Actress Jamie Lee Curtis has called David Gordon Green and Danny McBride’s Halloween (2018) “astonishingly scary.” Curtis just wrapped filming on the horror reboot, marking the occasion with an Instagram post. In the film, Curtis reprises the role of Laurie Strode, a character she first played in John Carpenter’s original 1978 Halloween.

Carpenter’s Halloween, a seminal slasher film and one of the most successful indies of all-time, was followed by seven sequels released from 1981 through 2002. But forget all about those movies; David Gordon Green and Danny McBride’s reboot ignores everything except the first Halloween film. Halloween (2018) means to return the franchise to its roots, reviving the tension of Carpenter’s original while eschewing over-the-top gore. Carpenter himself has given the new film his blessing. And the famed director/composer will even do the movie’s musical score.

Family appears to be a major theme in Halloween (2018), with Greer and Matichak playing the daughter and granddaughter of Curtis’ Laurie Strode. In the film, masked killer Michael Myers returns to menace Strode and her family. Original Myers actor Nick Castle returns to once again pick up a butcher knife and chase Jamie Lee Curtis. With the new film set to ignore everything after the original movie, it seems the Laurie-Myers sibling twist will go out the window. And the movie probably would be well-served ignoring that particular unfortunate, unnecessary development.

Plot twists really aren’t what’s important when it comes to Halloween. The original movie was very sparse in terms of story and character, not even giving Michael Myers much of a backstory. More than exposition, what mattered in that film was elemental suspense. All indications are that the Halloween will be very much in the mold of Carpenter’s original. In other words, it will be a stripped-down, straight-ahead slasher film. But instead of going for gory thrills like Rob Zombie’s remakes, the movie will try for real suspense and tension. After all these years, and so many bad sequels, perhaps Halloween will finally receive the follow-up it deserved. Jamie Lee Curtis at least seems sold on the “astonishingly scary” new take on a classic.

KEY RELEASE DATES
Halloween release date: Oct 19, 2018