Whilst tomorrow will no doubt be a day for sitting alone, eating to much choclolate and quietly sobbing, today was only suited to an entirely different sort of pursuit.
Because if you go down to the woods today you're sure of a big suprise. If by "suprise" you in fact mean "Machete in the FACE".
So yeah, I went to see the ne Friday The 13th movie. How could I not? I've liked Friday The 13th movies for a long time and frankly found the idea of a remake quite interesting. Normally I would be against the very notion with military zeal and a fanatical gleam in my eye, but Friday is for me a unique case. After all, the popular image of Jason does not make it onto screen until halfway through part 3. So how would this be handled? You are, after all left with the choice of remaking 3 films into one, or rewriting the mythology of the series in a dangerous way. So since to much Doctor Who has fosterd an interest in story structure and script editing in my feeble little mind this promised to be quite interesting from a technical standpoint if nothing else.
I'm pleased and frankly shocked to say that I found it to be a highly enjoyable experience. The movie stays true the essense of the series whilst jettisoning the bloated continuity that it finds unessesary to the telling of the story it wants to tell. So no zombie Jasons, psychic teenagers or anything like that. Just a big scary guy, in the woods, killing the shit out of a group of students or whatever in various fun ways. Spot the stiff is scarcely the most challenging game to play in a Friday The 13th movie. It it breathes, it dies. Spot the survivor is slightly more challenging, and this movie does actually pull a couple of tricks to give at least a small suprise as to who that is.
Worth noting are the many visual cues sprinkled throughout the film as a kind of tribute to all that has gone before, so if your familiar with the others theres a little something extra to look out for. It's interesting to contrast this technique with AvP2, where the whole thing felt like it had been storyboarded using clips from Predator and Alien, and just felt forced and unnatural. This movie achieves a much more subtle direction for these kind of shots.
The characters are, as ever, basically just meat. But at least a few of them acieve some small trace of depth or likability. Just a shame none of them survive.
Jason himself looks good, with a really solid performance from the guy playing him. Because solidity is what Jason's all about. He is an implacable, inescapable force of death. It's worth noting that whilst you do get a glimpse of the unmasked Jason a couple of times you never quite see him clearly. Just enough to tell he's deformed and hideous, but not enough to quite grasp the full makeup. This works very well. The unseen is always scarier after all.
The the film has an interesting structure, with the events of the original film covered in the first 5 minutes, followed up by what could almost be considered a mini Friday movie (which I guess you could call the part 2 section) which eventually ties into the main section (which could be considered the part 3 bit.) It's the area where Jason gets his mask, so I suppose thats a reasonably apposite summation.
So all in all, happy fun times all around, despite the presence of a certain name in the credits. I'm guessing that his production role wasn't massively hands on. Though there was one brief moment of hyperflamable tunnel that ALMOST looked like an explosion chasing someone down a hallway. I'll bet that was his idea. Fucking hack.
But yeah, enough of that git. JASON LIVES.
Of course he does. There's always room for a sequel. It's like jello.
Murder flavored Jello.
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