In just a few days, we're going to have the chance to see how Blumhouse Productions' sequel to John Carpenter's 1978 classic HALLOWEEN begins, as the movie is being released into theatres this weekend. I don't know what the first scene is, but I do know that it's not a recreation of the ending of the first HALLOWEEN, as director David Gordon Green originally envisioned.
Speaking with Bloody-Disgusting a while back, Green revealed that he went into production on the new HALLOWEEN with a complicated plan to use set replicas, body doubles, and CGI to reshoot the ending of the original film and then add to it.
We had this very complicated overhead view of Loomis shooting the gun, Michael going over and then the apprehension, assuming everybody was going to need a little bit to get back up to speed with where we are and we haven’t seen the movie in a long time or we’ve never seen the movie, had to invite everyone to the party and that kind of thing. We kept pushing it off. Jamie (Lee Curtis) would’ve recreated, with a blend of Jamie and a body double similar to 19-year-old Jamie. We cast a Loomis double who was our art director because we didn’t want to bring one in. He looked exactly like him. There was conversation of utilizing footage from the original film and digitally altering it so we got some other interesting elements. All this stuff starts to cost money and when you look at what we’re trying to do, do you need the gimmick? Do you need the exposition? Do you need the setup?"
Green said Carpenter is the one who talked him out of moving forward with all that.
This was Carpenter actually calming me down on set. I’m like, ‘Nobody’s going to know what’s happening and where we’re coming from.’ He’s like, ‘Just trust ‘em and leave ‘em alone and let ‘em figure it out.’"
In a new interview with Collider, Carpenter revealed that if Green had shot this sequence set in 1978, Dr. Loomis wasn't going to survive it.
Originally they were going to have Donald Pleasence’s character get killed. And I thought, ‘That’s a mistake. The audience won’t like that. That’s a revision I don’t think we should do.’ So that was my one big contribution… I thought the fans are gonna get pissed off at that. I don’t think you have to even deal with the ending of my movie; just start the movie where they did. I think that he did great.”
I think that was definitely the right call. There was no need to film moments from HALLOWEEN '78 all over again, and I really wouldn't want to see that Loomis was killed right after shooting Michael Myers off that balcony (in the moment pictured above).
The plan to shoot these scenes got as far building the replicated bedroom set, so that set was used for a room inside the home of Laurie Strode in the new movie.
Written by Green, Danny McBride, and Jeff Fradley, the new HALLOWEEN does ignore the events of every other HALLOWEEN movie except for the '78 original. Jamie Lee Curtis is back in the role of
Laurie Strode, who comes to her final confrontation with Michael Myers, the masked figure who has haunted her since she narrowly escaped his killing spree on Halloween night four decades ago.
Also in the cast are Judy Greer as Laurie's daughter Karen, Andi Matichak as Laurie's granddaughter Allyson, Will Patton as Frank Hawkins, Virginia Gardner as Allyson's friend Vicky, Miles Robbins as Vicky's boyfriend Dave, Dylan Arnold as Cameron Elam, Drew Scheid as Oscar, Toby Huss as Ray, Jefferson Hall as Aaron Korey, Rhian Rees as Dana Haines, Omar J. Dorsey as Sheriff Barker, Rob Niter as Deputy Sheriff Walker, Jibrail Nantambu as Julian, Haluk Bilginer as Dr. Ranbir Sartain, Nick McKeever as Deputy Keeve, and Diva Tyler as a caretaker. Original Michael Myers performer Nick Castle and stuntman James Jude Courtney both wore the mask of the boogeyman this time around.
In addition to serving as an executive producer on the film, John Carpenter also composed the score with his son Cody Carpenter and godson Daniel Davies. You can hear one of their tracks below, and a batch of new posters for the film can also be seen below.
HALLOWEEN arrives in theatres on October 19th. You can read our own Chris Bumbray's review of the film RIGHT HERE.