Hey all, it's me again. This time I'm going to review a movie,
Friday the 13th, a horror film which is a reboot of the
Friday the 13th film series. And, for those of you who don't know, these films are usually centered around a bunch of young adults hanging around the gloomy, decrepit Camp Crystal Lake and being stalked by a supernatural, unstoppable killing machine by the name of Jason Voorhees. And of course, this recent film isn't really any different.
This film starts out retelling the end of the first
Friday the 13th film (y'know, the one
without Jason Voorhees as the killer) as it depicts the Jason's crazed mother Pamela Voorhees as she chases after a young female (which, according to Wikipedia because it's been some time since I've last watched the first film, is Alice Hardy, one of the camp counselors who sought to reopen Camp Crystal Lake). Pamela is then killed by Alice, causing her son, Jason, who was believed to have drowned in the lake due to the negligence of the counselors years ago, to take revenge.
Then the film fast-forwards to many years after the event, where you see a group of young adults trekking through the woods at Crystal Lake, looking for a crop of marijuana they (or someone else) had planted. While camping at night (and doing the typical stupid horror-movie protagonist activities such as getting wasted and having sex), Jason Voorhees comes and kills every single one of them in a gory fashion except for one girl, whom he takes as his prisoner.
Then the film fast-forwards
again, six weeks after, where the brother of Jason's captive goes on a hunt to find his sister at Crystal Lake, where everyone is reluctant to help him. And of course, with him are a bunch of stupid people who are staying at a vacation house so that they can, guess what, do some stupid shit like have sex, do drugs, and drink alcohol until they puke. But our protagonist continues on his quest, ever vigilant to rescue his sister. Unfortunately for him (and those other people partying), he has disturbed Jason Voorhees, and must now survive his murderous rampage.
I'll tell you right now that I'm not a big fan of horror/slasher films such as this one. It's not that I hate them or that I don't find them entertaining, but it's just so typical. They usually star a bunch of stupid kids (with one being the central protagonist) doing a bunch of stupid shit, and then BAM! They're being stalked by a bloodthirsty, murderous monster. The entertainment found in these films usually come from how brutal or how messy the killing of one of the characters is. Thrown off a cliff? Boring. Having a leg caught in a bear trap and then having the head nearly sliced in half with a machete? Fucking awesome. Of course, films like
Friday the 13th are usually made not to scare the shit out of the audience, but to rather show off the most gruesome and the most sickening fake murders of the characters, and it makes the killings more entertaining rather than scary.
As a result, I didn't really expect this film to blow me away. I remember hearing about this movie and seeing the commercial and me saying to myself: "I'm probably not going to see this movie in it's entirety. I'll probably watch a scene or two when my brother buys it on DVD or something, but that'll be it." But it's rare for me to have the opportunity to watch a movie on the day it was released (in this case, yesterday, Friday, February 13, 2009), so when I was invited by my father, brother, and my brother's friend to see the movie, I initially rejected the invitation, but then I decided: "what the hell?" So I went to see it just so I can say:
"I saw that fuckin' Friday the 13th movie that came out back in 2009 when it was released on theaters, because all my friends and peers were out getting shitfaced or whatever and I had fucking nothing to do."Though, I am
not saying that I walked into the theater with a condescending, negative mood. No, I expected this movie to be entertaining. After all, the
Friday the 13th franchise was very successful during this time, and still is to this very day. To this day, whenever we see a hockey mask, we instantly think of Jason Voorhees and that memorable "Ch-ch-ch ah-ah-ah" noise that would usually sound whenever he, or anything representing him, was near. So, I expected to see an enjoyable movie. Not one that I'd call my favorite, but still a fairly good one. So was it good?
Well... I can't quite say. The individual deaths of the characters were entertaining. Jason makes use of using more than his trademark machete and his own herculean strength to exterminate the film's protagonists. For example, one character is killed after Jason shoots him using a bow-and-arrow, and another character is tied up in her sleeping bag (I believe) over a campfire, which eventually burned her to death. I haven't seen all of the
Friday the 13th films, and the ones I have seen I watched a long time ago, so I don't remember if Jason used more than his machete (among other weapons) and his own strength to kill the other characters. But, this film shows a more powerful, and in my opinion, scarier Jason. Along with archery and burning people, he is even shown to be skilled at throwing things (such as an axe) and he even runs after his victims. That's right, he fucking
runs. I don't think he ever
ran in the previous films. He just seemed to teleport instantaneously from one place to another (which he still seems to do in this film, by the way.) In my opinion, these new (if they are new) abilities making the murderer seem a bit more believable and a bit more imposing. After all, nothing is scarier than to discover than a giant, bloodthirsty, maniac you are running away from that you previously thought
couldn't run now has the ability to run after you and catch up to you (or he can throw an axe at you, whatever he feels is the best method for killing you.)
Another thing I liked was the cinematography. It gave the film and its setting a more ominous feeling to it, and made it kind of scary. Of course, in a typical horror movie fashion, the camera would focus on one thing before suddenly focus on the film's antagonist appearing out of nowhere or killing (with a loud scary noise or some sort of music playing) just to try to scare the hell out of you, and it worked. I actually remember jumping in fear whenever Jason suddenly appeared out, and I distinctly remember the high pitched screaming of my fellow movie-goers whenever that happened. It really helped set the mood, and it made the film scary.
There's not much to say on the story, since it's just another horror movie story. Though it was interesting to see how Jason (who wore a burlap sack on his head in his first appearance as a killing machine in the second film of the series) found his mask, but that's all I will say.
What I didn't like is how flat and static the characters were. They all had one personality that pretty much was kept the same throughout the film with only a few instances where their emotions actually changed. Every single one of the teenagers in both groups shown in the movie (excluding the protagonist, his sister, and one of the girls in the second group) were essentially the same. They were all shown to be drunk (or stoned) partying idiots indulging themselves in drugs, alcohol, sex, or whatever, and that's all we really get to know about them. Sure, most of them were just there only to be killed by Jason, but the fact that they are flat and just plain uninteresting makes their deaths
not shocking, and honestly, I celebrated every time they were killed because that was the
only time they were interesting. Sure, some of the characters did some stupid stuff or said something completely dumb that made me (and the audience) chuckle a bit. The fact that the characters were barely interesting made their deaths, though entertaining, a tad bittersweet, as it seems that the film makers tried to make it painfully obvious that they were merely typical horror movie murder fodder.
As I mentioned before,
Friday the 13th is just another horror/slasher film, and is fairly predictable. The formula for films such as this one goes like this: the protagonists appear, they go somewhere or stay where they are and do something (usually stupid), a murderer appears, the murderer terrorizes protagonists, he/she kills off all protagonists but one (or two), and then at the end, survivor defeats murderer temporarily. Sometimes as a bonus, the murderer comes back right at the end or gives a sign that he/she will come back. This film really isn't any different. You don't need to watch any of the previous
Friday the 13th films to have an idea how the film will end and who will defeat him. It's just typical, and in my opinion, stale. Granted, the details (such as the types and personalities of the protagonists, settings, etc.) generally give this formula some flavor, and makes us want to keep watching movies like this one, but it's still pretty dull once you get to thinking about it. Yes, Jason Voorhees is a killing machine and that's all there is to it, but if it weren't for how entertaining the murders were, we probably wouldn't be going back and watching him and his fellow horror movie antagonists spill more blood again and again and again.
In my opinion, the amount of nudity and sexuality was a bit much. I mean, having seen some of the previous films in the franchise, I expected there to be some, and there may or may not be as much sexuality shown in this film as there were in the previous films, but it was excessive. Quite honestly, it got to a point where I felt uncomfortable watching the movie. The only reason why I stuck around to see it is the knowledge that after the film was done entertaining every perverted teenage slob in the theater that it would get back to showing the horror movie murder and violence I paid to see. Fortunately, the film wasn't
all about sex and nudity, but it was getting to be a bit much. Yes, that stuff usually bothers me, even though I am, as of the writing of this review, a 17-year old male who should actually enjoy that kind of shit, and I should be mature enough to handle it. But, I have to draw the line somewhere, shouldn't I? Yeah, I know what you're saying:
"So violence is good and sex is bad?" Not necessarily, but the sex and nudity scenes just seem to be made to show off the females to impress the male audience (I'm not saying that the nudity of the male actors needs to shown off, I'm just saying that the excessive nudity was unnecessary), whereas both the male and female characters were murdered in a gruesome fashion indiscriminately.
In short, the film was okay. The characters were dull and uninteresting, sexuality was a bit much, and it was just another typical horror movie. But hey, it's Jason fucking Voorhees, and he's out to kill and scare the shit out of everyone. If you want a mind-blowingly good movie to watch, take a pass on this. If you want an excuse to hold your loved one in your arms, crying in fear, or whatever typical Valentine's Day shit you do, go watch this movie. After all, nothing says "I love you" more than watching the sickeningly entertaining murders of a bunch of kids at the hands of a masked madman hellbent on revenge.
So, happy Valentine's Day, and try not do die out there.
I'm sorry, I just haven't figured out a good way to end this post... so...
Yeah, don't die.
