Friday the 13th Shines Again

I love scary movies. I love movie in general but scary ones especially. But I am not sure why I love them. Maybe it is because I can be ten minutes into the film and know the characters, which ones will die, which ones are the bad guys, and where this entire film is headed. They are just predictable. They are cliche and corny and I love every single one. I actually like the ones that are more corny than the next. Like when a girl is running from a bad guy and she runs into a house, up the stairs, and into the bathroom. I mean, what in the hell makes you think that you can hide from a monster when you are cowering in the corner of the shower?

So this leads me to the article that we are speaking about today. I was at the movies this past week, as you have read, and there was a preview that caught my eye. It started with a bunch of teenagers (being played by twenty something individuals) all going to the woods for a week long camping trip. I was not ten seconds into this and I knew it was a Friday the 13th movie. They were in Cam Crystal Lake and they were relaxing, sharing stories by the camp fire. When all of a sudden pitch forks, knives, and chainsaws come a blazing.

But this sort of makes me mad. I mean, how many times can Jason die? He died in the first one. He died in the second one. Hell, he died in the fifteenth one. Does anyone know how many of those there actually are? This includes the ones where Jason and Freddy were together. Bonus points if someone can list every single one, the release date, and the individual who played Jason.

They just keep coming back. Every few years there is a new version, with a scarier mask, new ways to kill people, and a more frightening story. But they are never truly scary. I honestly can say that I have never been to a scary movie, or watched one on TV that actually scared me. I always know what’s coming. And so do you.

Now, do not get me wrong. I do jump and get startled from time to time. But I am never leaving the theater saying, “Oh my goodness we can not go into the woods any more.” Scary movies are just meant to be conry and cliche.

But I think there is a reason for this. You could make a scary movie if you made it a little longer and a tad more in depth. Put me in a real character. Show me the thought processes. Show me the depth of the person and their feelings and their emotions and their intentions. Then show me the true crimes. Show me the killings. Base them on true stories. Base them on characters that we can relate to. Don’t base them on characters that drown, are blown up, and burnt alive that just keep coming back and back and back to kill yet again.

I will say that this new Friday the 13th looks pretty interesting. They are getting to the point where the blood looks real. Where the kills look believable and you can actually sense that these people were decapitated and blown to bits right there in front of you. But nothing will make me feel that it is real unless its in 3D. Show me some 3D Jason and some blood shooting on my shirt and then we will talk.