31 Flavors of Horror #13: Friday the 13th, Part 5: A New Beginning

I had no choice but to feature a Friday the 13th title for the 13th entry of 31 Flavors of Horror... unfortunately I shoulda timed things out better so it wouldn't be one of the really bad ones. This is as opposed to the others, who're just "the bad ones." This was not the best of my "dates" with Jason. It's like he wasn't even there... 

I found it best to pass the time with this one by coming up with nicknames for characters... 

...and napping.

31 Flavors of Horror #13
Friday the 13th, Part V: A New Beginning  

Another Friday, another night in with Jason. In this, part five, things start to get a little unusual, as it's the "whodunnit" of the Friday movies. This one opens up with a bang. We're immediately stomping around in the stormy woods, in impossibly heavy rain. Corey Feldman is back, in a raincoat visiting the annoyingly well-tended grave of serial killer Jason. He arrives just ahead of a few profoundly stupid men, egging each other to dig faster into the grave in what sure seems like their sublimation of their attraction to one another.

Anyhow, int he well-lit woods, during this typhoon rain, the two dumb-asses open the casket and get killed by the worm-riddled Jason. It was probably irresponsible of whoever buried him to throw the machete in there. I mean, clearly they didn't read the script. Jason then stalks after terrified little Tommy and brings the machete smack down on him... but it was all a dream. Stupid cop-out.

Tommy wakes up as a different actor who looks nothing like him, who could be anywhere from 6 to 15 years older. Evidently he also wakes up a whack-a-doo, as he's a van labeled for the loony bin.

(Lots of spoilers ahead)

31 Flavors of Horror #11: Friday the 13th, Part 4: The Final Chapter

Number 11 in my 31 Flavors of Horror series, and it's another night out with my main-machete-man, Jason Voorhees. I fear Significant Other will start to get jealous, but then I just picture Jason getting run over with a Volvo and I know my home life will be just fine. Tomorrow, we're taking a break, but since Thursday is the 13th of the month, you can probably guess what's coming then...

31 Flavors of Horror #11:
Friday the 13th, Part IV: The Final Chapter 


Oh, my gosh, it's like I'm in some sort of masochistic relationship ("He hit me with a machete and it felt like a kiss") and I'm back for part IV, or "4" if you're not a Classical Roman.

We kick off with a zippy montage that mixes footage from the first three to get you up to speed, not that much homework is required to know what's going on. We then pick up at the scene of the last film, with police bagging axes and taking away bodies. "He got seven kids and three bikers," so, perhaps sadly, Dana Kimmell lives to bore another day.

An antsy ambulance crew takes Jason to the morgue where we meet my favorite movie type, the sloppily-eating coroner! The staff here is as randy as Haddonfield General's, and we all know that it's the proximity of mediocre sexual activity that provokes Jason. I'm not sure what channel ran soft-core aerobics, but that's what the horny coroner's watching when he gets a saw to the neck. Jason guts his sexy nurse friend, and we jump to the jiggly mom and daughter Jarvis jogging in the woods.

This is where we meet our real star, Corey Feldman, as Tommy Jarvis, the video-game and movie make-up obsessed stand-out of the series. His story kinda mirrors Jason's by the end of things. His life will be ruined by horny teens calling up the murder of his mother in the woods beside Crystal Lake (the movie came out in 1984, so I don't care about spoilers).

(Lots of spoilers ahead) 

31 Flavors of Horror #10: Friday the 13th, Part 3 in 3-D

Day 10 of the 31 Flavors of Horror - 1/3rd of the way to Halloween, and we have... yet another sequel. Well, in my defense, I was given a three pack and then, as you'll see soon, I got a bit carried away since. I happen to be a bit of a compulsive when it comes to sequels. If I see one, I feel I should see 'em all. In sequence. So, four Resident Evils last week and now we're on our third Friday the 13th... sensing a trend yet? I am. Don't worry, they won't ALL be sequels... just a fair bunch of them will.

I also like to pretend that watching the movies are like little "dates" I'm going on with my main-machete-man, Jason Voorhees. I adore him so. The strong, silent, rotty type...

Don't like it? Pick 31 for me to watch and review for next year. (Gee, I hope I don't regret saying that...) 

Bonus: I stumbled across this terrific blog from 2009 featuring 3D images from the movie. This whole blog is worth checking out.

31 Flavors of Horror #10
Friday the 13th, Part 3 in 3-D

Date number three with Friday the 13th should be the big one. Third dates are traditionally where the fireworks go off, right?

As Part 3 opens, we go straight from Ginny from number 2 to one really annoying local couple. Billowing 3D laundry isn't the most exciting way to start a horror movie, but seeing the low-rent blowsy Sandy Dennis wannabe get it for whining at hubby Harold is worth it. They're really such a cartoonish and awful couple that it's practically a delight to finally watch them die (especially after we have to join him on the john before he does). As they're locals and not related to the camp, one can only assume he kills them because they're awful people.

Then, sadly, you meet Kris, Dana Kimmell, and learn they'd be a much better pair of leads. Kris is a sex negative stiff who immediately mentions something ominous happened to her a long time ago at the lake. Plot exposition also introduces us to the obnoxious jokester Shelly ("would you be yourself, if you looked like this?") the walking fat joke, 4 sex-hungry teens, Kris, and a pair of stoners who could out-toke Cheech and Chong head off to a vacation on Crystal Lake at her family farm.

(Lots of spoilers ahead) 

31 Flavors of Horror #9: Friday the 13th, Part 2

Another day, another taste of the 31 Flavors of Horror. Most of the genre's success is owed to horror movies. In fact, most of Paramount's fortunes during the 1980's is built on the cash brought in by Jason Voorhees and his lovely mother. Both of those things mean that sequels are unavoidable in general, and this month in particular. So, settle in... over the next few weeks I'm going on several excursions with my main-machete-man, Jason.

(Significant Other isn't worried about this assignation, having self-esteem healthy enough to not be threatened by a zombie-slasher with bad social skills from the movies.)

31 Flavors of Horror #9:
Friday the 13th, Part 2


Why am I trudging through the Friday the 13th movies again? I haven't seen them since my teens, and they are at heart movies directed at teens. My teens were a while back, so it seems I'm choosing to revisit the series as a supposed grow-up out of some need to re-embrace the fun distractions of my youth. Can it really be juvenilia if you never give them up, these comic books and horror movies? I like to think my embracing them to this day means I was a prodigy with advanced interests for my youthful years.

Part II opens with Alice (Adrienne King), the "final girl" from the first film, and her ever expanding mushroom-hairdo in her fern-filled, badly decorated apartment. Seems Jason, the dead kid from the first movie is not only (retconned into being) alive, but has bothered to drag his rotting ass out of the forest and over to Alice's clutter-filled home. He even considerately brings his mother's head along with him. I kinda picture him carrying it around in a bowling bag. Alice gets one final shower, crank phone-call, and "spring-loaded cat" in before (sadly, I think) getting her loose end tied up. It may be just as well as the apartment made it look like she was turning into both a bad artist and a hoarder.

(Lots of spoilers ahead) 

31 Flavors of Horror #7: Friday the 13th (Uncut) (1980)

Many horror review bloggers - as opposed to those of us dilettantes who just fancy ourselves to be - are probably more original than I and not using the first Friday in October as an excuse to post a Friday the 13th review. I, however, am shameless and have absolutely no problem with it whatsoever. What can I say? I throw myself on the mercy of the court! 

There's not much you haven't heard about this one, so I really just pinged out a few thoughts here about the cast. In the event that you haven't seen it... and if you're enough of a horror movie fan to bother to read even this far I'm going to assume you have... but if you haven't, check it out. Since this was made before most of the "slasher rules" were set it almost plays out like a very gruesome version of Ten Little Indians. Check it out -- the original is still the best!

31 FLAVORS OF HORROR #7:
FRIDAY THE 13th (UNCUT) (1980)

Here's what I never noticed before about Friday the 13th - just how dingy, drafty, damp and moldy that damn camp looks. Camp really does look like a miserable, cold place; full of dry-rotted wood and mud everywhere you look. It also seems to be a place so devoid of creature comforts that the killer shouldn't be blaming the counselors for shacking up. They're just trying to stay warm and stave off the boredom.

Anyhow, this hoary old chestnut, the one that started it all, has been reviewed to death. I'm not sure I'd have any new observations about it, even with this remastered, uncut version, but watching the DVD goosed up on a Blu-Ray player through an HDMI cable really brings the chill home. The sound of rain is constant once it gets started. The arrows through throats and axes to faces look darn good, too. This was the first time in years I'd watched it, and this uncut version does deliver a few extra (nice-looking) pumps of blood.

And *why* didn't Laurie Bartram have a film career? She's a strutting, sassing junior Paula Prentiss, gorgeous and personable. By far, she shows the most personality of any of the neophyte actors, including Kevin Bacon.

Adrienne King, who only recently returned to film acting after years of being harassed by a stalker, seems strongest in the scenes where she's alone or with Betsy Palmer. With the other counselors she tends to blend in, though that actually works for the mousy character and to give you the sense that maybe there just might be a question about who survives.

(Spoilers ahead) 

31 Flavors of Horror #6: Resident Evil: Afterlife

 I know what you're thinking:

"Another one?" "Four in a row?" "Tedious, Jay. Tedious..." 

Well, for whatever it's worth, if you're going to watch them - and why not, they're fun - you may as well see 'em all, and see 'em in sequence.


This one adds a couple of pretty boys to the line up of pretty, slender gals who kick zombie butts, and was released in 3D... so there's that... anyhow, I promise I'll split up full-series reviews in the future, mmmkay?

31 FLAVORS OF HORROR #6:
RESIDENT EVIL: AFTERLIFE

Paul W.S. Anderson returns to bring the style over substance for the 4th Resident Evil. Right from the get go he brings green-glass candy lit city buildings and fashion victims standing in the Tokyo rain.

I'm not sure about the "Four Years Later" title we get as, at one point in movie three it's stated it's been five, but no matter. Not important. No need for logic here considering our story is set in the largest, most impossibly impractical underground Hive yet. It'd be easier to just build it and slip in in sideways under Tokyo than drill this puppy out

Let's get to the important stuff? How's are Alice. This go round she's sleek and sexy, clad in black leather and all Ninja-style. Her balletic, slo-mo slash-fest of an introduction is worth watching twice. This time Alice is also an army of clones. She's her own comic-book style sexy Suicide Squad and it's a pleasure to behold. The CGI is impeccable this go round and bullet-time has thankfully been given enough of a rest that it seems fresh again.

The special effects fest really is gorgeous - an opening that sets up the rules, then breaks them, returning Alice-Prime to her humanity, eliminating much of the Umbrella Corporation, and then taking us to the survivors of Arcadia. White the third film's desert parched look pleased the eye, this installment adds color and the softness of nature in places. It also let's Jovovich play something a little closer to a human being again, though she's still primarily an ass-kicker.

(Lots of spoilers ahead) 

31 Flavors of Horror #5: Resident Evil: Extinction

 Another bloody video game zombie movie with waify chicks who kick ass in combat. It's a thing. I kinda love it. This one, like the rest, won't make you want to adopt a Rottweiler, nor will it make you want to visit Las Vegas. 

It will, however, make you hope you're a gorgeous, genetically-engineered model-slash-actress-super-ninja in the event that there ever IS a zombie apocalypse. Because, let's face it... I wrote this and you're reading this, meaning, my darlings, the chances that we are BOTH first-line cannon fodder in the event up an uprising of the undead are probably pretty stinkin' high...

31 FLAVORS OF HORROR #5:
RESIDENT EVIL: EXTINCTION

The first thing you notice is that, like all of us, Milla Jovovich's face has changed over the years since the first Resident Evil (2002). It seems leaner, longer. It suits her well.  The second thing you notice is they re-framed a shot from the first film to excise her nipple from the proceedings...

We roll through a quick rehash of some footage from the first film so we can get to the third point. The third? Eww, there's a whole bunch of dead Alices and a slew of parched, dessicated zombies in the middle of the desert. Is that what happens when you eat the silica gel packs in shoe boxes? They even take a piece of footage from the last film, the CG satellite shot, and re-dress it for a parched Earth. I appreciate the frugality.

At this point in the storyline - and I've no idea if it echoes the video games - the very Earth is dying, and Alice roams the vast, parched wastelands looking for survivors. The sleek steel of the first film and jittery city grime of the second are replaced here with sun-bleached, parched lands of the American west. The red dress swapped out for a long duster. The sweaty browns remind one of the look of another grim third film, Alien 3. The first gang she encounters are a family of survivors in the Sawney Bean tradition of scavengers. Sadly, at this point, Alice's humanity has morphed into something along the lines of a "super-soldier" (her acrobatic ninja skills now supplemented with telekinetic skills) and she makes short work of them and their devil-dogs. Seriously, they devil-dogs are MORE than a little overplayed at this point - though the devil-ravens are beautifully cinematic touch.

(Lots of spoilers ahead) 

31 Flavors of Horror #4: Resident Evil: Apocalypse

This big month of horror flick reviews carries on with another in the Resident Evil series. While I didn't have that much I wanted to say about the first flick, I get a little more in-depth here... along with some sidetracking about outfits and the evils of smoking... but sidetracks are about par for me, so I just go with it.

31 FLAVORS OF HORROR #4
RESIDENT EVIL: APOCALYPSE 

Number two in a possibly endless series of Milla Jovovich movies where she kicks zombie butts, Apocalypse picks up right where the first one leaves off. This time, instead of letting us in with no knowledge like the amnesiac Alice, we pick up multiple plot threads with Dr. Ashford and Jill Valentine: a cop in a tube top who shoots four people, albeit zombies, in the head prior to our seeing her face. We also expand the setting from the underground "Hive" to a walled-off Raccoon City.

The story is so opened up, in fact, it feels less like a continuation of the first film than a character from it shoe-horned into a new, different zombie movie. They also sacrificed the crisp, clean aesthetic of the first film for a muddier, less focused look here. However, before long, and faithful to the video game roots, we've established a game board of locations, a set of loosely-drawn characters, and some goals - though nothing headier than "find the girl" and "get out." There's a reporter, a pimp, a child, some evil scientists and a bunch of cops. No one gets much in the way of personality, but it's not important.

(Lots of spoilers ahead)