Friday the 13th has become one of the most recognisable franchises in horror, and Jason's hockey-masked, machete wielding killer a firm cinematic figure. However, stripping past this high-profile reveals one of the most bafflingly successful horror films of all time (I put it down to the freshness of the idea), as this really is a poor movie.
For a start, it's terribly directed. There's an incredible over-use of extended shots (lasting several minutes) entirely on hand-held cameras, which start far away and draw slowly closer towards the characters. This was probably intended to build the tension, but it's so over-used you stop caring who's behind the camera. The film also uses that classic of cheap slasher films everywhere- the "eyes" of the killer. It's also incredibly badly paced. The film is over 100 minutes long, and yet that time seems to evaporate without explaining any of the background or developing a solid narrative. People start getting killed off very early, with no explanation. By the time anyone realises there's a serial killer on the loose- there's only one person left alive! Constant, drawn-out tension shots burn through the minutes, and the characters talk the usual filler that we're supposed to breeze over because we're clinging to our seat edges wondering what the killer's going to do next. The clincher is some very suspect editing- with shots lingering on long after anything left in the frame.
Essentially, this is a cheap rip-off of Halloween, and it lacks John Carpenter's direction, John Carpenter's score, John Carpenter's knowledge of how to work the audience up and Donald Pleasance's brilliant armed doctor, who is that film's crucial source of important information. What's left lacks any suspense, and many scenes are even taken pretty much straight from Halloween. The fact that we never know who's killing everyone (they remain a pair of hands and a knife for the most part) destroys the point of the film. Even Tom Savini's gore effects are decidedly tame compared to his still impressive work on George A Romero's Dawn of the Dead a couple of years earlier.
Does anything save this film? Well, ironically the best thing about it also removes the remaining good reason to see it. The acting in this film is actually reasonably good. I've seen countless zero-budget horror flicks and for such an amateur film, the acting is believable and consistent. Only trouble is that none of the characters are developed at all, so you really couldn't care less whether they die or not.
This straight-faced acting actually removes the "so bad it's good" possibility from this film- even though it almost qualifies with perhaps the most unintentionally hilarious scene in movie history. We meet the generic superstitious old man (Ralph) at the beginning, but after he's done his customary "you'll all die" bit he re-appears later on. Apparently he walks twenty miles across country, into the camp without anyone noticing, and goes into a store cupboard, shutting himself in and standing in the darkness, waiting for someone to open it up so he can warn them again for all of five seconds before ambling off into the woods. Absolutely brilliant.
Sadly though, even Ralph doesn't make this film worth watching. If you want a genuinely scary no-budget horror flick set in the woods- then I give you The Evil Dead.
For a start, it's terribly directed. There's an incredible over-use of extended shots (lasting several minutes) entirely on hand-held cameras, which start far away and draw slowly closer towards the characters. This was probably intended to build the tension, but it's so over-used you stop caring who's behind the camera. The film also uses that classic of cheap slasher films everywhere- the "eyes" of the killer. It's also incredibly badly paced. The film is over 100 minutes long, and yet that time seems to evaporate without explaining any of the background or developing a solid narrative. People start getting killed off very early, with no explanation. By the time anyone realises there's a serial killer on the loose- there's only one person left alive! Constant, drawn-out tension shots burn through the minutes, and the characters talk the usual filler that we're supposed to breeze over because we're clinging to our seat edges wondering what the killer's going to do next. The clincher is some very suspect editing- with shots lingering on long after anything left in the frame.
Essentially, this is a cheap rip-off of Halloween, and it lacks John Carpenter's direction, John Carpenter's score, John Carpenter's knowledge of how to work the audience up and Donald Pleasance's brilliant armed doctor, who is that film's crucial source of important information. What's left lacks any suspense, and many scenes are even taken pretty much straight from Halloween. The fact that we never know who's killing everyone (they remain a pair of hands and a knife for the most part) destroys the point of the film. Even Tom Savini's gore effects are decidedly tame compared to his still impressive work on George A Romero's Dawn of the Dead a couple of years earlier.
Does anything save this film? Well, ironically the best thing about it also removes the remaining good reason to see it. The acting in this film is actually reasonably good. I've seen countless zero-budget horror flicks and for such an amateur film, the acting is believable and consistent. Only trouble is that none of the characters are developed at all, so you really couldn't care less whether they die or not.
This straight-faced acting actually removes the "so bad it's good" possibility from this film- even though it almost qualifies with perhaps the most unintentionally hilarious scene in movie history. We meet the generic superstitious old man (Ralph) at the beginning, but after he's done his customary "you'll all die" bit he re-appears later on. Apparently he walks twenty miles across country, into the camp without anyone noticing, and goes into a store cupboard, shutting himself in and standing in the darkness, waiting for someone to open it up so he can warn them again for all of five seconds before ambling off into the woods. Absolutely brilliant.
Sadly though, even Ralph doesn't make this film worth watching. If you want a genuinely scary no-budget horror flick set in the woods- then I give you The Evil Dead.