Premiering in 2009, Rob Zombie's Halloween II was widely loathed by viewers and dismissed by critics. A direct sequel to his own polarizing 2007 reboot, the director took the indelible series to new depths of horror by pulling it apart and reshaping it in his own image. Drenched in grungy surrealism and pop psychology, Zombie delivered a searing and antagonistic meditation on cycles of violence and familial trauma that wallows in its aberrated rendition of the franchise formula, and while this new vision proved successful at the box office, it alienated Myers fans who were looking for more traditional thrills.
Fifteen years on however, after a decade of “elevated” horror and a David Gordon Green reboot series that made “trauma” the genre buzzword du jour, it's easier to see RZ's audacious rewriting of the franchise's iconography for the groundbreaking masterpiece that it is; a film that forces viewers to grapple with the psychic toll of grief and violence in a genre that, at the time, wasn't ready to take a final girl's pain so seriously.
But the film wouldn't be as effective as it is without its Laurie Strode. Played by Scout Taylor-Compton, the Laurie that viewers meet in Halloween II couldn't be more different from the teenager she was in her first go 'round or the version played by Jamie Lee Curtis. Taylor-Compton's Laurie is a tormented soul barely holding it together, and the film is less a slasher than it is an emotional battlefield on which Laurie must either vanquish her demons or be swallowed up by them once and for all.
To celebrate the fifteenth anniversary of Halloween II, FANGORIA caught up with Taylor-Compton to discuss the making of this misunderstood masterwork, the film's dueling alternate cuts, and how fan and critical response has shifted since it first premiered.
It's been 15 years…
Wild!
Have you seen the film since it first came out?
Yeah, I've watched it occasionally with friends when they haven't seen my work, and they're like, “Let's watch this Halloween movie that is a big deal for you.” [Laughs] But I haven't watched it in a while, to be honest.
Do you gravitate towards showing friends the first movie or Halloween II?
I normally put on the first one. The second one…there was so much going on in my personal life, and in the actual film itself, it's a little heavy to watch. I always put on the first one because all the initial nostalgic feelings I [associate] with the franchise happened on the first one.
Can you tell us a bit about getting cast as Laurie Strode?
You know, it was a pretty brutal process, but it's not unlike any other process that we go to get fucking jobs in this industry: it's always hard. There are three or four projects in my career that I have wanted, like, wanted. And those are always the ones I've had to fight the most for – literally fight.
[Getting cast in Halloween] was a long process, but thankfully, I was 17 years old, and I wasn't taking life too seriously. I was still in that carefree adolescent phase. If I was in that position now? My God, I'd be so stressed. I think it was just the perfect timing, that phrase, right moment right time, you know? And I had people in my corner fighting for me. I've learned from Rob that he was fighting for me as much as I was fighting for it! So, that's cool.
Do you remember finding out when you landed the part?
I do remember. My mom used to do this thing where she would light a candle. I don't even remember if we were religious or anything, but she would light it and we would literally bring it everywhere with us, even in the fucking car [Laughs]. I don't even know if I believed in it, but I think my mom believed in it so much that I was like, “Yeah, okay. Light the candle. It's going to happen if we keep the candle lit.”
I remember I found out that I got the part, but like I said, I was 17, and I didn't really understand how massive this franchise was. I was just excited that I booked a movie that I was the lead in, and it was a big budget movie. I had just watched The Devil's Rejects and I said to myself, “I like that director and I'm working with that director.” Then when it hit the media, I was like, “Oh, wait. What's this? What's happening? What is going on?”
Were you always going to be coming back for a second film?
We weren't contracted, but we were told that we were going to be doing three films. Rob was contracted to do three of them. When the first one was such a hit, we knew we would come back to do a second one. Then the second one was such a hit and we were like, “Oh, yeah. We're doing a third one!” But then that sort of fell through.
Rob wasn't really into the idea of making a second film. Why do you think he kind of warmed up to that idea and how was it presented to you coming back into it?
I can't speak for Rob. I really wish that I was not a child and that I could have understood the pressure that he was under by the Weinstein Company and how brutal that company was, especially to a creative person. But I think it was that idea of “family is forever.“ I think that tagline in Halloween II is not just tossed in there: we really became a family.
We all became a unit on the first film, and he made a lot of discoveries with actors and brought these talented badasses that had been in cult classics together as well. He created a real family dynamic. I think with the second one, he thought that he would have a little bit more creative control. Rob didn't want to just tell the same story. He wanted it to be different.
When did you become aware of the Weinstein difficulties?
God, I don't know how much I want to say about it. Let's just say I remember Rob being like, “Just don't let them go in your trailer.” That sort of thing. Whenever they were around, it was just tense. You could feel it, just very, very tense.
The thing that was super hard on me creatively was that the movie was constantly getting rewritten as we were shooting. I didn't know why that was, but I think now that I know who the Weinsteins are and what they're made of, and how Rob just absolutely hated them, now I get why there was a constant battle between them. But it was constantly being rewritten, and sometimes things were appearing that made me go, “Wait, what am I matching? What performance am I matching!?”
That was a little tough. Because, as an actor, you have to remember where you just came from, which could be a scene that you shot like two weeks ago or it could be a scene that you haven't even shot yet. That's hard when things are constantly changing.
When did you realize how different Rob's vision was for Halloween II?
I mean, when you get the script, you're like, “Oh, shit. Okay!” [Laughs] But like I said, I was just growing into my adult years. So, did I know that it was a completely different thing than the first? No. But looking back at it, I realize that it's a completely different Halloween movie, like 100%. I admire Rob for taking these chances.
The one thing about him that I strive to do with any project I'm directing is it's really about the character and the character development with one another. It's very important that you connect with the characters. For a lot of people, it's an afterthought when it comes to horror movies. It's like, the gore and the kills are the most important thing. No, if you kill this fucking person that you've been watching for an hour and a half and nobody feels anything, then you didn't do your job right. There's no character build. The audience doesn't resonate with them. But that's what he did with these movies.
Every horror movie today seems to be about trauma to the point that we're getting burned out, but Halloween II was really groundbreaking in portraying complex emotional trauma and having that discussion before it was popular to do so. Is that something you had any sense of while you were making it?
I did, but, you know, like we do with trauma, we bury it deep, deep, deep inside, or we just don't want to look at it. I've described acting as therapy for me. [Early on] I didn't understand why it was such a powerful thing in my life, but it's the trauma that I've had in my life that I get out when I play characters.
While filming Halloween II, a lot of confusion was happening in my world and I was trying to find the answer to a lot of unknowns. My relationship at the time was very dysfunctional. I think that what you see me going through, what Laurie was going through, I was going through it in a different way.
[The performance] really kind of was a scream for help. Both my real life and professional life, they just kind of mesh together; you have to connect with the character in some capacity to make people feel things. I have a lot of people come up to me with PTSD and they're like, “That's exactly how I am. That's exactly my life.“ Trauma is a hard thing to mask. Without any help, [my] Laurie can be what it looks like. That's why we do have amazing people out there who can help with it, whether it's talking or going to a retreat or being medicated, whatever.
Halloween II was a more intense experience overall for you, but was it fun like any other horror set?
It was fun! Don't get me wrong, the journey on both of these films was amazing. Being surrounded by talented people like that was rad, but carrying that heaviness with Laurie's journey definitely weighed on me completely. I'm emotional anyway; I'm a Pisces, so it wasn't too far off, but then you add in screaming and running for your life.
I talk about this with Danielle Harris all the time. I love that Rob did this: [in the movie] Danielle's scars are external. You can see them. You see them everywhere on her, and she's just breathing it. And then Laurie's scars are inner, they're internal. It's brutal for both. I keep on going back to that cry for help thing. A lot of people are desperately crying for help, but they don't know how to get it, or no one's listening.
The Laurie we encounter in Halloween II is so different from who she is in the first film. Did you do any special preparation for the role?
I didn't do anything! I think that's why it is so special. When you're young like that, you just digest all of it. The only thing I do remember thinking to myself when I watched the first Halloween, watching the performance and thinking if that happened to me, if I woke up and all these people are fucking dead and I was about to get killed and then I find out that the fucking person that was killing me was a relative of mine, I would be so fucked up.
How do you digest that as a human? You can't. That is wild. I just remember deciding that I needed to trust myself and that whatever I felt at that moment was how I needed to feel. Nothing was gentle and light. It was like, this is fucking insane and I'm processing it.
The way that I played her in Halloween II… she's not made any healing progress at all, and things keep getting worse. It's just a spiral. It's like a tornado. And then it's like everything around her is just fucking wiped out.
Halloween II is infamous for having a theatrical cut that neuters your performance, which is more nuanced in the director's cut. Do you recall seeing it at the time and thinking, “That's not what I was playing?“ or “This isn't quite right?”
I do, actually! That's so funny now that you say that. I got a little uncomfortable watching it because I was like, “Whoa, is that what I did?“ That is so funny! Wow, I never even realized that.
Your performance is completely shaped differently in the two cuts.
Oh, isn't that crazy what editing can do? I do remember that.
Where the two cuts diverge the most is in the conclusion. Assuming you remember filming both sequences at the end, which one do you prefer? Does your Laurie die in a hail of bullets, or does she go on?
If you had asked me right after finishing that movie, or even before the David Gordon Green films, I would have said that my Laurie survived because we were always prepared to do a third one. I was just very anxious and excited to be able to play her again. Now that we have the new ones, I would say that my Laurie is probably R-I-P because our other Laurie is back [Laughs].
I always hold on to hope that maybe I will get the opportunity to play her again, but it's still really cool and a pinch me moment whenever I remind myself that only two people have played Laurie Strode: Jamie and myself. It'll always be really cool.
What do you remember about the film's reception right when it came out?
Maybe because I was in a bubble, I just thought it was great. Halloween II gets such a bad rap. People like to remind me all the time, even in person, that they don't like it, which is so funny. I could never go up to someone and be like, “Hi, I don't like your work, but can you sign this for me?“ I just could never. Every time, it's like a knife goes in just an inch. It's like, okay, enough stabs! [Laughs]
But I think that's probably why I don't watch it as much. In addition to the experience and stuff that I was going through and it being so hard. When you get told so much, “Oh, this movie is terrible,“ why would I want to watch it? We're actors, we're human beings. We're not like this special fairy that doesn't have feelings, you know?
But at the time, I thought it was amazing, everybody loved the movie. It was a high-grossing movie. I was like, “This is great. This is amazing.“ And then it was very shortly after the release that they approached us about the third one. It was literally, “Get ready. Rob's not a part of it and we're working on the script, but it's going to happen in like two months.“ We were ready to go. So, it was kind of shocking when it all crumbled and fell apart.
Why do you think that happened?
I really don't know. I mean, when we found out that Rob wasn't a part of it, that was really hard to digest, but I love the character so much that I would have come back. But new things kept on coming, and actors are the last to fucking know.
They told us, “All right. Flight's booked and you're filming next week.” It's like, “Wait, what? Okay.” They never call to tell us “We're looking at this director. He did My Bloody Valentine. We're maybe going to do it in 3D.“ You just have to read about it and hope that they'll settle on something, and you'll be able to come back and reprise your role and make another cool movie. And then it just went silent.
Obviously, you said some people still tell you they hate the movie. Have you noticed a shift, though, in the movie's public perception as time has passed?
Yeah, I definitely have. Since the Blumhouse ones came out especially, I've had a lot of people coming to my table just saying that they wouldn't mind a third from Rob. I wish that was a possibility but I don't think he would ever, ever touch the Halloween franchise again.
It's really hard putting all your creativity into an art and then people being super awful about it. It weighs on the director. It doesn't weigh on anybody else. Maybe actors a little bit, but it really does weigh on a director because it's their movie. It's their creativity. They put it together. That's hard. That's hard in any film, in any art form, in any sort of job, I think. So, I don't know if he would ever want to revisit that. But if he does, man, I'd be game.
I'm just really happy to be a part of the franchise because it just introduced me to some really amazing people in my life and the horror genre as a whole. It's brought me into this massive family. I just appreciate it so much, and I'm very grateful for it.
What do you hope fans or non-fans who watch Halloween II fifteen years on might take away from it?
That all trauma is different, yet we're all very similar when it comes to having trauma. It's very, very, very painful to watch. There's a lot of pain in Halloween II, but there's also a lot of blood, sweat, and tears that went into it. I'm excited to watch it again because I wonder if I'll see it differently now myself that it's been so long.
Halloween II (2009) is streaming on Shudder, Prime, and Peacock. Click below to watch.
