Friday the 13th (2009)

James Berardinelli started his review out by saying, “Sometimes I wonder if there's a point to reviewing something like this. Then again, if I shared my thoughts about Sex and the City, why not Friday the 13th?” Let’s start off by saying this: If all you’re looking for is nudity, blood and gore, this film gets that all over. None of the murderers are really new, but they are a handful, and why bother being tricky when axes, machetes, knives and pointed sticks will be the right way to do it?

Berardinelli admitted, “Call me a rebel, but I ask a little more from my horror movies. Much as I enjoy the crimson tide of copious bloodlettings, I like the film to work on another, slightly higher level.” The best horror films come from a level of almost intolerable tension. There’s none of that here. At the least, tension is needed to a point of character identification, and it’s silly to debate that anyone in this movie could be considered a “character.” They’re just pawns put up to be killed. The story doesn’t make complete sense, but that goes with how it was made. No more are filmmakers taking their time and effort on a horror movie screenplay are no one seems to care.

Calling “Friday the 13^th” as a 2009 remake is wrong, even though that’s how it was called. It’s more of a combination of the first three movies. The movie tells us at the beginning that what transpired in the original 1980 movie is actually the backstory. From there, it starts going in a new direction, mainly having the events of this movie go through what happened in parts two and three. Berardinelli mentioned, “There are echoes of those movies here, but we're not in strict remake territory. This Friday the 13th is to the series as H20 is to the Michael Myers saga.” The older events and characters stay but the later, juvenile ones are taken out so things can get a fresh start. Not that they’re being replaced by anything that can be an improvement.

“Friday the 13^th” starts off great – a high-energy backstory that puts the places in order before the long opening title sequence. Berardinelli said, “Had the rest of the movie followed suit, I'd be recommending it to more than nudity-and-gore lovers.” Sadly, the main story is a mess, with every cliché right where it’s needed, the character doing the ridiculous things you can call on from fans of horror movies, and no suspense at all about who’s got a chance to survive to the ending. The narrative part is extremely uneven, but that’s probably not what long time fans of “Friday the 13^th” series will see (or care about).

The time around, our characters to be slaughtered are a group of college graduates who have driven up to a summer home built at the end of Crystal Lake, not that far from the well-known “Camp Blood.” (Paying tribute to the original, the location is still in Sussex County, New Jersey. However, unlike the original, it wasn’t actually filmed there.) The seven vacationers are Trent (Travis Van Winkle), the generic bully who screams like a girl, his girlfriend, Jenna (the hot Danielle Panabaker, currently starring as Caitlin Snow/Killer Frost on CW’s “The Flash”), Bree (Julianna Guill) and Chelsea (Willa Ford), the hot girls who you know will get naked, Lawrence (Arlen Escarpeta), the token black character, Chewie (Aaron Yoo), the token Asian, and the completely forgettable Nolan (Ryan Hansen). Also amongst the group are Whitney (Amanda Righetti), who is held hostage by main villain Jason Voorhees (Derek Mears), and her brother, Clay (Jared Padalecki), who is searching Crystal Lake for her. It’s superfluous to discuss any of the plot since it copies most of the slasher films ever made.

Berardinelli said, “The blood, intercourse, profanity, and nudity are more extreme here than in the 1980 movie, but I suppose that's progress.” The thing that’s really bad about this remake of “Friday the 13^th” is how little effort went into this film. Berardinelli said, “The original may be a landmark on the cinematic landscape in terms of its importance to the genre, but it was not a great motion picture.” There was a chance here to take the main idea and do something innovative with it. For about 15 minutes, it looked like it was happening. After that, we get something that’s more lifeless, more pointless, and less enjoyable than anything in the original. Berardinelli mentioned, “Remake, reboot, re-envisioning - whatever you call it, it amounts to the same thing: a cynical money grab. This movie exists for the same reason that Rob Zombie's Halloween travesty was made - because the studios behind the projects won't give up until every last cent is bled out of the titles and they survive only as punch lines to bad jokes.” This is the twelfth movie with Jason Voorhees, Camp Crystal Lake, and/or any mixture of the two. Do we really want a thirteenth? There is actually talk about it, and it was supposed to come out this year, but because of director issues, it has been pushed back. This is basically what director Marcus Nispel and co-producers Sean S. Cunningham and Michael Bay have given us, especially with this one invisible.

I actually made the mistake of seeing this one first before I went back and saw the previous 10. I regret doing it, but seeing this one before the original, I still thought it was bad. I don’t think it’s as bad as “Jason X” but it’s worse than “Jason Takes Manhattan,” if you can believe that. Just do yourself a favor and never watch this one, especially if you liked the original. This is one of the worst horror remakes I have ever seen.

Wow, does it feel better to finally get that one out of the way. We have now come to the end of “Friday the 13^th-a-thon,” it has been a long time coming. I know there is one that I skipped over, but just wait for that. There's something I need to do before I review that one, so just hold on, that review is coming. Stay tuned later today when I review a classic movie that everyone should check out around the Halloween time.