The Spatterfest That Brainwashed America and Made 20 Million... (Friday The 13th [1980] (DVD))

Member Name: HorrorHef1

Product:	Friday The 13th [1980] (DVD)
Date:	30/07/01 (18 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Lots of Gore, Good Direction, um...

Disadvantages: Too Much Gore, The Script, Most of the Cast

FRIDAY THE 13TH
Starring: Betsy Palmer, Adrienne King, Harry Crosby, Kevin Bacon
Rated: R for strong violence/gore, sexuality/nudity, and language
(Age Appropriate: 15 and up)

Let me take you into the mind of the 1980 Paramount Pictures Manager to make you understand why this film was ever put out on screen. You might be interested to know the logical reasoning behind one of the most hilariously, bad films that ever came out of Hollywood...

[Little Man in BIG Hollywood dude's head] ok George, you ready George? We haven't had a hit in one god damn year, George...what we gonna do about it? You kno...remember that hit slasher movie HALLOWEEN? Ya George...the one with no gore, good actors, good script, hot sex and top notch director? Well George, this idea is gonna top that one...what if we had a movie just like that but LOTS AND LOTS OF GORE, no good actors, no good script, REEEAL steamy sex, and a good director that will take little money? yaaaaa...now we're thinking George...and how about it's at a summer camp with a big, nasty feminist mom killing kids? Wouldn't that be hilarious George? Huh? Wouldn't that be just repulsive and good...

And so it was!! Old George of Paramount made this low budget, disgusting horror film that, like HALLOWEEN, was ruined by the sequelizations and immatations of it...I wouldn't be jumping to grab this one at the video store if I were you...Those that can't handle gore might want to walk right on past this one...However, for the others? Try giving this a chance...You may be surprised at how much you like it. Sean S. Cunningham (the director) works up plenty of chills and suspense with his slick direction style (which is much similar to John Carpenter's in HALLOWEEN). Excluding the direction, there's not much else that you can appreciate. The script is poor and the actors (particularly Adrienne King) are hilariously bad formed. Nonetheless, this is stylish
snappy and will have you guessing and jumping right up to the end. The murder sequences and make up effects are phenomanol...Don't diss effects in 1980's horror movies until you see this one...

The plot is extremely easy to follow...A summer camp nick named "Camp Blood" is re-opening and not too many people are happy about it. Before it opens, Steve Christie (unknown actor) hires 7 counselors to clean up the place...However, his choice of teenagers wasn't too smart-these teenagers are pot smoking, horny, evil-minded adolescents. Every one of them is guilty for one of the horror crimes including the survivor (s) of the film...And because of these guilty crimes (and a rainstorm that isolates the camp), they will have to be killed one by one by one by an unseen killer. So begins the mystery and terror of this perverted horror film...

As you can tell I haven't completely made up my mind with my final opinion. It has it's redeeming qualities and it's bad qualities so for the sake of argument let's just call it ok...Letter Grade: C+

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