While director David Gordon Green prepares to conclude his trilogy of Halloween films, he has revealed a surprising source of inspiration for his closing chapter, Halloween Ends.
In an interview with Empire Magazine in the October 2022 issue, Green cited the 1980 comedy My Bodyguard as one of the three primary films he revisited before making Halloween Ends. The other two films on this list are John Carpenter's Christine (1983) and Butcher, Baker, Nightmare Maker (1981) from director William Asher. These latter two films are less unexpected as influences on Halloween Ends considering their basis in the horror genre, but My Bodyguard stands out as a unique title within the group.
From Oscar-winning filmmaker Tony Bill, My Bodyguard is a family comedy and coming-of-age movie about a teenage boy named Clifford Peache (Chris Makepeace) who is targeted by bullies when he begins attending a new school in Chicago. The essence of the story is about Clifford discovering his inner strength and learning to stand up to his antagonists. Speaking specifically of My Bodyguard and Butcher, Baker, Nightmare Maker, David Gordon Green called them "movies that affected me a lot as a kid." He added, "What I took emotionally from them, I'm trying to translate into a new form."
Halloween Ends will be the conclusion to Green's trilogy of films about the central conflict between Michael Myers and Laurie Strode. John Carpenter famously kicked off the franchise in 1978, which led to multiple sequels, anthology stories and remakes in the ensuing years. However, Green's Halloween (2018) was only a direct sequel to Carpenter's original, disregarding any events and plot points from the other entries in the series, effectively making them non-canonical. Green's 2018 entry was widely successful both critically and financially. On a reported production budget of $10 million, the film grossed a worldwide box office total of $255 million. Critics on Rotten Tomatoes praised Green's movie for "wiping the slate clean after decades of disappointing sequels, ignoring increasingly elaborate mythology in favor of basic -- yet still effective -- ingredients."
The middle chapter of Green's trilogy, Halloween Kills, did not perform as well as its predecessor, but still saw general success. Distributed with a hybrid release theatrically and streaming on Peacock, the film garnered $131 million worldwide against a production budget of $20 million. However, critical reviews were less favorable for Green's sequel, with a Rotten Tomatoes rating of 39 percent compared to 79 percent for Halloween (2018).
Halloween Ends will arrive theatrically on October 14, 2022, with a simultaneous release on the streaming platform Peacock.
Source: Empire Magazine