I have a soft spot for Halloween: H20, it's a good old Dimension produced slick flick that I've seen on TV in the AM hours enough times for it to really grow on me. Also, it makes an effort to do something different this time around,as opposed to the same old well worn formula that we're used to. Don't get me wrong, it's still a slasher flick, but it's more coherent and self aware than the previous the entries, who are somewhat guilty of sleepwalking on the coat tails of the original duo. The notable feature here is the return of Laurie Strode, Jamie Lee Curtis making a comeback in a very different, commanding turn as the character she started out as so many years before. It's nice to see her back, even if they did subvert their own running continuity to do so, but I guess horror franchises were never much about the logic side of things to begin with lol. Casting in general on this one is pretty cool. The nurse from the original first two flicks shows up in a delightfully eerie prologue alongside a super young Joseph Gordon Levitt, setting the stage for the horror to come. Laurie is now headmistress of a swanky private school in upstate NY, and severely, stiflingly overprotective of her son (Josh Hartnett in his film debut). Him and his friends, including Michelle Williams and Jodi Lyn O Keefe, are excluded fom a school camping trip and left behind to get up to shenanigans right around the time old Michael decides to make an epic return to visit Laurie, and mercilessly slaughter anyone who gets in his way. Adam Ark in and a really unnecessary, dumb ass LL Cool J get in the way and become knife food as well. Seeing Michael and Laurie reunite again is legendary, and had to happen eventually, this film being just the enjoyable entry to showcase that. PS: back to the stupid mask again. When will they learn.
