by Beth Dobbs

Created on: February 21, 2009

I walked into this one uncertain about it. I'm not a huge Friday the 13th fan to start with, so slasher flicks can be fairly hit or miss for me. I dig Hellraiser and Nightmare on Elm Street more than Halloween and the Friday flicks... but this was pretty entertaining. Very much in keeping with the franchise, but most definitely updated for a modern audience. The pacing is solid even if I would have altered the order of events somewhat, and it's a solid entry to the horror genre, which sees, unfortunately, more than its fair share of poorly made movies.

The film opens with a very well-executed summary of what happened to make Jason what he becomes. They then move on to another bout of fun, the slaughter of a camp full of drug-using, fornicating teenagers. It's all fairly standard, but it's definitely done with entertainment in mind, and it's a good, solid, quick entry into the movie. No one walks into Friday the 13th not knowing that they're going to see a slasher movie, but this interlude does a good job setting the scene for the rest of the film.

The primary failing for this one, as with many slasher films, is that the characters you are supposed to identify with most as the hero and heroine are somewhat wooden. The same can be said of the villain (as always the strong but not terribly fascinating or bright Jason Voorhies), but he's classically a fairly uninteresting guy. Interestingly awful things have happened to him, but he's just a random masked killer in the end without much oomph. Unfortunately the comic relief (read: disposable) characters were more compelling to me than the folks who were meant to be the headliners, but such is life. I will give them points for being good enough to see that both of these characters are given interesting deaths. They also get pretty prime material while they are alive and go a long way toward giving the movie its spark.

All the usual elements of a well-constructed horror movie are here from indulgence in drugs and alcohol (to amusing effect, however clich it might be) to sex (with, naturally, the more or less required bare breasts for those audience members who look for such things) to bloody deaths. The deaths are perhaps not the most inventive I've ever seen, but they're well played and the effects are all high quality.

Don't walk into this movie expecting to see masterpiece, but if you go in with your eyes open, you'll find exactly what you're looking for: a bloody romp through somewhat familiar territory.

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