Halloween II

Directed by Rick Rosenthal, Halloween II follows Michael Myers (Dick Warlock) as his pursuit of Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) continues from the streets of Haddonfield into a local hospital – with the picture also exploring Dr. Loomis’ (Donald Pleasence) tenacious efforts at catching up to his psychotic former patient. Filmmaker Rosenthal, working from John Carpenter and Debra Hill’s screenplay, admittedly does an effective job of instantly luring the viewer into the proceedings, as Halloween II kicks off with a promising, entertaining opening stretch that picks up immediately after the events of its predecessor and details the surviving characters’ impressively compelling exploits. (There is, for example, a fantastic sequence in which Myers steals a knife from one house and murders a hapless teen in another.) From there, however, Halloween II progresses into an increasingly underwhelming (and sporadically tedious) midsection that moves at an often astonishingly deliberate pace, with the arms-length atmosphere compounded by a meandering, uneventful narrative and a roster of almost uniformly lackluster supporting characters. (Worse still, Curtis’ woozy Laurie is given little to do aside from scream and hide.) The comparatively action-packed final stretch arrives too late to make much of a difference, ultimately, which finally does cement Halloween II‘s place as a distressingly underwhelming sequel that generally feels like it should be much, much better (ie there’s just so much potential in the concept of Michael Myers loose in a hospital).

** out of ****