Review Tuesday: Friday the 13th (1980)

 

Friday

The 13th

When Camp Crystal Lake is about to re-open, strange things begin to happen all over again. 

Earlier this year, in August when we had a Friday the 13th, I suggested to Mrs Bax0jayz that we should make this original film in the franchise date night viewing. Personally, I like to revisit these old horror movies and see how they hold up with age. 

 

The movie starts off with the counselors descending on Camp Crystal Lake, NJ, from various other places. They have two weeks to finish getting the place in order for when the children start showing up. One back-packer gets a stern warning from a local loon who informs her that the camp has a death curse and she should stay away. That was some subtle fore-shadowing! She doesn't even make it to the grounds of the camp when some mysterious person murders her in the woods.    

Then we switch over the the camp. The owner leaves the counselors to take care of some chores while he heads to town for various jobs and supplies. Of course, by night time everything has already gone out of control. By the end of the film everyone is dead except for one counselor, Alice (played by Adrienne King). And does Jason really make an appearance of did she imagine it in her state of shock from the events of the night before?

 

The most important thing I took from revisiting this movie is that this isn't the slasher film everyone thinks of when they hear Friday The 13th. Truly, this movie reminded me more of PSYCHO than HALLOWEEN. You have a mentally unstable old woman, Mrs. Voorhees (played by Betsy Palmer) who thinks she's speaking with her son who tied tragically at this camp twenty two years earlier. Once you see her in action, you quickly realize she's the one responsible for all the terrible things that have happened at Camp Crystal Lake since her son, Jason, died there. This was all vengeance since the camp didn't properly supervise her special needs child. Therefore, all future camp counselors were guilty of the crimes of their predecessors. 

 

This is an old horror film. The effects aren't great. Acting isn't great. Most of the characters aren't even likeable. It does have a young Kevin Bacon in it, so that's fun to see. Other than that, it's fun to see how this legendary franchise got off the ground. It's not great, and doesn't really stand up to modern horror standards, but there is plenty of suspense developed until you finally get to see the murderer. There are also some oddly beautiful scenes that almost seem out of place in a gory film like this. 

 

Worthwhile to revisit. 

 

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