Sometimes the most frightening aspect of a horror film isn’t the film itself, but that something so truly horrible was created. I prayed after I saw Halloween III: Season of the Witch that I’d escape this franchise with nothing worse than that film. “What could be worse than this film?” I naively thought. Turns out, there is a film that puts the Silver Shamrock commercial to shame and it’s Halloween 6: The Curse of Michael Meyers. Released six years after Halloween 5, this film takes Michael Myers down a dark and twisted path no one expected. Having survived the fifth, Myers and Jamie were captured and kept underground with a group of druids who worship evil. This group also subscribes to the idea that Myers, and I’m sure others, are infected with “thorn” - an evil that forces its owner to engage in killing sprees.
This is the final film featuring the character of Jamie; Halloween H2O and Halloween Resurrection pretend as though 4, 5 and 6 never happened. (Maybe that was a good idea.) The actress was recast for this film and the character was changed significantly. At the beginning, Jamie gives birth to a baby and attempts to escape her underground prison and go back to Haddonfield. The film spends a bit of time on that story, but mainly revolves around relatives of the Strode family living in Michael’s house. When he discovers this, he heads back to his home to terrorize the new residents.
I’m not even sure where to begin on this movie. The plot is all over the place and most of it doesn’t even make sense. The druid/thorn storyline was building since the end of the fourth film and you’d think the end result would be better. The reality is, this storyline is a silly supernatural tie-in that made me like Myers less. I’ve said before that I don’t like my campy serial killers to have much of a backstory, and I meant it. Loomis’ warnings that Michael is pure evil were always enough. The thorn angle attempted to explain and even justify his actions and I hated that. Plus, the druids were weird and it was difficult to understand who they were and what their goals were.
Oddly enough, Paul Rudd is in this film. Technically his first major motion picture, I was surprised to see him and excited for his character. The good news for Rudd is after his performance in this film, his career could only get better. Rudd plays an older Tommy Doyle (the kid Laurie babysat in the first film) and his character is quite peculiar. While he has a motive for defeating Myers in that he met him as a child, this becomes lost in bad acting and writing. As I think about it now, I don’t believe any of the characters brought a connection out of me. The sub-story featuring the Strode family living in the Myers house in an attempt to sell it is slightly confusing and introduces characters the viewer has never known and sadly doesn’t actually get to know. Even Loomis is aged and fatigued. The actor dies after this film is made and the credits dedicate it to him. It’s honestly a shame that such a horrible representation of the franchise is dedicated to one of its most compelling actors.
My greatest disappointment with this film was what the writers did to Jamie’s character. Such a promising character in the beginning (Halloween 4), and they simply ruined her by the end. The film never explicitly states who the father of Jamie’s baby is, but none of the options are anything less than disgusting. Having her kidnapped, held captive, raped and terrorized for six years seemed a step too far for this franchise and one that was unwarranted. As with the fifth film, I was sad to see a potential character and a myriad of story lines dissolve, all to make way for a terrible plot.
It truly saddens me to give a film in this franchise a score as low as a one. I never thought it would happen and I still wish it didn’t. But you can’t take a one back after it’s out there. Myers should be ashamed of this film and his franchise average takes a serious hit after this. While I fear the Rob Zombie remakes, I’m comforted by the fact that they can’t be anywhere close to this bad.
If you liked Halloween 6, you might also like Halloween H2O, Halloween Resurrection and Halloween (2007).