Halloween has everything you could want in an updated slasher movie, as long as you're not a homicidally slavish purist.

Writer-director Rob Zombie spends the first third of the remake immersing us in the dreadful childhood of Michael Myers (played as a boy by Daeg Faerch), then copies most of the plot and some of the key moments from John Carpenter's original chiller - but not all of them, and the hard-rockin' director puts his own spin on many of the classic bits.

Halloween (Dimension Films) Starring Malcolm McDowell, Daeg Faerch, Tyler Mane, Scout Taylor-Compton. Directed by Rob Zombie. Rated R. Time 109 minutes.