. . . And Jerry Mathers as the Killer

I went to a little-known film school in Chicago from 1991-1995. Since my graduation one of the school's alumni - the Academy Award winning cinematographer of Schindler's List and Saving Private Ryan (and Vanilla Ice's Cool as Ice!) - has become "the famous guy from Columbia College Chicago."

But back when I was watching Fellini and Godard we had a semi-famous alumni that nobody wanted to talk about because he directed a truly brutal flick called Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer. That's right, I graduated from the same school that John McNaughton went to . . .

The original Henry starred Michael Rooker as an emotionally bankrupt character based on notorious serial killer Henry Lee Lucas. It was brutal. It was downbeat. It was an excellent film. So excellent that I went out and bought a Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer t-shirt (much to my poor mother's chagrin).

. . . Flash forward a handful of years. I'm working on the new Troma Film, Terror Firmer. Since most of the time on a film set is spent waiting, I was reading the paper when I spotted an ad for Henry, Portrait of a Serial Killer 2: Mask of Sanity. The first twenty people at the midnight show that night received FREE Henry 2 t-shirts! Understand that I had been up since 5:00am that morning and had the same call time the next day. That meant that if I went to the movies at 12:00 it would only be a few hours before I had to be up and at 'em. A few of the crew members and myself screamed out of the location that night and drove straight to the theater. We were the first five guys in line, so the next day we all arrived on set in our spiffy new Henry 2 t-shirts.

Unless you're getting a free t-shirt you probably want to avoid Henry 2.

In essence a re-telling of the first film, Henry 2 picks up right after the first one ends. Somehow Henry has pulled a "Darren Stevens on Bewitched" by changing from the morose and scary-looking Michael Rooker into the pudgy Jerry Mathers look-alike Neil Giuntoli. As in the first film, the deadpan Henry comes into the home of a white trash couple. The only difference is that this couple isn't brother and sister and they're industrious enough to run their own porta-potty business. That's right, Henry's upwardly mobile. He works emptying porta-potties by day and kidnaps and murders folks by night.

Lo and behold, it's revealed that the shady couple are insurance arsonists for hire. As in the first film, Henry drags his firebug accomplices into the "murdering for kicks" business. But soon things get out of hand which results in death for pretty much everybody but our ersatz hero, Henry.

Oh yeah, there's a subplot involving the naive, delusional sister of the firestarters who falls in love with Henry, but it doesn't really go anywhere.

Basically (as with most sequels) you've got a lesser version of the first film: Giuntoli's Henry is morose and quiet like Michael Rooker, but he's got way less menace. The arson sidekicks are scummy white trash, but nowhere near as disgusting as the first film's Otis. The violence is explicit rather than implied as it was in the first film. The ending is bleak, but not as disturbing as the original. The budget of this one appears to be lower than that first.

What I'm saying is: rent the first Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer is you haven't already - it's a classic. If you're a serial killer movie completist like me, you'll have to check out Henry 2: Mask of Sanity regardless of its measly two Santo Mask rating. Fortunately you'll have the advantages of A) paying rental price, and B) having the "fast forward" option, both of which will probably make the viewing experience more pleasurable . . . But you won't get the free t-shirt.

- Trent Haaga