LoginJohn Carpenter's 1978 'Halloween' is wholly deserving of its status as a horror classic. To this day it's still one of the freakiest films personally seen and introduced the world to one of horror's most iconic villainous characters Michael Myers.
Which is why it is such a shame that not only are all of the sequels nowhere near as good but that the decline in quality is so drastic. Ok, the original 'Halloween' is very difficult to follow on from, but most of the sequels could at least looked like effort was made into them. To me, and many others it seems, 'Halloween 5' is one of the worst of the series. Even with its attempt at a grittier tone, it is far from a thrill ride and there is very little scary about it, other than one scene and how poor quality the film is.
Danielle Harris and Don Shanks give strong performances, as does Ellie Cornell in the limited screen time she has. Donald Pleasance does his best and succeeds in creating an unnerving presence, but his character is now too much of a caricature which is at the writers' door not his.
There is one effective scene, that with the laundry chute which is actually pretty freaky. The setting has a haunting eeriness when it is not hindered by the low-budget-looking rushed-looking filming.
Sadly, most of the time it is with the editing being especially amateurish. The direction is also sloppy, especially in the dramatically inept non-horror scenes. The music is here a drawback when it was one of the better elements of the three previous sequels. Here it sounds cheap, goofy and would have sounded out of date even in the 80s most likely.
'Halloween 5' is also seriously lacking in atmosphere and the darkness and grittiness doesn't come through enough because too much of the film is dull and descends into overly-silly camp. Again, 'Halloween 5' feels more of the same, the chilling scares, nail-biting suspense and the feeling of being unsettled. There is nothing creative or shocking about the scares or deaths, it's all by-the-numbers, over-familiar and indifferent. Everything is just too predictable and dull in pace to be remotely suspenseful.
Stupidity is also all over the film. So many moments are intelligence-insultingly ridiculous and almost illogical. The characters mostly are very bland and annoying, especially Tina. High quality of acting and dialogue is never to be expected in a 'Halloween' film, but both are especially bad here. The script is so last-minute sounding and not even half-baked and outside of the aforementioned the acting is terrible.
In summary, one of the worst of the series. Scary and thrilling are the two last words to describe this revenge. 3/10 Bethany Cox
3/10
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A revenge that is neither scary or thrilling
