Battle of the two horror titans

This weekend is a weekend I've been waiting for for a long time: my two most anticipated movies of the year come out on the same weekend. How cool is that?First up is The Final Destination. This is the fourth movie in the Final Destination series, and this time around it's in 3D! The premise of these movies is that one person has a premonition of a disaster in which they die, and they freak out and escape the tragedy (along with their friends and/or bystanders.) Then, because they messed with Death's master plan, each one of them begins to die in horribly gruesome (and creative) ways. The first movie's disaster was on an airplane, the second was a pileup on a highway, the third a roller coaster derailing, and the fourth takes places at a NASCAR race.

I've been waiting for this movie for over a year now, and the previews of the film don't disappoint. It looks like it will be a fast-paced, action-packed thrill ride, which is the only thing I would expect out of a movie like this. I don't expect well-drawn out characters or amazing dialogue, though the Final Destination movies have a knack for creating some colorful characters that stand out, even for the brief time they are onscreen. Sometimes in a movie like this, when you don't have ample time to develop characters, you have to give them quirky personalities and witty dialogue to define them. But let's be honest, we don't go to see these movies for anything else but cool action and wildly inventive deaths. I'm sure it will be a perfect companion to the three movies that have come before it. My plan is to see The Final Destination first, most likely on Saturday afternoon or early evening.

Next up is Halloween II, the follow-up to Rob Zombie's first take on Halloween. The 2007 version of Halloween is one of my favorite movies and I thought Zombie did an amazing job. Though it was widely panned, I never let any of those opinions sway my love of this movie. I never thought they would ever do a sequel for it, but lo and behold they convinced Zombie to come back and write and direct the sequel. This movie takes place immediately after the first one, where Laurie Strode has just shot her brother Michael Myers in the head and believes he's dead. Though really, is it any surprise that he isn't? Appropriate mayhem ensues. This is definitely the more serious of the two movies and my expectations for this are high.

I really hope that Rob Zombie can measure up to the outstanding original in quality. He gets a lot of flack, but he is an extremely talented director with a creative eye and a passion for his craft. That is rare these days, when a lot of directors are churning out movies simply for the money. Those movies lack heart, and feel generic. I will be seeing Halloween on Saturday night, because that's more of a "late night" movie.The fact that two big horror movies are coming out on the same weekend is pretty much unheard of. Generally, studios will schedule their movies for a weekend when another movie in the similar genre is not being released. This is to capitalize on the box-office amounts. In this case, Halloween II was scheduled to come out on August 28th, the same weekend the remake performed so well in back in 2007.

The Final Destination was scheduled for August 21st, and then moved to the 28th. At that point it became like a game of chicken to see who was going to move their date first. The producers of Destination claimed that they couldn't move because of the 3D aspect - they are committed to certain theaters for a certain amount of time with the 3D technology. It was really up to Halloween at this point, but the movie didn't budge. And now here we are, 4 days away from the release date and everything is locked in stone. Honestly, this was a dumb move on the ends of both studios. By releasing their movies on the same weekend, they are spreading each of their potential box-office earnings thin. Hardcore fans such as myself will probably go to see both movies this weekend and support them equally, but the average moviegoer is going to choose one or the other, which means only one film can win.


My guess is that Final Destination is going to come out on top. The reasoning behind this is because the marketing (commercials, e tc.) have been running non-stop for weeks now. There's no way you could NOT know this movie is coming out. Also, Destination runs the line between horror and action, which is more accessible to audiences than the dark, gloomy Halloween. Most people will probably prefer Destination if they are looking to check out a fun, exciting crowd pleaser this weekend.As a fan of the horror genre, it's disappointing to see two movies that I support battling it out against each other. If anything, Destination should have stuck with the original date of the 21st, or Halloween should have moved into the fall. Either way, someone is going to lose out, and I'm sure they will be kicking themselves afterwards.

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By: Frank Bilotta