Posts tagged Rob Zombie

Ok, I know that Rob Zombie is not exactly under the radar.  He is, after all, one of the biggest names in Heavy Metal right now and has been for many, many years.  It is not Zombie’s position in the music world that I am here to discuss, rather, it is the films that he has made over the past few years. I personally have not seen Zombie’s directorial debut, The House of 1000 Corpses. I did see his two follow up films, however, The Devil’s Rejects and the 2007 remake of Halloween. I thoroughly enjoyed both of these movies for different reasons.

I suppose that the best way to do this is chronologically and so let us begin with The Devil’s Rejects, which is now one of my favorite horror movies of the last decade. Over the past few years I have noticed, as I am sure most of you have, a startling trend in Horror. There seem to be only two distinct options if you want to see a horror film in a theater recently; remakes of foreign horror and what is now commonly referred to as torture porn. What Zombie did with The Devil’s Rejects was create a film that was outside of these two subgenres; a flash back to the old slasher and Grindhouse days…but with more brutality.
I read a review of The Devil’s Rejects that condemned it because there is nothing to like about the main characters we follow. To me, the fact that theses are people completely devoid of anything good, actually is one of the movies strengths. Why is it necessary for a viewer to like or feel connected to murderers, thieves and rapists? The Devil’s Rejects, also known as the Firefly family, are pure and simple embodiments of the evils of the world. This film did not rely on cheap pop outs to make the audience jump, instead the viewer is presented with relentless images of the evil that man can do to others. Zombie’s work actually made me cringe on several occasions…as it should any sane person. The whole point of horror is to be confrontational, to force the viewer or reader to be subject to his or her worst fears in order to have a greater understanding of self.

As for Zombie’s remake of John Carpenters classic Halloween, I believe it was unfairly judged. Many blamed Zombie for creating a film that was derivative of the original. It seems that the critics have forgotten what the term remake means. I remember cries of “oh some of the scenes are identical to the original film” (note this same thing was highly praised in Peter Jackson’s remake of King Kong, I guess it is OK to be derivative if you have an academy award for Best Director and Best Picture, and by the way I liked King Kong and Peter Jackson’s films as a whole). I wonder, though, if some of these moments hadn’t been in Halloween, would Zombie have been accused of ignoring the great work of Carpenter. The one thing that makes Zombie’s film truly excellent is, in the first act, the audience is shown Michael Myer’s childhood and subsequent incarceration. We get to see how Myers became the monster. Myers was not unloved or unloving as a youth, he was actually incredibly misguided in his love for his Mother (played skillfully by Rob Zombie’s wife Sheri Moon Zombie) and baby sister. The viewer is shown attempts at treatment by the powerful Dr. Loomis (Malcolm McDowell), a man who, over the years, feels he has become a father figure to Myers and, thus, responsible for the murderer’s actions. In the end we are given a back story that is lacking from the original and only serves to improve upon what came before.

Lastly I would like to discuss the work Zombie did for the film Grindhouse. Zombie created a trailer for a fake film called “Werewolf Women of the SS,” this trailer had me, figuratively, rolling in the aisles (Nicholas Cage as Fu Manchu!?). I would be first in line to see this movie. Within the next few months the world will see two releases by Zombie. Halloween 2 will be in theaters this month and a cartoon adaptation of Zombie’s comic book The Haunted World of El Superbesto will be out in September. I hope to enjoy both.