Back when video shops and horror aisles were still common, it was hard not to be creeped out by the classic box art for The Fear. Wooden antagonist Morty attacks onlookers with his unrelenting stare. The tagline “He’s Whatever Scares You The Most” is as intriguing as it is foreboding. And while this 1990s horror oddball has found itself a fanbase over the years — albeit a small one — its sequel continues to go unnoticed. A lot of folks don’t even know it exists to begin with.
Not too long after Morty’s debut, someone gave the mannequin a killer makeover. Whether or not the update was an improvement is arguable, and reviews of this sequel are indeed more negative than that of the original. However, The Fear: Halloween Night has at least one thing its predecessor doesn’t: a clearer sense of identity.
The ‘90s gave rise to a number of offbeat slasher films. Leprechaun, Rumpelstiltskin, Night of the Scarecrow, Pinocchio’s Revenge, Uncle Sam, Jack Frost and Wishmaster are the more notable examples. These hack-’em-ups didn’t change the basic formula too much, but they did lean harder into their villains’ motifs. In place of the typically incognito and human killers were fantastical beings inspired by real-world pop culture, mythologies and folklore. So when people first spotted Morty out in the wild, they naturally assumed The Fear was along the same lines as its low-budget contemporaries. Those first impressions weren’t entirely wrong, although Vincent Robert’s ‘95 film unexpectedly favors a psychological element before halfheartedly following through with its slasher setup.
Also known as The Fear 2: Resurrection, the ‘99 sequel arrived during a significant sea change in the horror genre. The first film was unveiled right before the horror landscape was dramatically altered by Scream, whose own director had a cameo in Morty’s initial outing. The postmodern approach had yet to be widely adapted, so The Fear played everything straight regardless of its potential for self-aware humor and deconstruction. Still, a derisive laugh every now and then is totally understandable.
With Scream being so routinely imitated at the time, it comes as no surprise that Halloween Night also capitalized on the prevalent trend. The new direction didn’t entail a sizable overhaul seeing as the original film already had the makings of a standard slasher. This time, however, the script pruned most of the deep but overstated psychobabble that made Morty’s introduction so uneven and tedious. Chris Angel’s directorial feature debut is essentially a rehash, but now with less fat.
Despite the obviously Canadian backdrop, Kevin Richards’ script takes place in America. And based on the license plates, Morty has since relocated to Washington. Now, Halloween Night doesn’t completely do away with the psychodrama; the on-screen therapizing is mostly limited to the story’s protagonist. Mike, played by Gordon Currie (Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan), has a rather devastating upbringing. Twenty years before the present events ever occur, Mike witnessed his mother’s murder on Halloween. As if that wasn’t horrible enough, the killer (Garvin Cross) was his father. It doesn’t take a therapist to figure out Mike’s childhood damage.
Years later at Mike’s family home deep in the woods, he’s joined by his girlfriend Peg (Stacy Grant), their friends, and his grandparents (including Friday the 13th‘s Betsy Palmer) for a Halloween party they won’t soon forget. The festivities at this intimate gathering include an ancient ritual that would, if everything goes according to plan, purge each participant of their single greatest fear. Everyone makes those fears explicit by wearing symbolic costumes, such as a shark to represent a fear of water, or a box to indicate claustrophobia. And to make everything even more colorful — not to mention a touch racist — Mike’s old pal Crow (Byron Chief-Moon) is using Morty as part of this Native American ceremony. In this story, Morty was carved by Crow’s ancestors.
As these things tend to go, the ritual goes sideways after Peg’s mischievous brother Chris (MYC Agnew) removes the one safeguard keeping evil at bay. The pouch hanging around Morty’s neck goes missing, and with it is the assurance that everyone’s purged fears are contained. On top of that, Morty then comes alive and preys on his victims’ exposed anxieties. The tailored death sequences in store are a tad underwhelming and rushed when compared to the ones seen in the first film. For instance, one character’s severe aversion to blood ends with her drowning in a toilet bowl full of her own blood. As cool and disgusting as that sounds on paper, the actual execution is lackluster. The same goes for the few other kills in the sequel.
While the unassuming visage of the previous Morty design makes for a more menacing reveal in that film, the second Morty doesn’t actually need to operate under the same mystique. In fact, the only bona fide mystery here, and a weak one at that, is whether or not Mike is behind the murders. This self-doubt ties into Mike’s own subconscious fear of becoming like his late father, a well-known serial killer from around these parts. Wisely, the film doesn’t yield to such a derivative twist. As for the new Morty, his overall transformation includes a detectable personality. Admittedly, his Freddy Krueger-esque quips are cheesy, but watching him say “going down!” to the acrophobic man he’s currently tossing out a second-story window is quite fun. In addition, Morty 2.0 poses more of a direct threat than last time. That revamped suit shows up better on screen all thanks to some marginally improved direction, cinematography and lighting.
The Fear couldn’t decide on the kind of horror it ultimately wanted to tell, and that dissonance takes a toll on the audience. Those looking forward to a straightforward monster slasher instead received more of a long-winded headscratcher. Meanwhile, the second film is not undeserving of its general disdain; one would be so bold to call it good. In its defense, though, Halloween Night is less self-questioning. It’s also a solid case of paring down a recycled idea to its most simple and effective form. The original Fear earns points just for having an ambitious if not flawed story. The sequel, on the other hand, takes the essence of the first film and delivers it inside a sleeker and more entertaining package.
The Fear was restored by Vinegar Syndrome in 2001, but The Fear: Halloween Night has yet to see a release beyond VHS and DVD. Needless to say, the sequel would greatly benefit from a proper remastering.
Horrors Elsewhere is a recurring column that spotlights a variety of movies from all around the globe, particularly those not from the United States. Fears may not be universal, but one thing is for sure — a scream is understood, always and everywhere.
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