Friday the 13th (2009 Remake Review)
Director: Marcus Nispel
Cast: Jared Padalecki, Danielle Panabaker, Amanda Righetti, Travis Van Winkle, Aaron Yoo, Derek Mears, Jonathan Sadowski, Julianna Guill
Paramount Pictures / Rated “R” for strong bloody violence, some graphic sexual content, language and drug material / 2.35:1 Widescreen / Dolby DTS / 97 minutes / Official Website
The Friday the 13th series of movies are a staple in the horror community since the original opened in 1980. There are 10 sequels plus a crossover with another horror series mainstay “Freddy Krueger” in Jason vs. Freddy. Now with this new re-imagining/update from Paramount Pictures/Platinum Dunes/New Line Cinema, the people who brought you the Texas Chainsaw Massacre retooling, this makes 12 movies in the series. The original series was panned by most critics but still was a cash cow for the respective makers making it the highest grossing horror series to date. Now, with the wait finally over, we delve into the already charted waters of Crystal Lake to see what lies in wait on the bottom…
A group of teens go camping in the woods near the rundown Camp Crystal Lake where some years before Mrs. Voorhees was beheaded by the only survivor of her murderous rampage of revenge after the counselors allowed her son Jason to drown. Now, while the group is off having sex, swilling beer and searching for – and finding – a HUGE marijuana patch, Jason is all grown up and looking for his own retribution for his mother’s death. After dispatching them one by one, he captures the last girl, Whitney, because she looks amazingly like a picture of his mother that is in a locket he still has. And we all know how much of a mama’s boy Jason is.
A couple of months go by until another group of young people head up to the same woods where one of them has a fancy cabin. While on their way, they run into Whitney’s brother who is passing out “Missing” fliers with her picture on them and asking around. He ends up at their cabin after going door-to-door everywhere else and hits it off with one of the hotties. It isn’t long before Jason comes on the scene and wields his trusty machete with righteous – yet emotionless – indignation. He again stalks the stupid, drunk, oversexed and high teens until the inevitable showdown with the two characters you picked at the beginning as the last couple standing.
I am over all of the hate for the rash of remakes in the last 5 years or so. Horror snobs are some of the worst – yet faithful – snobs you will ever find. And they don’t like their classics fucked with. Me? I was that way until I came to realize that they aren’t trying to replace my favorite madmen, they are merely updating or retelling the story for the new generations. So after seeing the Texas Chainsaw remake in the theater and hating it – the original is my all-time favorite movie – I saw it again on DVD and actually enjoyed the shit out of it. Michael Bay, as much as I want to hate him, knows how to make a loud, heart-pounding, slick horror movie and that’s what he did here with F13.
Sitting in the theater on this fine Friday the 13th, I was taken back to the ’80s when slasher flicks weren’t all serious and disturbing. They were fun, joke cracking, beer chugging, pot smoking, sex having, tit showing good times. The action, gore and good times rushed along in a fast moving, well paced action horror flick just screaming for its own sequel and thus, its own series of badass follow-ups. All of the actors and actresses were perfect in their roles, from the asshole rich boy to the ubiquitous sluts. I loved the cast as they cracked their one-liners and took their ass kickings from Jason like real pros.
The blood flowed, the violence was wall to wall and the naked boobs (topless wake boarding, anyone?) were more than perky and plentiful. I’m not going to tell you that the direction and writing were top-notch, but they were indeed competent enough to pull this off. The 50-75 people that were in the theater with me (at the 5:50pm showing) seemed to really dig it as well. The cheers from the crowd signaled almost every gore drenched kill. And the “laughs out loud” could be heard after nearly every sophomoric joke. I don’t care what the nay-sayers think, this was one hell of a good time and I’m already looking forward to the DVD and the sequels.
I’m still torn on how I feel about this. I’m going to see it a 2nd time with my girlfriend (first saw it with the guys on a midnight showing). My initial reaction was that it was in fact, pretty damn cool. However, I also thought that it should have been so much more (this is the biggest selling horror franchise after all). I also expected the kills to be more over the top, but they were sadly much more tame then the recent My Bloody Valentine 3D.
Great review! The more and more I read about this film the more excited I’m getting about it
I feel the same way you do about the remakes–I’m over it. They are aimed at the new generation of horror fans and that is fine.
I think you enjoyed this one more than me, which probably just goes to show that I’m more jaded and out of touch, I suppose. I didn’t go into it with high hopes, so I wasn’t let down or anything. The kill scenes were too dark and not gruesome enough for my taste. I did like the sleeping bag roast.
Both the remake of F13 and My Bloody Valentine have made me re-evaluate Hatchet–which I didn’t think was that great when it was released. Compared to those two remakes, it was way more fun, IMO.
Rev.,
The original F13 series wasn’t overtly gruesome either. A lot of the actual gore was implied. The violence however was pretty sweet. No one delivers a machete chop like Jason!
Great Review Greg!
I agree with the Phantom. This Friday is not for the gen x horror fans of old. Platinum Dunes doesn’t make movies for us. It’s for the tweens and millenials.
I really hated the movie. To see Jason do the things he was doing was un-Jason like.
To smart, to clever.
Ahh but boobies never change.