key thing going for it, Michael Myers. He is one of the scariest Psycho's and it helps the film a great deal. The supporting performances by Ellie Cornell, and Donald Pleasance add to the whole mix. You actually believe that Ellie's character Rachael will risk her life to save her Foster- Sister Jamie.

If you can get over the minor mistakes and plotholes and take the film for what it is worth, you will enjoy this movie. This movie brings the series back to form, too bad the producers destroyed the momentum with the ending of Part 5 and all of Part 6. Had they just improved on this flick without adding bogus, silly, plot details, the franchise would still be healthy today. This is the last good "Halloween" flick.

Rating:
Summary: Michael Myers is Back
Review: Halloween 4 marks the return of Michael Myers and rebirth of the entire series. Considered by many fans and critics alike to be the best of all the sequels. This DVD is limited to 40,000 copies and if you want it you better hurry to get it. The transfer of the film is from Anchor Bay so we are almost garanteed to get something good. So this being said what else does this DVD have. Well a collectors tin! Okay so that's not all too exciting. Well it's a widescreen presentation enhanced for 16x9 TVs, includes the theatrical trailer, and an all-new 17 minute documentary Produced and Directed by Mark Cerulli entitled Halloween 4 "Final Cut". But that's not all, look for the 4-Page Collector's Booklet and possibly even a 5x7 original theatrical poster replica. This being said any fan of the Halloween series must have this DVD. If not in it's limited edition at least pick up the regular release from Anchor Bay

Rating:
Summary: The Night He Came Home ... Again.
Review: Michael Myers returns to Haddonfield, Illinois for another night of blood-soaked mayhem in this fourth installment of the popular (and seemingly endless) horror series.

After the departure of original film creators John Carpenter and Debra Hill following the unfortunate "Halloween III" (directed by Tommy Lee Wallace and featuring a completely different story line), producer Moustapha Akkad resurrected the series with Alan B. McElroy (the future screenwriter of "Spawn") penning the script and Dwight H. Little ("Rapid Fire" with Brandon Lee) assuming the directorial duties. But despite the obvious talent involved with this project, the results are far inferior to the original 1978 groundbreaking horror film.

Ten years after the climactic events chronicled in "Halloween II" where Michael Myers was blinded by Laurie Strode and caught in a tremendous explosion, the unstoppable monster is being moved back to Smith's Grove from a high security institution. One of the paramedics accidentally lets it slip that Michael has a neice living in Haddonfield, which proves to be a fatal mistake for most of the supporting cast members. Responding with ferocious rage, the "Shape" kills the occupants within the ambulance, escaping from the wreckage and slaughtering anyone in his path as he makes his way back to Haddonfield. Back from the first two films is the emotionally tortured and scarred Dr. Loomis (Donald Pleasence, always first rate), another survivor of the hospital explosion in Part 2 and determined to catch the embodiment of evil before he can reach his unsuspecting quarry. But time is running out -- young Jamie Lloyd (Danielle Harris), the nine year-old daughter of Laurie Strode (who has conveniently "died" off-screen), has already embarked upon trick or treating around the neighborhood, accompanied by her step-sister Rachel (Ellie Cornell). Before long, the town's power is cut off, and the body count begins to rise ...

Filmed for around 5 million dollars, "Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers" features some surprisingly good cinematography and a few moody sequences. But none of these qualities bring the film within striking distance of John Carpenter's chilling, unsettling original classic. Michael Myers has become less of a creepy, stealth boogeyman and more of a mindless killer in the "Friday the 13th" tradition -- pressing his thumb through a forehead, impaling an unlucky teen with a shotgun, crushing another heroic teenager's head with his bare hands. Before long, the murders start to have a numbing effect. Where is the suspense and the dread from the original?

The writing features a number of laughable scenes and truly hideous dialogue, which is not a tremendous surprise given the material (and how little time McElroy had to write the script before an upcoming Writer's Strike). During an obligatory love scene in front of a roaring fire, Rachel's wayward boyfriend and local teenage superhunk Brady (Sasha Jenson) -- who sports teen idol looks but little Midwest devotion -- exclaims "Oh, I think I'm in heaven!" right after the Sheriff's daughter, Kelly (Kathleen Kinmont) has pulled off a T-shirt which says, in large block letters, "Cops Do It By The Book." Nice touch. No doubt Daddy bought her that one. Within no time, Brady is stripping off his own shirt, and I have to admit that Sasha Jenson is one of the things that I really enjoyed about this movie. He's quite easy on the eyes.

Pleasence does his best in a familiar role, trying to give Loomis the same urgency and pathos from the original "Halloween" and its sequel. Sometimes it works. Other times, the material drags him down. Cornell is a typical slasher film heroine. Harris, a favorite of horror fans, generates plenty of unintentional laughs from her inept overacting. Jenson is solid as the strapping young hero who engages in a memorable, hand to hand confrontation with Myers while protecting the ladies -- a first in the series. George P. Wilbur is unspectacular as Michael Myers, if only because he has to contest with Nick Castle and Tony Moran from the first film.

Little's direction is average, creating neither a sense of terror or a single shock for the audience.

Despite this, "Halloween" and horror fans might very well get a kick out of seeing Myers back in his home town again, and it's certainly far better than some of the other sequels (Parts 3, 5 and 6 come to mind). Just realize what you're getting here -- a sequel that has less in common with Carpenter's landmark film and more similarities with the thousands of imitations which followed. A very guilty pleasure.

Of the DVD editions, try to wait for the special limited box set (from Anchor Bay) due on October 9, 2001. This edition features a documentary with interviews and insight into the making of this latest entry into the franchise, along with other extras.