Taking Shape

by Dustin McNeill

  He’s such an original artist and a fascinating filmmaker to work with. He’s one of those people that knows what’s right by the way it feels, which sometimes happens entirely in the moment. We prep as much as possible, but things can always change. With Rob, there is a plan but there also isn’t a plan. I never know which direction we’re going to look in because things can change on the fly. Rob also likes to shoot 360 degrees with his movies. He wants to be able to put a camera in any spot at any time with little setup time. Due to that, we shot with very little lighting, which caused the movie to look extremely dark, but we were wanting that. We didn’t want you to be able to see what was lurking in the shadows. It makes it more terrifying that way.

  Did Rob reference any films as inspiration for the look of Halloween II?

  Only one, this film Gary Oldman directed called Nil by Mouth. I’m not sure Gary has directed anything since then. Nil by Mouth is this super tense dramatic-thriller from the 90s starring Ray Winstone. Oldman shot it on 16mm with very long lenses. He also crowded lots of foreground elements into the frame. Visually, he gave the film so much texture. It has a real uneasiness to it.

  It seems like Rob often likes change things once on set. Does that complicate your job?

  Not everyone has an easy time working with Rob for that reason. I think it might take a certain kind of collaborative spirit to work with him. You have to be really flexible in the moment, even if you originally prepared to do something entirely different than what he asks for. This keeps you on your toes, but it can also be incredibly rewarding.

  I think you may be right about Rob’s Halloween II aging well. The shock has worn off some and people are starting to judge it based on its own merits, not those of the previous films.

  I think so too. I remember Rob and I discussing its performance and reception when it first came out. Our Halloween II did okay, but it wasn’t a hit like the first one and it wasn’t critically revered by any means. We thought it was a little ridiculous how it did. We even said to each other how years from now people would start to realize that there’s a pretty good movie here. Granted, we’re biased since we made it, so naturally we think we’re right. But as a fan of movies in general, I really love the chances this one took by going in such a different direction. We turned Halloween on its head.

  Halloween II does something interesting with Laurie. Unlike in most horror movies, life doesn’t go back to normal for her. Normal is over. That’s a novel approach, isn’t it?

  I think so. Nothing would be fine after what she experienced in the first Halloween. People just don’t forget or abandon that kind of trauma. Scout did an amazing job with that role as well. I also like the sense of doubt we start to get regarding her character. If this is her real family, and it truly is, could she be just like them? If the story had continued, might she have become the one carrying out the murders? I think it could’ve easily gone in that direction. Who knows?

  Halloween II shot in Georgia on what seemed like an ambitious schedule. Rob has often cited this production as being a difficult shoot. What was the hardest part for you, personally?

  All of it. The whole production was just logistically difficult. I felt as though any given day was the hardest day of the shoot. I remember spending what felt like forever in the location we used for Sheriff Brackett’s house. It was so small and everyone was angry because they kept bumping into each other. We got a little cabin fever shooting there. It was also freezing, which is the opposite of what we expected being so close to “Hotlanta,” as people call it. It snowed twice.

  One of the hardest things to shoot was Michael chasing Laurie outside the hospital in the opening. That sequence unfolded during a torrential downpour of fake rain that we had to pipe in. It was also miserably cold and, because we were shooting handheld, the cameras had to be right in the middle of it. The one good thing I remember about that sequence is that I got to work with my dad. They brought him in to handle the rain effects, which I thought was so cool.

  The biggest bummer of the entire production was when we lost an entire night’s filming. Remember when the coroner’s van hits the cow and Michael emerges to kill the guys in the front? We lost all of that – the dialogue, the crash, their deaths, everything. Our film cans were being flown back to Los Angeles and were somehow inappropriately x-rayed at the airport. The damage was beyond irreparable. We couldn’t even fix it with CGI. So we had to shoot all of that again on what was already a really tight schedule. It was devastating news to get in the moment.

  What are your favorite moments in the film?

  Can I just say all of it? I’m proud of how the movie looks. I feel like it stands out in my fimography in a way that I almost can’t articulate. Halloween II is such an ugly film, but purposefully so. There’s a unique beauty in the consistency of the ugliness. It also assists with the storytelling, which was the entire point of it. We wanted to create this kind of dark reality for the movie.

  I loved how the Phantom Jam turned out. The energy of those scenes made it feel very real, which it kind of was. It was like we threw this wild party in some random barn out in the middle of nowhere. I also love the opening where Laurie is stumbling through the rain, almost catatonic. Sheriff Brackett picks her up and is trying to figure out what’s going on. It’s almost poetic that it was real rain in that scene. It felt so appropriate and melancholy for that moment.

  My favorite moments in the film have less to do with my own work and more to do with the actors. I loved seeing Brad Dourif as Sheriff Brackett. There are scenes where he’s trying so hard to be a dad to Laurie and Annie that I really enjoy. It’s all so understated and well done. Remember the scene where Brackett discovers his dead daughter in the bathroom? That remains one of the most haunting moments I’ve ever filmed on any production. His performance made it feel so incredibly real. And then Rob made the choice to flash between actual home movies of the actress as he’s basically holding her dead body. I thought it was an amazing choice.

  Dourif is incredible in that scene. It absolutely destroys me to watch it, the sheer power of it. I think the cross-cutting with home movies is from Rob’s director’s cut, isn’t it?

  I think so. I have a hard time remembering what’s in the theatrical version because, for me, that’s not the film we originally set out to make. I don’t think the changes that were made improved on anything. The director’s cut is the definitive version of Halloween II. That scene with Brackett makes the whole movie for me. It’s not cinematically impressive or anything. It’s just a dude in a bathroom giving an amazing performance.

  That scene is a great example of how Rob assigns such dramatic weight to the kills. There’s a gravity and a sense of loss in Halloween II that many slasher movies lack.

  That’s exactly it. We don’t feel that enough in slasher movies. It’s like someone dies and that’s it – who cares? In Halloween II, you really feel the impact of the murders being committed. It’s not necessarily designed for you to enjoy it. I think that’s part of the reason why it didn’t go over so well. Death makes people so uncomfortable. It’s not something they want to deal with and our film doesn’t shy away from it. Discomfort is a big part of our movie.

  Rob’s original ending killed off Laurie, Loomis, and Michael. The Weinsteins requested an alternate ending for the theatrical release that let Laurie survive. Part of their motivation for that was to leave the door open for future films. How do you view the two endings?

  The only good thing I can say about the reshoots is that it was much warmer when we filmed them because it was now summertime. We did those up in Connecticut, much closer to where Rob lived at the time. Between the two endings, I definitely prefer the one we originally shot, the one in the director’s cut. I hate to be like, ‘Whichever one Rob liked is the right one,’ but it’s true. I even said that to him while we were shooting the second one. And it’s no secret that Rob had difficulties with the Weinsteins from the start.

  I remember one day during film
ing we heard how the Weinsteins were nervous that we weren’t getting enough of what they called “trailer shots.” You know, the kind of shot where you’d see Michael Myers reflected in a mirror looking all spooky? We ended up getting those later on, but we hadn’t gotten them at that point. So they flew down to the set in Covington, Georgia in order to show us trailers they’d cut for their other horror movies and then asked us to get shots like that. As far as Rob was concerned, they were a constant pain in the ass. He just wanted to make the movie his way, which he pretty much did.

  The original ending has that great crane shot looking down on Michael, Laurie, and Loomis laying together on the ground. I love that. I don’t see why anyone had a problem with that ending. Who’s to say Laurie didn’t survive that? Yes, we have that long hallway shot that may or may not be in her mind, but we left it vague on purpose. Is this all in her head or an actual place? It could be either one. It wasn’t all that necessary to spell out whether she survived.

  Speaking of leaving the door open, the Weinsteins tried to mount a Halloween III effort without Rob’s involvement. I know Tyler Mane and Scout Taylor-Compton were both uneasy about returning without Rob. Was that something you would’ve considered?

  I would’ve been hesitant to return without Rob. It’s his vision. He’s the kind of filmmaker that, having worked with him, you come to respect him so much that you want to be loyal to him and not jump ship just to take another job. What’s weird is that I entertained returning to the franchise to shoot Halloween Returns back when it had Marcus Dunstan and Patrick Melton attached to it. Marcus and I go way back, even to before I met Rob, and he was interested in having me shoot that one, but it ended up falling apart.

  Tell me about shooting Halloween II’s surreal dream/nightmare sequences.

  Those were a lot of fun to do. They added a fantasy element that you don’t see much in this series. Those scenes were almost Baroque in their presentation. They allowed us to have these wild creative flourishes that didn’t have to necessarily attach to anything in the movie, so we enjoyed making them as fantastical as possible. Wayne Toth made all of those crazy masks you see in those scenes. The white horse was a super late addition that Rob added very close to filming. But that’s sort of how he likes to work.

  Beyond the visual style, I thought those dream sequences allowed us to see the lens through which Michael views the world. In his mind, those dreams are the world. Yes, they’re brutal and violent, but there’s a real sense of serenity to how he sees things. As a storytelling device, those dreams were a great juxtaposition to the rest of the film. We ended up liking that style so much that we ended up reusing it in the next movie I did with Rob, which was The Lords of Salem.

  Did you happen to catch the newest Halloween from David Gordon Green and, if so, what did you think of it?

  I did see it. I’ve actually worked with those guys a lot, the Rough House Pictures group. There is this show I did that just came out starring Danny McBride called The Righteous Gemstones. We were prepping that while they were cutting the new Halloween. Because of that, Danny allowed me to see parts of it even before the movie came out, which was exciting. What I didn’t realize at the time was that he was showing me the ending. He basically spoiled the whole movie without any warning. I was like, ‘Wait a minute, what did I just watch?’ But I did like it. I really appreciated that they tried to go back to Carpenter’s style from the first film. I thought that was a great approach.

  INTERVIEW: Glenn Garland

  (Glenn Garland: Editor - RZH1, RZH2)

  You’ve now edited and produced a slate of notable genre films. Are you a fan of horror?

  I am now, yes, but I don’t think I was as much before I started working with Rob. I don’t know that I quite understood the genre as much when he hired me. I specifically told him, ‘Just so you know, I’m not a horror aficionado.’ And he said, ‘Yes, that’s why I want to hire you. I don’t want my films to look like every other horror film out there.’ Rob likes for his movies to feel like real-life dramas that just happen to have horror elements to them. So yes, I’ve become more of a horror fan over the years. The horror films I like are mostly the stuff from the 60s and 70s, things like The Exorcist, Spider-Baby, The Last House on the Left, and the original Halloween, of course. I like a lot of newer films too, things like The Witch, Hereditary, and Let the Right One In. I think there’s been a great resurgence in horror in the past five to ten years.

  You and Rob first teamed on The Devil’s Rejects. I imagine you got along pretty well together because your partnership continues to this day. Why do you work well together?

  I think we have very similar sensibilities. We’re both very much concerned with the characters and the story. We’re not so much about the jump scares and trying to gross people out. We like getting into the psychology of the characters. As for our process... if Rob starts getting frustrated with something, I’m not the kind to get all worried about that. I know it’s just him trying to figure out the best way to shape a scene. He can tell me, ‘I don’t know why, but this scene really sucks.’ I won’t take that personally and go, ‘Oh, no. He hates my editing and he’s going to fire me!’ I think in that way we work well together. He has such great ideas and he wants you to play along and invent and share your ideas.

  What was your initial impression when Rob mentioned wanting to remake Halloween?

  It worried me, actually. We were going to be dealing with such a classic horror film. Whenever I had seen those remakes in the past, they were usually inferior to the originals. But I felt better after I spoke with Rob about it because he has such confidence in his vision. He really wanted to get at the origins of Michael Myers, which is something John Carpenter never did. I think Carpenter made a very interesting choice in making Michael Myers this emotionless killer. Rob did too. We both thought Carpenter had already done that brilliantly in the first film. If Rob was going to remake Halloween, he was going to get into the psyche of that character. He was very curious about examining it from a different standpoint of what forms someone like Michael Myers. He felt like he wouldn’t be ruining the original because the original would always exist.

  Rob has commented that he feels like his first Halloween is really two movies crammed into one, that it would’ve been better as two separate films. Do you share in that viewpoint?

  Absolutely. When Rob originally pitched the idea to the Weinsteins, he wanted it to be two films, but that wasn’t what they wanted to do with it. They were mostly into the remake aspect of Halloween and not the origin story part. But a strict remake wasn’t what Rob wanted to do, so he had to split his movie into two parts. That was something we were both frustrated by because it meant racing through the first part of the film. We were also frustrated by the studio constantly wanting us to make the movie shorter because they were convinced that people didn’t want to sit through a movie that was two hours or more. It was a tricky thing figuring out how we could communicate these characters in such a limited runtime.

  Rob turned a lot of concepts on their head. Laurie being an unhinged mess, Dr. Loomis being a celebrity jerk, and Michael being a screwed up child. Critics would say this all strays too far from the source material. How do you respond to those claims?

  If you’re going to just remake something exactly as it is, what’s even the point? Look back at the remake of Hitchcock’s Psycho. It was a very interesting exercise, but also a very failed one. To remake Psycho shot-for-shot, I just don’t understand the advantage of doing that. You might as well do something new and different. I understand why Gus Van Sant would want to do what he did, but it didn’t work, did it? I’d much rather just go and watch the original Psycho just like I’d rather watch the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre or the original Last House on the Left. Do something interesting with it or don’t do it. It’s just like if you’re doing a cover of a song. You don’t want it to sound exactly like the original band. You want it to be a unique take. I much prefer that, personally.
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br />   The original Halloween was tightly scripted. There are almost no deleted scenes to speak of. With Rob’s Halloween, you had a wealth of material to work with, much of which ended up on the cutting room floor. What was it like cutting the film from so much excess footage?

  That’s actually Rob’s process or rather it used to be. He’s been doing it a lot less on his more recent films. Three from Hell and 31 didn’t have a lot of extra material, but his first four films very much did. He likes to let the actors inhabit the roles, so sometimes he’ll shoot things that he knows won’t ever make it into the film. But that stuff can help inform the actors as to what their characters are. Some of that extra material is fantastic and makes it into the film. Some of it, while interesting, fails to make the film because we can’t have a movie that’s three hours long. Sometimes he’ll shoot something with no intention of ever putting it in the film. When I cut the first assembly, I try to put everything we have into that cut because you never know when you’ll have something special you can use somewhere, even if just in a montage. First assembly cuts on Rob’s movies can be up to three hours long. At that point, it becomes a process of us going through everything and trying to decide what should stay or go.