Friday the 13th

A director of photography named Daniel C. Pearl is credited
immediately following a beheading in Friday the 13th. Either the
editor of this sequence is clueless about historical events and
Angelina Jolie movies, or he’s making an inappropriate joke.

But to get worked up about this revamping of the Friday the
13th franchise isn’t easy. It’s a simple movie with a simple aim: A
showcase for Jason’s ability to puncture different types of holes
through people’s heads. The unkillable killer turns into a wuss
whenever someone waves a picture of his mom in front of his face, which
isn’t really a wise move in the long run.

The newest Michael Bay-produced horror remake is directed by Marcus
Nispel, of the vile Texas Chainsaw Massacre ’03, and it’s as
visually slick as slasher movies get. But Nispel’s penchant for shiny
elegance is undone by the film’s caustic loudness. It doesn’t seek to
compensate for the original series’ low-rent charms with the chilling
forest-at-night atmosphere these movies have always been missing
(Part 2 came closest in this regard).

Sure, Jason knows how to work an audience with a well-timed kill,
the best involving puncturing the head of a girl hiding under a dock.
But the 27-year-old teenage characters are cardboard. Writers Damian
Shannon and Mark Swift (both of Freddy vs. Jason) throw in
academic dialogue references to Blue Velvet and Fast Times at
Ridgemont High, and subscribe to Kevin Smith’s theory that the way
to write a multi-layered black person is to have him spend the movie
complaining that white characters are stereotyping him.

There’s wit in a pre-title sequence lasting a third of the whole
film’s length. That prelude starts the movie with promising energy. But
Jason’s lack of menacing presence draws attention to the blandness of
his victims. Friday the 13th is fine for a while, but its
generic mechanics wear down until it’s just another movie about Gap
models waving flashlight beams.

For showtimes, see Movie Times. Can’t buy me
love at palermo@thecoast.ca.

This article appears in Feb 19-25, 2009.