the groundhog day project

I'm torn, on this final day with Halloween II ; I wanted to do some Christ-Figuring but I cannot decide if I want to do a serious sort of figuring focused on Loomis or a semi-serious one focused on Laurie, or a probably not serious at all one focused on Michael. The vital question, because I think we know what I got from a movie like this back when I was five years old, is can I manage all three. And, in the process make an even bigger farce of the Kozlovic-Black Scale of Christ-Figuring. Note, in case you are new: the scale is scored out of 25, but there are more than 25 items. 1 tangible and 2 central are easy here, but Michael and Loomis take the lead over Laurie with 3 outsider and Michael takes the lead with 4 divinely sourced (though I could make the argument for Loomis having that point, too). Michael: 4, Loomis: 3, Laurie: 2. No one gets the point for 4.5 miraculous birth but Laurie gets the point for 5 alter ego . I'm tempted to give that point to Michael as...

I decided last night, after innumerable viewings of Halloween II over the course of the past 36 years, that Laurie does not shoot Michael in the eyes. I mean, yeah, he's purely and simply evil, and he's got some Cult of the Thorn pseudo-immortality going on, but as soon as Michael was back for The Return of Michael Myers in '88, it was either suspend my disbelief over eyes healing, accept that it takes 7 years for eyes to grow back when you've got cult of the thorn magic in you (even though the specifics of the Cult of the Thorn were still a couple movies off)... Or, the obvious option, which didn't occur to me until last night. 1) Laurie does not shoot Michael in the eyes. She shoots him, sure. But, she is not that good (or lucky) with a gun. 2) Michael, being all supernatural evil and serving the (incorrectly identified) Celtic Lord of the Dead Samhain, cries blood. It's not just an interesting visual, blood coming down like tears. It's tears. Michael i...

Consider another angle. Maybe Michael isn't Laurie's id . Rather, Laurie is Michael's super-ego. Michael wasn't waiting for the opportunity to kill again. He could have done that at any time. He was waiting to be judged for having killed. This is why he follows Tommy first. He can feel a connection with Tommy. Tommy is just like him, a little boy full of imagination and potential. And, Laurie looks after Tommy. Like Judith didn't look after Michael all those years ago. This means Laurie's repression is even more important to the story than already suggested. She isn't free of Michael's violence (up to a point--and that point matters) because she doesn't have sex and do drugs (Notably, Michael probably has no idea Laurie was smoking in Annie's car. He's following them, but that doesn't mean he can see what's going on inside.) but because being that pure, virginal girl, she can pass judgment on him. He wants approval. He wants disa...

So then there's little ol' me. I'm two, I'm three, I'm four, I'm five. I'm all the ages since. And, honestly, I am still figuring out what the fuck all of the things around me are for, and I am blessed with the wonder that is cinema. Movies are just one of many stimuli that get injected into the mix. And, Halloween is just one of those movies. But, oh what a movie. And what a great movie to see often growing up, watching the way it is put together, the way it is structured. There's not really any fluff. There's odd choices here and there--Annie could have just driven past rather than stop and talk to her father, for example, then there's no risk of getting caught with that joint. But then, does Brackett tell Loomis about the robbery details? And, do we know just how worried Laurie is at getting caught over this one transgression? Each detail serves the whole. And, some of the details are beautiful. That high pitched music cue when the light g...

So then there's little ol' me. What am I--two, three, four, five? Somewhere in there. My brain is still figuring out what the fuck all of the things around me are for, and blessed with the wonder that is cinema, movies are just one of many stimuli that get injected into the mix. And, Halloween is just one of those movies. But, oh what a movie. Whether you take Michael as representative of fate, of death, of the inevitable, of moral judgment, of Laurie Strode's id--yes, that's a thing; just see Muir (2009) and it's right there along with his section about fate--Michael is some... thing . However much he appears an average kid in that opening, however much he looks like a normal man without his mask (when Laurie briefly gets it off of him right before Loomis shoots him), and however much the sequels explain him, he is a force of nature, or a force beyond nature. More supernatural than natural... Except, that isn't really true. I mean, in this film and this film ...