Friday the 13th

Friday the 13th

Now just a paragraph on the reboot of "Friday the 13th." No need to look deeply into this one. It has Jason, he kills people in semi-interesting ways. He runs now, which I thought was a mistake. The whole menacing thing about Jason is that he always walked but still caught up to everybody. Anyway, Jason kills potheads and oversexed college kids, so this is business as usual. The jokes are cheesy, but high school kids on down might enjoy them. There are a few odd references that I personally enjoyed (if the whole Heineken/Pabst Blue Ribbon thing wasn't a nod to "Blue Velvet" then that is just one of the biggest coincidences in film history). There are some unintentionally funny lines ("Where are you, gun?") and a guy screams just like a little girl at one point. So there is fun to be had here, but I think this is a misstep in the series. "Freddy Vs Jason" was much more enjoyable. I wish they would have stuck with that route. Oh, and Jason uses a bow and arrow in this, which I thought was odd.

Eric Harris - www.canneltoncritic.com

FRIDAY THE 13TH

**½

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Friday the 13th

Friday the 13th

Starring:

Jared Padalecki, Amanda Righetti, Danielle Panabaker, Jonathan Sadowski, Travis Van Winkle

Producer: Michael Bay

Director: Marcus Nispel

Genre: Horror

Rated: R

A group of Kids go to the woods, do drugs, fornicate and get killed off one by one. That pretty much sums up what Friday the 13^th is all about.

This one is being billed as a Reimagining of Friday the 13^th, However it is really more of a direct sequel to the Original than a remake; and actually starts with the ending of the first one.  This franchise much like a nightmare on Elm Street has consistently gotten worse in every film and somewhere along the way went from horror film to slasher comedy.

Director Marcus Nispel and Producer Michael Bay have given the same treatment to Friday the 13^th that they did to A Texas Chainsaw Massacre and the series is better for it. The story of Jason is finally being taken seriously doing away with the bad jokes, ridiculous locations (Jason in Space) and Jason being an inhuman killing machine. This version takes its cues from the original but offers a grittier feel; it goes back to its roots and gets it right.

In this Reimagining We get subtle differences that somehow make all the difference in the world. Jason is not only able to think but he feels pain, he comes off as more human which makes him scarier. The location that started it all and the only place that feels right for a Friday the 13^th film Camp Crystal Lake is back, rundown from years of neglect. In fact almost everything you could ask for is in this one, the relationship with his mother, origin of the hockey mask, obnoxious teenagers that you want to get killed, Drugs and Alcohol and a rarity for this day and age which used to be a staple of the genre, topless girls. There are legitimate scares in here, some imaginative execution scenes and the feel of the film is great, Hands down this is the best Friday the 13^th since the original.

Friday the 13th (2009)

The original "Friday the 13th" from 1980 wasn't a great movie. It was camp-y, simple, predictable, and more violent than genuinely scary. But at the very least it was an entertaining 1980s slasher movie...which spawned so many sequels it's ridiculous. The new "Friday the 13th" is a combination of the first four movies in the series. The result is nowhere as good as the original. The original made a little bit of sense...this new one does not....at all. Who the heck would continue going to Camp Crystal Lake after Jason Vorhees (and his mother) has hacked, dismembered, or otherwise violently killed every single person to set foot near the camp in the last twenty-nine years? The answer: the unbelievably stupid teenagers in the newest incarnation of the movie franchise. They were all so unbelievably annoying and really should have kept their clothes on...once they come off it's mere seconds before they are bloody and dying...just a fun little fact about horror movies. Almost every single person is unlikeable/drunk/high/making awful decisions/etc. Just about everyone dies...oops...sorry, I ruined the movie. And by the way, the beginning of this movie ruins the original...so see the original first. The plot is pretty non-existent, most of the cast is awful, and the music at times just got me in a bad mood. So yeah, it's your typical slasher movie...not a horror movie...a slasher. There is a difference - slashers are just violent and bloody whereas horror movies actually have a plot and characters that lead to genuine scares and suspense. These are often psychological or a little demonic depending on the movie. So quite honestly if you are thinking to yourself "I want to watch a horror movie. Why don't I rent the new "Friday the 13th." Don't do it (unless it only costs you a dollar)...rent "Psycho," "The Exorcist," "Jaws," "The Shining," "Poltergeist," etc. It will be a better use of your money and "Psycho" may be the greatest movie ever made because Alfred Hitchcock is an amazing director...hmm kind of got off track from the movie actually being reviewed...But the main point of this review is that there is no legitimate reason to see this movie because it is awful and of course Michael Bay would produce it.

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Friday the 13th

It's a strange thing to see a movie that is exactly what you expected, neither more nor less.

It's almost... unexpected.

The current remake of Friday the 13th is about -- spoiler alert -- a killer named Jason who slays horny teenagers at a woodsy haunt called Crystal Lake.

The film lives up to its premise. It chews up its share of teenagers and flaunts plenty of camera-conscious sex.

Strangely it does not combine the two. That was always the appeal of the original franchise. There was the unspoken message that unrestrained sex leads invariably to a violent, and fairly immediate, death.

All us virgins watching the movies the first time around had no idea if this was true or not. Maybe most sex acts DID end in death. That would explain why everyone seemed so uncomfortable discussing the subject.

In the new version, though, sex and death always occupy different scenes. That really dulls whatever edge this story once had.

You might have a decent "directors cut" with "seventy fewer minutes!" by just showing the actual murders, one after the other. Everything in between, like the dialogue scenes of a Skinemax flick (do they have those anymore?), is just tedious nonsense.

At one point I caught myself thinking, "Okay, how many kids are left? Three in the cabin, two in the truck, one wandering around. That oughta mean we're no more than forty-five minutes from the end."

Not exactly a terrifying film-going experience.

Friday the 13th for the millionth time

I just wanna say, I’m tired of seeing remakes of the Jason, Freddy, and Myers horror films. Everyone of the million remakes is nothing more than a exact replica of the the one before, no originality. So to Friday the 13th…I honesty don’t remember half of the movie, yea it was just that boring. I’m not even sure I made it through the movie. But i can tell you Jason fanatics that they stuck to the storyline. The actors did a good job serving their purpose but none gave a standout performance. Overall, this is a very bad horror film and deserves a 5 out of 10.

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The Wiz

Friday the 13th

It's always really hard to review a classic. Part of the reason is because there is such a cult fan base for them that, as part of a review's job to pick out flaws, the reviewer will feel a backlash if they insult the fans. Another is that there are already so many reviews out on the film already that it is hard not to be biased by another review, and it makes it difficult to say things that haven't been talked about before. Yet another reason is that one has seen the movie so many times, since it has been deemed a classic, that it is hard to look at it with a fresh mind.

With this in mind, I will attempt to review Friday the 13th the best I can, and if I touch on points already analyzed, or if I judge harshly, don't blame me - blame the cult that F13 has garnered. (And yes, that is really just an excuse to get the heat off my back if I'm deemed an insolent douchebag.)


I feel like most people know the story of Friday the 13th, but to give a quick run-down: It's a film directed by Sean S. Cunningham, where teens are recruited to work at a summer camp that is opening up again - Camp Crystal Lake - which had been closed down after murders had been committed there in the past. A little boy drowned in the lake, some counselors were found dead, and now the townspeople believe there is some sort of curse on the place. Obviously, none of the teenagers take heed of the warnings, because they're teens and they pretty much know everything there is to know - or maybe they're just too stoned since this is a slasher film - but they start working in the camp and mysterious disappearances start to happen, along with some sex and nudity, including Mr. Kevin "Footloose" Bacon. And yes, we all know the twist, but if you haven't been living and don't know, I won't spoil it. But the film's eventual only protagonist, butch counselor Alice (Adrienne King), becomes final girl and has a girl-on-girl duke-out when a Mrs. Voorhees (Betsy Palmer) shows up.

Looking back, there are tons of things that happen in F13 where I have to call out, "Who really does that!?" or "What was the point of doing that?" The good part about Friday the13th, though, is that on first viewing, one kind of puts these questions to the back of their mind, using suspension of disbelief to heighten the viewing pleasure. In this case, the film succeeds in entertaining enough to distract from some of the more unbelievable elements. I mean, I don't really think that teens are so oblivious to their surroundings when horny to blatantly disregard a dead body lying on a top bunk while clearly in sight when standing up. Or that the killer took the time to foresee all possible escape paths of Alice and then position the dead bodies accordingly so that it creates a sort of haunted house as she runs. The list goes on and on.


However, F13 excels in pacing. Slasher films are sometimes notorious for their slow plot development, since the audience must meet all of the characters, and (hopefully) flesh out their personalities for the viewer to care if they live or die. In F13, we are exposed to the normal meet-and-greet, but we also get an equal amount of killing sequences. The fact that F13 presents the viewer with a potential protagonist who ends up dying early on showcases the ability to get kills in even while we are still meeting the characters. Here, it works, because it's a total surprise as we think that the plot will build off of this main character. I do like how the movie really throws the viewer around, presenting a few different characters that could become the final survivor and then killing them off anyway. In the end, we are presented with the most unlikely heroine, which builds her likability as a person because of her prowess in taking control of the situation.

Deaths are hit and miss, though. While it is great that we are presented with a slew of kills throughout the movie, many of them happen off-screen and don't really give us that heightened sense of fear of how they will be slaughtered. We see the aftermath, but by that time, I feel like the suspense has already been extinguished because we've been made to focus on a new situation. On the other hand, the lightening of suspense allows for the boo scares that happen towards the latter portion of the movie, but I'd rather be afraid for a character instead of frightened by a dead body.


Yet when the kills happen on-screen, the gore is there and the realism is incredible. Kevin Bacon's throat being ripped open, anyone? They create sequences that make you squirm when they're there, which they should, but I was asking for more of them. I know that what you imagine can be worse than what you see, but I wasn't imagining much here because I wasn't feeling for them.

Obviously, the surprise at the end is great, but I do feel like Mrs. Voorhees  is introduced way too late in the film - it happens too fast and too convenient. One of the best parts of the movie is when that something happens at the lake, after Alice has gotten off Camp Crystal Lake. It used to make me jump every time, even if I knew it was coming.

F13 is a little dated, but I still feel the attraction. It does a lot right, a few things weird, and some stuff just seems off. It's an enjoyable experience, but to those who already know what happens, it might get just a little bit boring. I love that it's a classic, and I love that it's still watchable, but I wish I could relive it again as if I had never seen it. Watching it now, it feels nothing like it did when I first watched it as a kid, and I feel like to be a truly great horror film, it should still scare me even if I know what's coming - and that is the element that I feel is lacking from this movie. If you can forget that you've already heard about/seen/memorized F13, I think it would be a good movie to come back to. But I really do think it's time to move on from Camp Crystal Lake, and maybe the upcoming remake will help.

Last updated: 2009-08-24 03:39:28 by Ryneb