As a child of the 80’s, the Friday the 13th franchise is quite special to me. Most likely, the first time I ever saw a naked breast was in a Jason film. I became quite enchanted with the concept of summer camp: The sex. The drinking. The skinny dipping. Kevin Bacon. Not so much the machete-wielding psychopaths. Inspired by Halloween, director Sean S. Cunningham gave us the first of twelve Friday films, Freddy vs. Jason included. I am already starting to dread my trip back down this series of films because in comparison to the original, most of the latter sequels are complete garbage. This does not bode well as the first one is mediocre at best.
Don’t get me wrong, this film does what it is basically supposed to do; make you laugh, perhaps a bit uncomfortable, maybe even disturb you at times. However, considering its legacy and the genre it helped popularize, it is less sensational than the sensationalism. If this film had been released in say, the late 90′s or early 2000′s it would have been lost in a sea of run of the mill slasher films that most horror fans only see once, if at all. It simply does not have the aesthetic stab as a Halloween or Texas Chain Saw Massacre. Yet, it does have a charm, and that, coupled with instant nostalgia make for a pleasant viewing at any time.
So here we are at the beginning. Camp Crystal Lake is cursed. It has a death curse according to crazy Ralph, the town lunatic. In fact, the townspeople refer to it as Camp Blood. Charming, no? Basically, here are the events that led up to the camp being dubbed as such, not necessarily revealed to us in this order:
In 1957, a young boy named Jason Voorhees drowns in the lake, while the camp counselors that were supposed to be watching him were having sex. In 1958, two counselors are murdered after they leave a rousing campfire sing a long to have sex. There are some mysterious fires at the camp, and in 1962, during an attempted reopening, the water is found to be bad, so it never opens.
Back to present day (1979), and specifically, Friday the 13th. Steve Christy, the camp’s present owner, along with the help of some attractive, oversexed counselors are fixing up the camp so they can open it yet again. Annie, who is backpacking through town, comes across a diner. After failing to obtain directions to the camp from a dog outside, she wanders inside the diner and asks the patrons inside. They all give her the “what the fuck?” look and after one of them calls it Camp Blood, a man offers to drive her half way there (I assume this is either due to country hospitality, or his desire to see if she will live). During the drive, Annie tells the driver that she is going to be a counselor there, and his response is to give her the horrible legend of Crystal Lake. Apparently neither his story, a warning from crazy Ralph, or the disturbed looks on the diners’ faces will deter her. She will counsel some kids, goddammit.
Exposition now complete, we are introduced to the camp counselors: Ned, Jack (Kevin Bacon), Bill, Marcie, Brenda and Alice. They are call cool and rad and every other 80′s slang term for being hip, and love having a good time. Whether it be swimming, having sex, drinking or playing strip Monopoly, these kids are all about hedonism. As we watch them having incredibly boring conversations and meander around the campground doing equally as boring activities (even the sex was a bit mechanical), they start getting picked off, one by one, either off camera, or in Tom Savini awesomeness. This basically is the constant state of events until the film’s end.
Somewhere in the middle of this film, I realized I was wanting the kids to die. Not because they were bad people (they weren’t) or what they were supposed to represent to their dispatcher, but because they were insanely boring people stuck in long stretches of tensionless scenes. Yes, the only tension to be found is seconds before someone dies. There is never any build up. I could sort of see this tactic being used to simulate us, the viewer, also being hunted, but the constant use of the killer’s POV would negate that.
One thing to appreciate about this film is the lack of over the top character stereotypes. Unlike the later films, there is not 1 geek, 1 snobby girl, 1 hot guy that snobby girl likes but he cannot stand, a lone minority, etc. They were all just kids having a good time (you know, until say, an axe to the head). Also, while the acting was not terrible it was just good enough for us to believe how laid back, silly and sometimes clueless to their surroundings they all were.
The on-screen killings are pretty entertaining. You can see the beginnings of the outlandish deaths yet to come in the franchise. I am torn between two in this installment for my favorite. It’s a toss up between the completely out of nowhere spear through the neck or the straight up brutality of the axe to the face.
Friday the 13th is good in spite of itself. While it never goes below tolerable, I find that it is not the cinematic masterpiece most folk remember it to be. However, it has my adoration, and rightfully so. It sparked my love of horror and the franchise remains my favorite, and not just because Terry Kiser was in Part VII. The series doesn’t span nearly 3 decades for no reason.
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