Instant Favorite.

Brilliant and touching

I really wanted to like this movie. I feel terribly cynical trashing it, and that's why I'm giving it a middling 5. Actually, I'm giving it a 5 because there were some superb performances.

Strong acting helps the film overcome an uncertain premise and create characters that hold our attention absolutely.

Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer, Part 2 (1996)* (out of 4) Sequel to the 1986 masterpiece picks up slightly after that film ended. Henry (Neil Gluntoli) finds himself homeless but picks up a job in a small town. A husband and wife takes him into their home and soon the husband and Henry are on a murdering rampage. HENRY: PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER, PART 2, somehow, has a fairly good reputation among people but I found the film to be quite horrid from start to finish. I'm not going to lie, I really didn't go into this picture expecting anything like the original. The original film was one of the greatest of its type so it's impossible for this thing to match up to it and especially since we've got a new cast, production crew and director. The problem I had with this film is that it's basically just a remake of the first picture with a few changes made. There's no question that Henry and the "new" husband are just carbon copies of what we got in the original film. There's a young "troubled" woman here who is just a slightly different version of Becky from the first picture. The entire film has a very cheap feel to it and, unlike the original, that's not a good thing. Very little is done here and the entire story just struck me as pretty stupid. The entire business scheme of the husband and Henry setting places on fire just went nowhere interesting. The murder rampage that the two go on is, you guessed it, just a cheap rip-off of the original. None of the violence here is shocking or very interesting. There's quite a bit of gore but it too never gets all that exciting. The performances themselves weren't that bad but you shouldn't be expecting Oscar-caliber performances. HENRY: PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER, PART 2 is a pretty poor film simply trying to cash-in on a popular movie.

HENRY: PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER 2- MASK OF SANITY (2 outta 5 stars) Uh, long enough title, you think? First things first: this movie is one of those In Name Only sequels... and has practically nothing to do with the original classic. It hasn't got the same writer, director, actors or even the same style. This film is of a distinctly lesser quality in every respect. (This movie has some of the absolute WORST, fakest fight choreography I have ever seen!) Neil Giuntoli stands in this time for Michael Rooker (the original Henry) and, while he has a couple of effective scenes of underlying, stoic menace, for the most part he doesn't make much of an impression. This time around Henry is on his own and looking for work. He gets a job cleaning and moving port-a-potties and makes fast friends with a co-worker, Kai (Rich Komenich). Kai and his very un-happy-looking but smolderingly sensuous wife (Kate Walsh) invite Henry to stay with them until he gets some money put together. They also have an emotionally unstable niece (Carri Levinson) who draws freaky pictures. You think, with the two women in the house making googly eyes at Henry and carrying all that emotional baggage, that the tension would escalate into something really interesting. Well, you'd be wrong. Instead, Henry finds out that Kai does arson jobs for extra cash and the two of them get sidetracked into burning down old buildings for awhile. Then Henry starts into his killing spree again, slowly involving Kai more and more. The finale is a big disappointment in all respects... hardly touching on some of the more interesting elements introduced earlier in the movie. No wonder that there hasn't been a Henry 3.

Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer, part two (1998) was an ill advised and unwelcome sequel to the dark and brutal film Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer (1986). Many things are missing from this film that made the first one so memorable such as the original director and Michael Rooker. Without those you just have an average run-of-the-mill low budget slasher movie. The movie lacks motivation and a theme. The film makers turns Henry into just another movie monster who kills his victims creatively at every turn.The film follows the further exploits of Henry. He travels around the back woods of America continuing his murderous spree. Unlike the first film, we never get a glimpse into his sick and twisted mind. It's better to just forget this movie and pretends that it never happened. That's how I feel about this movie.Not recommended for fans and non-fans of the original. Others definitely need not apply.

When I started to watch the movie my first thought was: This isn't Henry, But if the character starts to talk and kill than this movie becomes a very decent following story of the first movie. Henry again has a criminal friend and a women that doesn't get the respect she earns and the story begins again...