Friday The 13th (1980)

 

So, in keeping with the theme of old-school slashers (most of which have been remade, or updated since their original release), I bring you the thoroughly enjoyable, mildly scary, Friday the 13th, which helped shape the horror genre and also happened to spawn a bazillion sequels. Jason Voorhees is one of the classic horror villains, but I've never been afraid of him. I don't really get the fear factor with Jason at all, especially compared to, say, Michael Myers. I mean, he looks kind of silly with that hockey mask (although the machete is a good weapon), and he ambles after people like any old serial killer. He has no real zest to him, no real appetite for destruction. Yawn. However, I needn't have worried, because he only makes a fleeting appearance in this, the first movie in the long-running series. 

The events of the film take place around the iconic Camp Crystal Lake, an area so secluded and picturesque that one just knows some bad shit is going to go down once the lights are out (or possibly even before - the scariest things happen during the daylight, after all). Surprisingly, It opens with a fairly gruesome murder, from the first-person perspective of the killer (always a welcome addition to a slasher movie). As a first kill, it's fairly bloody - not too much, not too little. And the fact that it happens to unsuspecting, cutesy, horny teens, who are in the midst of a make-out session no less, does not bode well for the the rest of the characters. 

 

 Kind of a mannish pair of hands there...

On that note, I decided to play a little game while watching this, and count how many typical horror movie "bad signs" I noticed throughout the film. You know, the typical horror fare that's become stale and repetitive at this stage, but back in the '80s would've created genuine tension. For example; people having sex, the power going out, someone wandering out in the rain alone, a thunderstorm, the phone lines being dead, the last remaining people splitting up to investigate shit alone, hiding in stupid places with just one escape route - all of which happened within the course of Friday the 13th. That's not to say that it was boring or predictable, just that it played by the rules which, let's face it, were established by this film, and Halloween, and everything that came after (I'm just used to it all at this stage, sadly, but that doesn't mean it's not fun!). 

I guessed who the final girl was immediately, but was wrong (possibly for the first time ever). She was the first one to get a name, and she was so bright-eyed and adorable and unassuming that I just figured she was cliche enough to be it... And then, she died, after a fairly frightening forest chase scene (see above). Besides that unforunate chick, the other teens who are setting up Camp Crystal Lake for its' grand re-opening, after horrific murders years beforehand (the film's opening sequence takes place in 1958), are all attractive, energetic and fairly generic, i.e. perfect horror movie victims. They are warned on several occasions, by creepy Ralph (the town loon), that they are doomed and will not survive if they stay in the camp. But hey, who's going to listen to some crazy old dude, who's shouting in a bizarrely over-the-top Irish twang as he rides off slowly on his bicycle!? Not these kids. They're too busy fucking and drinking and playing Strip Monopoly - oo-er!  Besides, the camp is in a secluded area in the middle of nowhere, miles from the local town, which is filled with loveable, cliched, small town locals - what could possibly go wrong!?

 

 That top is bloody ruined now

The story, as such, is fairly simple. The teens are slaughtered one by one, at a fairly regular pace, by somebody whom we don't get to see until the very end of the film - simply catching glimpses of an arm here, a hand there, a foot there. It's an interesting method, one I haven't experienced in a while, and it did manage to creep me out quite a bit. Usually the killer is seen trailing behind or hiding somewhere, but rarely is just an illusion of he/she given, which just proves that what we imagine is nearly always more frightening than the reality. There are scenes in Friday the 13th that create true terror, despite very little happening - like when one girl is in the shower block and sees the curtain moving, or another ventures out into the rain when she hears a woman's voice screaming for help, only to end up under the floodlights on the archery range. Very little is explicitly done or said, which just makes it all the more tense.

However, the kills, when they are shown, are bloody and inventive. Kevin Bacon, in particular, dies in a fairly gruesome way. But he looks lost and confused up until that point, so it's not really a big deal (plus he'd just got laid, so at least he died happy). Bodies turn up at totally inopportune moments, causing me to jump out of my skin, which hasn't happened during a horror movie in a while - especially not at silly scares like corpses hanging off doors or being thrown through windows. But the tension is ratched up so effectively throughout that it's impossible to ever feel secure (the final girl can't even close the curtains in her cabin, for fuck's sake!). 

 

  She's still somebody's mother!

The killer's reveal at the end is quite odd. Since the movie came out thirty years ago, I have no problem discussing its relevance here. Just in case, like me, you were deprived of slasher movies for most of your life, look away now! Finding out that a middle-aged, fairly normal-looking woman, in a jumper no less, has been the knife-wielding maniac all along is disconcerting enough. When she begins talking to herself as her son (we all know who he is) and going on about horny teens being the reason he's dead, the tone changes significantly, even verging slightly on the ridiculous. But she's still scary. Quite scary, indeed. And I ended up gasping when she said the name "Jason", even though I knew it was coming. So perhaps Mrs. Voorhees should've been in Jason's shoes all along...though that would've been weird...and it would've changed the landscape of modern horror forever.

There are many fakeouts before she is eventually defeated, all of which kept me suitably on edge. Once again, it was impossible to ever feel secure or safe. One scene, in the pantry, is particularly cringe-inducing. The final girl, in fairness to her, manages to put up a bit of a fight, punching and kicking at Mrs. Voorhees with all she's got. The camp setting is just as disorientating for her as it is for the audience, and when the killer turns the power back on, so that it'll be near impossible for her to hide, a real sense of "Oh fuck!" washed over me. What seemed scary in the darkness suddenly seems terrifying in the light.

  No more dancing for you, Bacon

Put simply, when Friday the 13th works, it is very effective. The characters are just thin enough to be disposable, but fleshed out enough for the audience to give a shit about what happens to them. Mrs. Voorhees is just nice and normal enough for the final girl to trust her, before turning completely psychotic and being truly terrifying. The audience doesn't sympathise with her, but it's also difficult to completely hate her because her kid drowned in the lake due to negligent counsellors in that very camp. Still not really a reason to murder innocents, but whatever.

Since this is a slasher, the final girl manages to get away, and for some reason hops in a canoe and wades out into the middle of the lake. What follows is one of those jump scares that only really works if one doesn't know it's coming. I did, but I still freaked out. As far as I'm concerned, the movie should've ended there, on a high. Unfortunately, it rambles on for another five minutes, finally settling on an image of Crystal Lake, so that the audience is left in no doubt that a sequel is on its way. 

 Peekaboo!

Overall, Friday the 13th was great. I was scared, the story moved along at a decent pace, the kills were inventive, the killer was frightening, and I screamed a total of 6 times, which is quite a lot for somebody who watches this kinda shit on a regular basis. I shudder to think what Michael Bay has done to sex it up, but I await his efforts with a shrug.