FRIDAY THE 13TH PART 5: A NEW BEGINNING

Last October I covered the "Friday the 13th" films leading up to the first time the series was announced to officially end "The Final Chapter". It would've made a great finale to the franchise, except that there are 7 films left (not counting the remake) for me to cover. In all honesty, even though the previous film looked like the official end to Jason, there were still signs that the series was going to carry on without him after seeing Corey Feldman go insane at the end. This ambiguous ending led the series to the appropriately titled sequel released the following year...

Taking place 5 years after when Tommy Jarvis killed Jason, Tommy (John Shepherd) still traumatized by his encounter is transferred from the state mental institution to a halfway house to rehabilitate him back to normal (what exactly happened to his sister, no clue). Not long after his arrival, a teenager with anger issues living at the facility kills one of the teens that annoyed him, who is then quickly taken under custody by the authorities. The killing doesn't stop when visitors and locals by the place where Tommy is staying are being murdered by an unknown killer, who eventually starts murdering the teenagers living at the half-way house.

Now that Jason has been officially killed-off in the last movie (for now), the series decided to go back to its roots by having the killer be unknown until the climax. Without giving away who it is, the reveal of who the murderer is is silly, disappointing, and senseless. The worst part is the film attempts to create characters who you would suspect to be behind this, as some of the characters would develop theories that Jason may have risen from the grave. But from the moment I saw a character react to a situation in a certain way, I knew that this person was going to be the killer for how lacking any subtly the scene was supposed to have.

The film was originally going to have Corey Feldman be the star of the film, but after already being committed to the classic 80s kids film "The Goonies", he only had a limited time amount of time to be in the film. This of course led to the film's script being rewritten by containing similar features that was originally going to be used for the plot for Part III (mainly the last survivor being sent away for treatment). Feldman's presence was reduced to a cameo instead of the starring role, who is obviously not committed to being frightened by Jason when you compare his performance to the last movie. John Shepherd as an older Tommy Jarvis gives the exact opposite performance that Feldman gives and truthfully just about every cast member in the entire film. Despite looking too old to be a teen and semi resembling the "they're eating her" guy from "Trolls 2", he still looks like a grown-up version of Corey Feldman's character. Watching him suffer through the film psychologically is some of the best acting that the series has to offer which is incredibly rare! In most of these films when characters act scared or tormented, they usually come across as hokey. With Shepherd's performance, you don't get that. He says very few words and yet his actions and reactions says everything. When his memories of Jason come to haunt his recollection to the point where he sees visions of him, he's terrified out of his mind and insanely frustrated that he can't forget about his encounter with him fearing that he one day he may become a murderer like Jason after murdering him himself. And after being pranked or pushed around by a teenager it pushes him over the edge causing him to coldly lash out violently and running away in fear of what he could've done if he wasn't stopped. The battles that he has with himself are always present. They are illustrated effectively through Shepherd's emotionally gripping performance of a person who's near the end of his rope making you believe that this is a man who needs some serious help, most likely because Shepherd volunteered at a state mental hospital in order for him to study the behaviors of the mentally ill.

 

The psychology of Tommy is utterly fascinating to the point where it's emotionally chilling, but the film is more focused on the supporting characters and how to kill them off. None of the characters is given the same kind of depth as Tommy does. They are all very simplified for how many characters the writers are trying to push-in for the unknown murderer to kill where they come across as stereotypes or living cartoon characters. As much of a waste, it is to have Tommy's struggles be overshadowed by characters who have little importance to the story, this is by far the most entertaining cast of characters that I've ever witnessed in any of these films. Usually, these movies would have one or two characters who are either intriguing or fun to watch, as the rest of them are bland and forgettable. The characters in this film all standout for how over the top they are, who should be annoying but are laughably goofy. There's way too many characters for me to talk about but some of the best include the chocolate loving Joey (Dominick Brascia); the foul mouthed nasty next door neighbor Ethel (Carol Locatell) and her childish motorcycle riding son Junior (Ron Sloan); the punk robotic dancing teen Violet (Tiffany Helm); the two greasers Pete (Corey Parker) and Vinnie (Anthony Barrile); the perverted coke addicted nurse Billy (Bob DeSimone); the angry Mayor Cobb (Ric Mancini) and so on. The irony is half of the characters are so abnormal that the teens at the halfway house are sane when compared to the characters outside. There's only one or two characters (not counting Tommy) who look like they have a purpose to be there, as the rest seem like they could function fine with society for how minor their problems are played out. There are indeed characters who don't stand-out as much when compared to others or just as uninteresting bland as many of the other characters in the franchise like Robin (Juliette Cummins) who seems to have no reason to be at the half-way house; the cops; some random guy in the woods who just shows-up (easily the most pointless character in the film); and one of the directors of the facility Pam (Melanie Kinnaman). The best character in the supporting cast definitely goes to Demon (Miguel A. Núñez Jr) a punk who looks like a wanna-be 80s pop star than he does an intimidating hoodlum, who lives inside a van with his girl smoking weed and eating enchiladas. His flamboyant personality is a lot of fun for how it doesn't fit his tough guy approach, but it's his short-lived relationship with his little brother Reggie (Shavar Ross) that gives a little more personality than the one trait given to the others. There's a sense that the two genuinely love hanging out with each other, and as much as Demon loves being a "bad boy", he's very protective of his brother by trying to keep him away from mischief. It would have been nice to have more scenes of these two together.

The crazy thing about some of these characters are that they are killed off immediately after they are introduced, and given how many characters are in the film that would mean the body count would be extremely high, which certainly is. It's the highest that the series has ever been by far. But if you're expecting to be amazed and shocked by the murders like in the previous film, you're going to be disappointed! The MPAA have once again demanded the film to be heavily cut due to its grotesque violence and hardcore sex, consequently causing the film to be re-edited multiple times to be granted an R rating as opposed to an X rating, and the film suffers greatly for it. There are some highlights like a pov shot of a character getting a meat-clever to the face as blood trickles down from the screen; a teen getting his eyes crushed by a belt (even though the directions for when the killer is tightening it keeps changing); and a girl getting her eyes clipped by hedge-clippers, a kill that we don't see but is still effective from the sound effect, pov shot, and the blood we do see (a lot of the best kills in this film involves eyes doesn't it?). Some of the dead bodies shown after the kills look very gruesome as well. And out of all deaths, the highlight is the first real murder that happens in the film for how unexpected and silly the reason for it is, making it the first time a person who isn't from the Voorhees family has cold-bloodily murdered an innocent. But aside from those moments, the deaths are very tamed, anti-climactic, and hokey (and most of the cheapness to these deaths don't usually fall under the "They're so Fake it’s funny" category like in some of the other films). You can definitely tell that a lot of material was cut for how less of an impact most of these killings feel, and most of the little gore do we look like the kind of gore you would buy from "Party City". It's just as bad as the editing and effects for the second film. Also, keep in mind that in spite of having such a large body count, some of the deaths happen off-screen, which are only evidenced of them happening by seeing their remains. The atmosphere surrounding the film doesn't make-up for these restrained deaths either for how average everything looks and appears, as well as predictable from how most of the scares and scenes play-out (the fake-out at the ending being the most obvious for how wholesomely corny the scene starts out). The only scenes that director Danny Steinmann knows how to exploit even with the MPAA making him cutting most of the footage out are the scenes involving sex and nudity. This is easily more perverted and sleazier than any of the films that came before it for how Steinmann likes to have girls randomly show their breasts to the camera, and show as much sex possible when two teens are getting it down in the woods. But I guess that's expected when you hire a director who directed porn earlier in his career.

OVERALL THOUGHTS

Many fans consider this film to be one of the worst in the series, if not thee worst, and their reasons for feeling that way are legitimate. The reveal of who the killer is obvious and disappointing. The death scenes after coming-off the heels one of the most gruesome films in the series are lacking due to the violence being heavily censored. And putting Tommy's struggles with his insanity to the side just to show water-down killings is a missed opportunity. However, much like how I found Part 2 to be overrated, I find this film to get too much of a bum rep. I'm not saying it's one of the best of the series, it certainly isn't. But when comparing it to a sequel that gets way too much love from fans despite having some of the same problems that this film has (The MPAA interfering with the violence, the predictable formula, and the confusing motives from the killer) this film has more hits. The killer is way more threatening than Jason was in the 2nd installment; the supporting characters though aren't anywhere near as natural as the characters in the second film were, are definitely more memorable and entertaining for how joyfully loony they are; and the psychology with Tommy is more fascinating than how Part 2 touched upon Jason's psyche, let alone having a better lead and an actor who gives an intense performance. It's a disappointing follow-up no doubt, but when ranking these films based on the previous films, it's not the bottom of the barrel, that I'm afraid goes to the second film regardless of its importance for being the film to make Jason the killer.