Look at the date! Look at what new film is coming out today! Much like Rob Zombie’s Halloween, today’s release is a re-imagining of sorts of Friday The 13th. It’s not a remake yet it’s not a new film. There are some parts from the original yet some new stuff thrown into it. One thing is constant though and that is the presence of the masked murderer that roams the forest area around Crystal Lake. And he has been the one thing that has been a fierce force in every film in the series (except one of course). So it’s time now to take a look at Jason Voorhees…and his mother.
Michael Bay has me a tad worried because he has taken my beloved Friday The 13th franchise and is attempting a re-imagining of his own. When Rob Zombie took over the helm of Halloween; my fears weren’t as great as they are now because at least Zombie has a demented enough mind to give me something worth watching. No, it wasn’t as good as John Carpenter’s masterpiece but it was still good. And don’t get me wrong by assuming that I think the entire Friday franchise is good because there are some true pieces of shit there. But Michael Bay is known for his big time effects and “I like to blow stuff up” attitude. There are no real explosions in and of the Friday movies so how would he fit in here? Even though he’s not directing it; his name is attached to it and that upsets me.
Let’s take a closer look at everything then shall we? I’m going to do a small dissection of each film in the series and give a few thoughts on each. Some of them are great. A few are decent. And there are some that are extreme pieces of crap, but I’d still watch all of them repeatedly. So let’s see how they stack up against one another and go out on the limb to see if this new stuff will be even worth going to the theatres to see.
We all know I’ll go anyway.
The first! The original! An certainly my all-time favorite in the franchise as we are introduced to Camp Crystal Lake and learn a little story that appears to be more urban legend then anything. That is until the new camp counselors/helpers start getting picked off one by one. It’s a certified “slasher” that is pretty commonplace today, but this was one of the early one and it also had something that two out of every three films today have…a twist. You cannot say that the first time you ever watched Friday The 13th that you knew it was going to be Jason’s mother. If you watched it without knowing a thing about it and thought it was anyone else then Jason coming back to get revenge on the camp that tortured him so then I’ll call you a liar.
For those that are going to e-mail me about that; I’ll save you the trouble and humiliation of the response e-mail you’ll get back from me…LIARS!
Our first sequel and it’s much of the same thing you got in the first film as some counselors descend upon Camp Crystal Lake and are left to have fun, enjoy some sex, and get brutally murdered. Only this time we are actually getting who we expected it to be all along and that’s Jason Voorhees himself. As much as I love this film; it’s just not nearly as good as the first one and that is mostly to blame on the actors. For some reason, the group of young kids (including Kevin Bacon) from the first film was just much better at seeming real. Their actions, their stupidity, and their screams were so much better then those we get here, but it’s a horror film and the casts would get much worse anyway. But the main intention of this movie was simply to introduce Jason as the world’s next boogeyman killer. In that respect; it did the job it was meant to do.
A cool trend that followed a good number of these movies (especially early on in the franchise) was how quickly each one followed one another. Part II started up about six months after the original ended. Here we have the third film and it begins almost immediately after the second trauma-filled thrashing finished up. That’s continuity if I ever heard it. Be prepared for the acting gets even worse in this installment and the similarities to the first two films may start to get on some of your nerves but what do you expect from this franchise? Still, with the way Jason was introduced as our bad guy in the second movie; this film is just as important for the introduction of something even more iconic…the hockey mask. Jason’s signature accessory has finally appeared and he now has something that people will identify with the mere mention of his name.
Oh, and it’s in early eighties cheesy 3-D people! Frickin awesome!
Jason’s dead and we are essentially lead to believe that he’s not coming back. Well, they wouldn’t have made a fourth film just to show him in the morgue so you know something is up. Also hearing the phrase “The Final Chapter” is just humorous if you’ve been following along with the never ending saga that is Friday The 13th. There isn’t much of a point to this movie more then everyone realizing that Jason is pretty much immortal and now we get introduced to Tommy Jarvis (a young Corey Feldman) who would play a fun role in this film and the next. Some interesting kills fill up this installment and we also get the fantastic Crispin Glover in all his glory so that’s something to look forward to.
Maybe this is just a turning point in the franchise and intended to let audiences know that Jason isn’t going down without a fight. Hell, even then he’s not really going to roll over and play dead. Not much happens here and it’s actually kind of dull, but things heat up shortly.
Much like Halloween III: Season Of The Witch; this movie just succeeded in pissing me off more then anything. Those involved here should have learned something from that debacle three years prior and not tried to change what was a very workable and successful formula. It may not have been as drastic here as it was with totally changing the Michael Myers’ storyline, but it’s close. Tommy Jarvis is all messed up in the head thanks to witnessing Jason off tons of people he knew so he’s trying to straighten out his mind. That’s a big part of the storyline, but the bigger part is when kids start dying one by one and when all is said and done…it’s NOT Jason that is doing it. Booooooooo to you! BOO I say!
Things get back on track here as we return to our regularly scheduled programming after Tommy Jarvis (no longer Corey Feldman) brings Jason back from the dead and starts bumping people off left and right again. When no-one wants to believe Tommy though; he realizes that he must stop Mr. Voorhees. While nothing new or really exciting; at least we’re back to not having some imposter act as Jason and killing people. Man that just annoyed me. Hmmm…nothing else to really say here. Yep, that’s about it.
Oh wait, the film does end with a rather cool visual of Jason chained to a big rock at the bottom of Crystal Lake. I mean he’s got to be dead now right? Right?
Here is a little known fact that many people don’t know about this particular installment into the Friday The 13th world: it was supposed to be Jason Vs. Carrie. Yes, Sissy “Carrie” Spacek. The license couldn’t be acquired to have the “Carrie” character in the film so they simply gave her powers of telekinesis to a girl named Tina in the film. Decent idea, but not nearly the same effect. Tina actually ends up bringing Jason back to life (or awakening him) when her intentions were to bring her father’s body from the lake in order to close their bad relationship. Jason then runs amuck, amuck, amuck. Again we have a pretty good idea for a storyline by adding more to the “Jason kill counselors” deal we always get, but other things contributed to not making this movie as good as it could have been.
Maybe it was the MPAA coming down hard on the film industry in the late eighties or something, but the death scenes in New Blood are overly lackluster and not nearly as fun as the first crop of films. Every time Jason gets ready to off somebody; he reaches back with his weapon, we see the face of the soon-to-be victim, and then BAM…camera cuts away. Lame!
So it only took seven…sorry, six movies (I don’t count one of them) for Jason to get away from Camp Crystal Lake and where does he end up? In one of the wildest cities in the world and he has a bevy of people to choose from that probably more then deserve a good shot with his machete. First though Jason was brought to life by some idiots on a boat in Crystal Lake and their anchor hit an electrical line that put a spark (ba-da-bum) back into the big guy. And from then on, Jason ends up on a murderous path to the Big Apple but barely spends any time there at all so don’t expect him to end up in an “I (Heart) New York” shirt or anything. It’s a fun and mindless film that seemed like it would end the string of murders since he had been taken from his home sweet watery grave home, but that just can’t happen now can it? Jason Takes Manhattan also marked the end of Paramount’s run with the deranged goalie so many thought it was time for him to stay dead. How wrong they were.
Jason Goes To Hell just rips the heart out of my chest because it is so ludicrous but then it redeems itself by giving me one of the coolest visuals in cinematic history. Jason Voorhees finally gets what is coming to him he heads back to Camp Crystal Lake from New York and ends up getting decimated by the FBI and a SWAT team. Upon his arrival to the morgue in bits and pieces; Jason’s still beating black heart possesses a guy in the forensics’ lab who then goes on a killing spree himself. Really? This leads to a bounty hunter going after Jason with the old (yet new) adage that Jason can only die once and for all at the hand of another person in the Voorhees’ family tree.
That whole thing just makes my head hurt, but it’s the thirty seconds or so of the movie that makes me all happy in the pants (thank you Travis). If you haven’t seen Jason Goes To Hell before then shame on you and stop reading now because I’m going to spoil it for you…screw it, read it anyhow. Watching the camera close in on Jason’s mask sitting on the dirt as he lies in could quite possibly be his final resting place. All of a sudden, a gloved hand with knives for fingers reaches up through the ground and brings the mask down into hell as maniacal laughter echoes out of the ground.
HOL-EE SHIT! We’re actually going to get a movie that puts two of the biggest horror icons together?? Jason and Freddy Krueger are going to work together to kill people? Or maybe they’re going to fight one another? The possibilities are endless and I can’t wait until next year or maybe the next when this movie comes out.
Hey! It’s been eight years and I’ve been waiting a long time for this movie. Wait, where’s Freddy? Why is Jason getting frozen? Or better yet, why is he alive anyway because he was banished to hell! This is some horseshit!
Yes, shortly after Jason descended into hell and his mask too thanks to the hand of Freddy, the Friday The 13th series faded into obscurity for quite some time. The different studios just couldn’t come to the agreement needed for both horror superstars to end up in the same film fighting one another so we get Jason X aka “Jassssooonnn Innnnnn Spaaaaaaccceeee!” So our own Jason Voorhees ends up in space in the future and decides to go ballistic on all those on a spaceship and treat them as if they are camp counselors. After a little while of doing so; he catches up with the times and becomes Uber-Jason which is pretty damn cool looking I must say.
The movie itself kind of blows but the scene where Jason goes to a virtual reality Cap Crystal Lake is really sweet. Other then that; things aren’t too thrilling here and they basically needed a filler before the inevitable Freddy Vs. Jason.
Finally after ten years in the making, we get the match-up we have been waiting for and that is Freddy Krueger taking on Jason Voorhees. So many questions needed to be answered here: would they fight in the dream world at Camp Crystal Lake or on Elm Street? Would Freddy only attack Jason in his dreams? Could Jason even get a hold of the Dream Master? That’s only a few of them and even though this movie wasn’t the best effort they could muster up; all those questions were actually answered. FvJ ended up being kind of corny and even a bit dumb at times, even for my taste. But when things got down to it and the battle began between evil and evil, it was awesome.
Freddy using Jason as a way to kill some kids because his power wasn’t up to full strength is brilliant. Jason getting sick and tired of it and then turning on Freddy is great. Freddy attacking Jason’s psyche by taunting him constantly with water is a great homage back to the original backstory of the Voorhees’ child. There is just so much to work with considering there are eight films in the Friday series and seven in the Nightmare On Elm Street franchise so that gave the filmmakers a huge history to grab stuff from. While it could have been better; they appeased my appetite for this battle to finally happen and paved the way for more to come. That final fight between them was pretty epic anyway and a touch of Michael Myers would be just what Dr. Satan ordered.
Well here we go. Here we have a re-imagining that sees a group of young adults stumble across Camp Crystal Lake all boarded up with no-one in sight. It seems like the perfect place for a couple nights of drugs, music, alcohol, sex, and even an old urban legend about a kid named Jason Voorhees. They soon find out that the myth of Jason is a lot more then just a legend and he’s back to seek revenge on just about anyone he can get his hands on.
Jason Voorhees has been played by numerous actors and stuntmen over the years and an actor named Derek Mears is slipping the mask on and going to try and breathe new life into the giant goalie. I tell you, the guy looks scary enough without the mask but from what I’ve seen so far, he does a pretty damn good job in costume too. Trailers have shown me some promise in not only the new Jason, but everything in general. It appears as if the kills will be fun and gory. Camp Crystal Lake looks restored to all the glory of its heyday so that is a nice touch. And it looks like all the campers are falling victim to lessons they should have learned from horror film after horror film but just never bothered to think it could happen to them.
Oh, and have you seen the speed that Jason has in this new movie? Before he did the creepy “walk and keep up with you no matter how fast you’re going” but now he is running and coming after your ass. As if you needed more proof that you just weren’t going to get away from this giant beast coming after you. We shall see if this new group of kids has what it takes to survive or if this merely the start of another band of films where people think you can actually kill Jason Voorhees.
I’m kind of frightened and afraid of what this new version may bring to the table, but I’m anxious to find out. More then likely it will be cheesy, but then again which one of these films hasn’t been? It’s still kind of cool that we have come fool circle through all the horror remakes and gotten one that now everyone has heard of. Yeah, I know what The Last House On The Left and The Hills Have Eyes is, but not all people do. Texas Chainsaw Massacre came out in 2003 as a rather successful remake/re-imagining in my opinion and Michael Bay had a part in that so perhaps my fear is unnecessary. We shall see though because if he starts blowing shit up then I’m going to be pissed.
Enjoy your bloody Valentine’s Day everyone and I’ll see you back here next week or else I’m going to “crack the whip!”
