Halloween 5: Review By slysnide

After the unexpected success of "Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers" (1988), the producers got box office happy and ordered up a sequel for Halloween 1989. While this can easily be done, as we've seen with countless franchise flicks, Moustapha Akkad made the unforgiveable mistake of recruiting the worst director for the job.

Dominique Othenin-Girard was a television writer/director who had little to no experience with making horror movies, as evident by his horrid "Omen IV: The Awakening" (1991) which ignored the Rapture ending of its predecessor and started anew with the same old story from the first two films, thus completely ignoring the genuinely interesting aspect of the end of the predecessor and turning the franchise into a colossal clusterf*ck. To no surprise, he'd done the same thing here two years earlier.

Now I have nothing wrong with a recycled version of the fourth Halloween film, since I generally liked the series, but he really lost me when he decided to make this about Michael preying on a deaf Billy Hill (Jeffrey Landman), the now insane Jamie Lloyd (Danielle Harris), and the annoying wannabe prom queen Samantha Thomas (Tamara Glynn). I found myself cheering for Michael way too much when he preyed upon Samantha and the numerous guys, which is a given for fans, and therein lies the problem. One of the reasons the predecessor was such a hit was because it went back to creating characters you care about, rather than ones whom are just set-up to die like ALL the supporting roles in this film.

But the truly horrible part was when you compare these two infamous chase scenes from the Halloween franchise: Laurie Strode frantically fleeing the Wallace House while the SHAPE walks behind her in no rush, and Billy & Jamie running as fast as possible from Michael who's driving a car!!! How could Dominique go so awry???? This is a Halloween film! Not a Leprechaun spoof! Though that film was a spoof itself so I don't know. Can you spoof a spoof? But this was just terrible! I lost ALL respect for this film when that scene occurred, because while we all like innovation in these sequels, that was just too much. It became the simile for the film: In "Halloween" (1978) he walks across the street after a 17yr old babysitter, and in "The Revenge of Michael Myers" (1989) he chases children in a car. Not sporting at all, nor good for his rep. So it wasn't much of a revenge given that and the cast if you ask me.

Though I don't blame this on stuntman Don Shanks, who's arguably the bulkiest Michael Myers in the series. The mask didn't fit him well as the neck of it kept slipping from his jumpsuit, but anyway, he's a stuntman playing Michael Myers, not the SHAPE, but Michael Myers. And those who've read my previous Halloween reviews know what I'm talking about when I say that.

However, ever the trooper, our dear friend Donald Pleasence (RIP) returned to the series for his fourth go round, always being the trooper that he was. Though heaven knows why. I can understand if Peter Cushing (RIP) were to turn THIS film down. No sweat on that part. But for an aging actor residing in England to continually return to play in these ever worsening horror flicks is beyond me. For given the slim budget of $5,000,000 then I'm sure he wasn't getting much out of this. Long live Donald Pleasence!!!

Despite all I've said, the film did make $11,642,254 which was very good in comparison with the budget/revenue of the predecessor, but Moustapha Akkad attributed that to what he called 'Halloween hype' following the good reaction of the fourth film from fans, for in the long run (like a few months) the film lost its' popularity among diehard fans of the originals, and even the immediate predecessor. But what do you expect from a director who refuses to take advice from his crew who've done films in this franchise before when he has not? That's right, anytime anyone made a suggestion contradicting his own for the betterment of the film and to keep it in good taste with the predecessors, Dominique would tell them to shut up since they're lowly crew members, while he was the director. So therein lies the source of all the problems.

Now I know what you're thinking: 'jeez is this movie even worth this rating?' but I tell you that I can beat all of those negative points with this one: The main thing which ticked off fans, critics, and the cast was that Ellie Cornell's beloved character Rachel was killed off so early and needlessly. A huge lack of storytelling, unless it was meant as a metaphor for the rest of the characters being pretty much f*cked, in which case it'd work. But till this very day, that decision was lamented among the cast, fans, and critics.

So if you like an unnecessary amount of buckets of blood & gore with absolutely zero scare value, then you'll tolerate this film. If not, then just remember what Moustapha Akkad said: "Halloween 5 was a mistake. We rushed into it."