Anticipating Rob Zombie's Halloween II

WWW--YES, I loved Rob Zombie's reimaging of John Carpenter's original Halloween, I thought it was extraordinary and worthwhile, almost a "what if" of filmmaking--think Peckinpah doing a slasher.

All the more reason to do a reimagining of the 1981 sequel, since it, well, sucked. Everything that the original Halloween was accused of--namely, being bloody and gratuitous--were writ large in the original Halloween II, it never justified its existence. Zombie's films justify themselves purely on their stylistic charms, but he does have point-of-view, something that's sorely lacking in most of today's cinema. Where are the great directors? Maybe Rob Zombie has yet to prove his mettle as a "great" director," but he's gradually convincing me, and I've been watching movies for at least 36 years.

Other than maybe Guillermo Del Toro, I'd have to say that Rob Zombie is one of the only noteworthy directors my generation has yet to produce. Whenever they make a new film, I'm as excited as I ever was or am when the new Terry Gilliam or David Cronenberg film becomes news.

Why? Zombie actually has something to say, and I thought his first remake in this series was a good anti-violence tract, it made me cringe the way a horror movie's supposed to, but it didn't allow me to like the carnage. This irritated a lot of the audience I saw it with a couple years ago, your typical Indiana goober crowd. Zombie went for the Kubrick approach from A Clockwork Orange or Peckinpah's masterstrokes in Straw Dogs and Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia: show violence and its consequences, show it for what it is, ugly and tragic. More of the same? Bring it on, I want more...