| Halloween H20: Twenty Years Later | |
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Theatrical release poster |
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| Directed by | Steve Miner |
| Produced by | Moustapha Akkad Malek Akkad Bob Weinstein Harvey Weinstein Paul Freeman Kevin Williamson |
| Written by | Robert Zapia Matt Greenberg |
| Story by | Robert Zapia Uncredited: Kevin Williamson |
| Based on | Characters by: John Carpenter Debra Hill |
| Starring | Jamie Lee Curtis Adam Arkin Michelle Williams Adam Hann-Byrd Jodi Lyn O'Keefe Josh Hartnett LL Cool J Joseph Gordon-Levitt |
| Music by | John Ottman |
| Cinematography | Daryn Okada |
| Editing by | Patrick Lussier |
| Distributed by | Dimension Films |
| Release date(s) | August 5, 1998 |
| Running time | 86 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $17 million[1] |
| Box office | $55,041,738[1] |
Halloween H20: Twenty Years Later is a 1998 slasher film and is the seventh installment in the Halloween film series. It is directed by Steve Miner and starring Jamie Lee Curtis, Josh Hartnett, and Michelle Williams. The screenplay, based on a story by Kevin Williamson further developed by Robert Zapia, was written by Zapia and Matt Greenberg. It is the seventh installment of the Halloween series and a direct alternate sequel to Halloween II, ignoring Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers, Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers, and Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers (Halloween III: Season of the Witch has no connection to the other films and is not considered to be a part of the "Michael Myers" storyline).
The film is set twenty years after the events of the original film and centers on a post-traumatic Laurie Strode living in fear of her murderous brother, Michael Myers, who attempted to kill her all those years ago.
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On Thursday, October 29, 1998, Marion Chambers (Nancy Stephens), Dr. Sam Loomis's colleague, returns to her house to find it has been broken into. Before entering, she runs next door and lets her two teenage neighbors know that someone has ransacked her house. When arriving, Marion gets shaken up when she gets scared by one of the teens, Jimmy Howell (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) for he pops out in front of her wearing a Jason Voorhees mask. Jimmy searches Marion's house, but finds nothing and Marion decides to wait for the police in her house alone. While in her house, Marion discovers her file on Laurie Strode (Michael Myers' sister who escaped the attacks 20 years earlier) missing and finds someone is still in her house and immediately rushes over to her neighbors house. When she arrives, she finds both teenagers murdered. The killer, Michael Myers, (Chris Durand), attacks her. After a brief confrontation with Marion, he manages to kill her. The police arrive as Michael leaves the house with the file on Laurie Strode.
The film then moves to Northern California, on October 31, 1998 - Halloween. Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) has faked her death and is living under the assumed name "Keri Tate". As Tate, Laurie has a seemingly perfect life with a son, John (Josh Hartnett), a boyfriend, Will (Adam Arkin), and a great career as headmistress at Hillcrest Academy High School, a private boarding school. However, Laurie/Keri is far from happy. The tragic events from 20 years previous still haunt her and adversely affect her parental capabilities. To everyone, including Laurie's school secretary Norma Watson (Janet Leigh) this is "just another Halloween", however, Laurie still lives in constant fear from the attacks from 20 years ago, and partially believes that her brother is still alive and will one day return.
After stealing a woman's car from a rest area, Michael manages to find her using the file, and starts stalking the school grounds. As school lets out for the weekend, most of the students leave for a weekend getaway and Norma leaves work for the day. John and his classmates are having a intimate Halloween Party in the basement when John's classmate, Charlie (Adam Hann-Byrd), goes to get a corkscrew and is attacked and killed by Michael. When Charlie's girlfriend, Sarah (Jodi Lyn O'Keefe), (who had been waiting on the next floor down) goes looking for him, she finds his body and is attacked. She climbs into the elevator to save her life but as she climbs out, Michael tries to bring the elevator down by cutting the rope, and it falls on her and partially severs her leg. Michael then heads up to the floor she is on and kills her as well. When John and Molly (Michelle Williams) (who had heard the elevator crash) go looking for their classmates, they find Sarah's body hanging in a pantry and are chased by Michael through the school grounds and John gets stabbed in the leg. Just as Michael is about to get Molly and John, they are saved by Laurie and Will, who open the door for them just in time, and just as the door closes Laurie and Michael come face to face for the first time since their last encounter 20 years ago. Laurie and Will hide the kids and decide to try to kill Michael.
When Will sees a shape approaching from the far end of the hall, he takes Laurie's pistol (which she had secretly kept under her pillow at home during all this time) and shoots the shape five times, only to discover that it was the school's security guard, Ronny (LL Cool J). The real Michael then appears and kills Will. Laurie, Molly and John escape but she tells them to go for help while she chooses to go back to the school with a fire axe from the security house to challenge Michael in a fight to the death. She finds him and attempts to kill him several times, and finally after stabbing him multiple times, he topples over a balcony, similar to the first film. She approaches his body and pulls one of the knives out of his chest. She slowly raises the knife high above her head, preparing to bring it down on Michael and kill him, but before she can deliver the final blow, Ronny suddenly appears, apparently having survived the accidental shooting (the bullet had only grazed his head), and grabs her. He manages to restrain her from attacking the seemingly dead Michael and drags her out of the cafeteria.
The police come and put Michael's corpse in a body bag, loading it into a coroner's van. Laurie, knowing that Michael is incredibly hard to kill and not believing that he is really dead, grabs the axe from earlier and an officer's pistol and steals the coroner's van with Michael's body in the back. While driving away, Michael sits up and escapes the body bag, trying to kill her again. She slams on the brakes, throwing him through the windshield. She then tries unsuccessfully to run him over. The vehicle tumbles down a cliff but she escapes, while Michael gets trapped between it and a tree. Laurie recovers the axe and walks to where he is pinned. He reaches out to her, apparently seeking forgiveness and compassion. At first it seems she will accept this, and begins reaching out to him, but then she slowly pulls her hand back and with one swing decapitates Michael, finally killing him. Michael's head, still concealed by the mask, rolls down the hill. Laurie exhales, as sirens are heard approaching from the distance.
John Carpenter was originally in the running to be the director for this particular follow-up since Curtis wanted to reunite the cast and crew of the original to have active involvement in it. While it was believed that Carpenter, himself, opted out because he wanted no active part in the sequel this is not the case. Carpenter agreed to direct the movie, but his starting fee as director was $10 million. Carpenter rationalized this by believing the hefty fee was compensation for revenue he never received from the original Halloween, a matter that was still a bit of contention between Carpenter and Akkad even after twenty years had passed. When Akkad balked at Carpenter's fee, Carpenter walked away from the project.
Scream writer/producer Kevin Williamson was involved in various areas of production on this particular sequel including coming up with the treatment that the film was based on. Although not directly credited, he provided rewrites in character dialogue, which is seen heavily throughout the teen moments. Miramax/Dimension Films felt his involvement as a co-executive producer merited being credited. The original working title for the film was Halloween 7: The Revenge of Laurie Strode.
The original music score was composed by John Ottman, but some music from Scream was added to the chase scenes later on during post-production. John Ottman expressed some displeasure about this action in an interview featured on the Halloween: 25 Years of Terror DVD released in 2006. Ottman's score was supplemented with Marco Beltrami's scores from Scream, Scream 2, and Mimic by a team of music editors as well as new cues written by Beltrami during the final days of sound mixing on the film. Dimension Films chief Bob Weinstein demanded the musical changes after being dissatisfied with Ottman's score.[2]
The song "What's This Life For" by rock band Creed was featured in the film during a party sequence and is also heard during the credits of the film.
The theme from Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho was briefly used during the scene (at 42:00) where Laurie Strode speaks with Norma Watson (played by Janet Leigh, Jamie Lee Curtis' real life mother). (In addition Janet Leigh stands in front of a 1957 Ford Sedan, license plate NFB 418, which was her car in the movie Psycho.)
As said on Halloween: 25 Years of Terror, Halloween H20 had scenes re-shot due to complaints of the Myers mask used in the film. Scenes that could not be re-shot had a CGI mask replace them frame by frame. Four masks were made for the film.
The critical reception for H20 was mixed, with a rating of 53% on Rotten Tomatoes; the site's general consensus is that it is the finest of the sequels since Halloween II.[3] In terms of total gross, Halloween: H20 is the highest grossing film in the original Halloween series, and second in the overall franchise, behind Rob Zombie's 2007 remake of the original. It was released on August 5, 1998 in the US and later in many other countries. H20 cost $17 million to produce and returned over $55 million in domestic box office sales, with an opening weekend of $16,187,724.[1] As for video/DVD rentals, the film grossed over $21 million.
In the United States, Halloween H20 was released on home video and laserdisc by Walt Disney Video. In the United Kingdom, the film was released on VHS in 1998, a re-release was made on September 1, 2000.
On DVD, the film was released by Dimension Films on October 19, 1999 as part of the "Dimension Collector's Series" on DVD. It was released in the UK on October 22, 2001 and re-released on April 25, 2011. It was also released exclusively in the UK in 2004, as part of the complete collection, consisting of the first eight films, a set with is now out of print. It was re-released by Echo Bridge Home Entertainment on April 26, 2011, althought, it does not contain its original aspect ratio of 2.35:1, it now features a new 1.66:1 widescreen transfer.[4]
Halloween H20 was released in Canada for the first time ever on Blu-ray by Alliance released along with Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers and Halloween: Resurrection on January 12, 2010.[5] on May 3, 2011 it was released by Echo Bridge Home Entertainment in an aspect ratio of 1.78:1.[6] It was also released along with Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers in one Blu-ray collection.[7]
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