Director: Marcus Niespel
Cast:
Jared Padelecki/Clay
Danielle Panabaker/Jenna
Amanda Righetti/Whitney
Travis Van Winkle/Trent
Julianna Guill/Bree
Derek Mears/Jason Voorhees
PLOT:
Jason kills a bunch of idiot dumb college students in the woods. It’s a Friday the 13th film, what do you expect?
BREAKDOWN:
Another day, another remake. When will this craze END?! I’m sick of them remaking all of my favorite movies. I adore the original Friday the 13th to death. I found it to be a scary and suspenseful well-made movie with characters I cared for. Oh well…this craze isn’t going to end for a while I feel like. At first I was angry with how Jason was the killer AND had his hockey mask, because any fan boy knows that his MOM was the killer in the original and that he didn’t get the infamous hockey mask until Part 3. But after a while and watching the pretty badass trailer, it looked more like a sequel to me then a remake…and that is how I looked at it as Friday the 13th: Part 12…and that made it better to me, because I’ve been wanting another sequel for a LONG time now.
I saw this movie opening night on Valentine’s Day with my ex-boyfriend. (Asshole!) I was really looking forward to this, even though I knew it wouldn’t meet the greatness of the original. This was my idea of a romantic movie though.
The movie opened up strong with one of the greatest openings to a horror film ever. The first twenty minutes gave us five likable characters that were fun and very enjoyable. I especially liked that Richie guy. He definitely got me to crack up! I really warmed up to these five people. Then Jason came in and ripped them to shreds so to speak. The kills were brutal and harsh (although not that gory) and suspense and tension was IN THE HOUSE! The pacing was perfect and everything was perfect. And this is JUST the opening scene! When the title showed up after this, I couldn’t wait for the movie to truly kick in! How awesome was it truly going to be!
But alas this is where my problems lie. The movie had an AMAZING opening (although I could have done without that corny black and white pre opening thing) but then…went onto become a bland and suspense-less thrill ride with not too many thrills. So in the end, the rest of the movie couldn’t live up to the badass opening. If the movie would have just been the first twenty minutes and been a short film, I actually probably would have been a happy camper. But what was wrong with the rest of the movie you may ask; let me tell you.
First the characters! Except for two characters, these were some of the most annoying and cardboard thin characters to grace the screen. They were supposed to be college students in their twenties but they were doing things that only little kids would do. Basically they grated my nerves BIG TIME! I just wanted them to all die. Thank god for Clay and Jenna. Clay is a guy on a mission to find his sister who went missing in the beginning. He was likable and he was my root to the movie. But it was Jenna who truly stole the movie for me. Danielle Panabaker shined BIG TIME. Her character was pretty thin, but she made her so likable and really added depth and she became the ONLY true character I wanted to make it out alive in the end. The rest of the cast was decent. I didn’t really notice any bad acting; it’s just that they didn’t really have any good roles. If it were up to me, the first five characters would have been the main characters of the entire film.
My biggest problem is that this was NOT Jason. It was pretty much Leatherface at Camp Crystal Lake. Jason in this film was intelligent, held people captive, and traveled through underground tunnels. What?! This is NOT the Jason I know and love. I like my Jason either as a dumb and deformed retard or as an unstoppable zombie. Here he was played as an intelligent hunter. This created MANY plot holes. How could no one notice an intelligent killer living there…especially when he has HIGH BEAM LIGHTS set up! And Jason does NOT keep people captive. He slaughters them, not chains them up. To me this was just not Jason Voorhees. Mears played him well, but I hope in the sequel they make him MORE like the Jason we know and love.
The kills in the movie were brutal and harsh…but they could have gone further. They weren’t gory enough for my liking. But hey! It was still better than any PG-13 shit fest (like Prom Night or The Stepfather remakes). Even though I am a gay man, I appreciated all the sex and nudity because it added an old 80’s feeling to the movie. But having lots of sex and nudity doesn’t make it a Friday the 13th film.
What about the soundtrack? It was...adequate. Nothing more. Nothing less. It did it's job and i don't even remember it...but i would have like more of the ki ki ki ma ma ma theme.
Then came the ending. It was…entertaining, but was DUMBER than Paris Hilton. If you do not want spoilers TURN BACK NOW!!!
SPOILERS!!!
Clay finds his sister alive after six weeks of being chained up by Jason. WTF? Again, Jason doesn’t chain people up! Then they kill off the ONE person who was the only truly likable character, Jenna. It was a surprise because she WAS the heroine. But she went out in such a stupid way. If they were going to kill off the heroine, at least give her a GREAT and respectable death scene. Then it’s the brother and sister alive. There was no suspense. No tension. And when they “kill” Jason, why did they kick his body into the ocean. He’s a “real man” remember? They just disposed of evidence. In Part 6 it was fine cause Jason was a zombie, but here it was just utter stupidity.
In the end, the movie was just a good first 20 minutes and then another hour or so of tensionless stupidity. Almost no likable characters. Jason isn’t the same Jason we used to love. The kills were harsh, but not gory. It was pretty much just dumb entertainment with now suspense.
To think of a rating was hard. Because those first 20 minutes REALLY kicked ass and if I had to JUST rate the first 20 minutes alone, I’d give the movie a strong 8/10…but alas that isn’t the entire film. There was another hour plus. So I had to think of it all together.
Strong opening. Bad middle act. Entertaining but stupid third act. I think the final rating is fair. This movie was stupid entertainment. Nothing more, nothing less.
OVERALL GRADE: 5/10
