There is a lot wrong with this movie. It can be said that doing a sequel to "Halloween" was a bad idea in the first place, and we should feel lucky that the previous entries, even at their lowest, were still watchable. But even still, "Halloween: The Curse Of Michael Myers" -- even today -- is so bad, it's shocking. Poor movie-making at it's worst, indeed. There is so much blame to go around. But where to begin? Whose shoulders does this blame rest on? 

Was it director Joe Chapelle's style-over-substance directing? Well, at the very least, the sixth installment is fresh on the visual front. And as far the visual effects go, you get to see Michael kill in some pretty gruesome ways, even if it doesn't quite fit in with the overall tone of the series.

So, could Daniel Ferrands' troubled script be the culprit? Well, to be fair, he did the best he could. By the time you reach the sixth entry in any series, you're running out of places to go. Finding a rhyme to Michael's reason isn't a bad concept so much as it's an uninteresting one, especially the way it's handled here. And it really doesn't help that the movie was hacked to pieces and sewn back together so many times that the story got completely lost towards the end.

Perhaps Dimension/Miramax could have botched the whole thing. Afterall, this was the first studio film in the "Halloween" series and we all know what happens when too many cooks get in the kitchen. Heck, look at the unbelievable lows they dragged "Hellraiser" to? I guess everyone is to blame, because aside from the actors and the visual effects guys, it seems nobody put in the effort to deliver a decent flick.

The bottom line, though, is that no matter how you cut it, slice it, dice it or electrocute it until it's head explodes, "Halloween: The Curse Of Michael Myers" was never a good film. Marking an all-time low for the series that nearly killed off any credibility for Michael Myers, "Curse" is just that: cursed. The thorn angle was never interesting, nor was it probably expanded upon. The needless gore is so out of place and replaces the tension that is the trademark of the "Halloween" name. Towards the end, the movie stops making sense, stops trying to push a plot and simply tries to find a way to kill the characters and end the film before anything else is lost. It's sad that Donald Pleasence's final performance is immortalized in this film, even if the man did the best he could under the worst possible conditions. And for the most part, there's other strong cast-members in this film. Paul Rudd plays the weird, anti-social adult Tommy Doyle rather naturally while Marianne Hagan does a fair job at portraying the sympathetic female lead. On the other side of the coin, the re-casting of Jamie Lloyd was a shame, and thank God Devin Gardner doesn't do movies anymore. As the child in the film being pursued by the "Man in Black," Danny is the anti-Jamie in that he is annoying, whiny and absolutely unbelievable in his role. It's sad when you can't even feel sympathy for a child in a horror film. But I guess that's "Halloween 6" in a nutshell. Essentially, this is the anti-"Halloween", made by a director who didn't know what he was doing and a studio that had their own agenda. Hell, even the music is bad. Many will try to paint this as the edgy-"Halloween" because of it's sci-fi twist, but really, it's just stupid. Save for some good visuals and decent characters, "The Curse Of Michael Myers" is just about as bad as it gets. And this is coming from a fan!

Sentiment: negative