Starring: Amy Steele, John Furey, Adrienne King, Kirsten Baker, Stu Charno, Warrington Gillette, Betsy Palmer.
Director: Steve Miner.
Friday The 13th Part Two opens with a recap of the original film, told through a nightmare occurring in poor Alice's traumatized mind...it's basically a chopped up recount of the third act, with some of the better made-up corpses and physical bits showcased. It's not a bad way to start the proceedings: I've always liked seeing what happens to survivors following horror films, even if it is just to see them get summarily killed off.
In this case, it's fitting that Alice be Jason's first kill(assuming that he hadn't bumped a few people off beforehand, which is certainly possible). Out with the old, in with the new and such. I love a good cat scare, I really do. They're so silly. But Alice's whole death scene is actually well done: there's a lot of fake-outs(like her opening the shower curtain and looking directly into the camera), playing into our expectations as an audience. Then there's a head in the fridge because, well, that's just rad.
Then we're with our new group of mostly interchangable characters, except for Ralph who is back to once again tell everybody they're going to die (he's totally right, but he's a weird drunk so...moral of the story: when drunken lunatic tells you death is certain, you should totally turn around and go the other way).
I've always liked Amy Steele, in the few movies I've seen her in anyway. Loved her in April Fools Day. She's tough but still good looking, highly rational and serious. I wish she had gone on to have a bigger career, not that there's anything wrong with the career she had.
I wonder how many times the "ghost story where the guy jumps out and screams stuff" thing has been done in horror flicks...but kids in slasher pics have always loved to tempt fate in that way, so...it's a thing. Anyway, it provides more exposition in a non-intrusive way, so it's pretty effective.
NO!!!! RALPH!!! I guess that was inevitable.
Paul is kind of a neat enough character. His response to the Police Officer is pretty entertaining. When the cop tries to tell him how to do his job, he kinda acts like a dick...it's actually a pretty endearing moment. Paul might be a cool guy, and a cool boss. The cop then chases Jason to a shack and gets himself killed.
There really isn't much going on in this movie. Even compared to the first one it seems particularly exploitive. Come to think of it, there wasn't an extraordinary amount of nudity in the first one...it doesn't take long for a girl to go skinny dipping(while searching for her dog, apparently), not that she really needed to do that (her shirt is...well, it's not a shirt, really). A boy plays a prank on her, gets himself strung up and is killed. She comes back, screams and we cut to seventies rock at a club.
I think my favorite part of the movie is Ginny making a rather rational and intelligent analysis of the Jason "legend" and subsequent psychoanalysis of Jason's personality...and then Paul says "You're drunk" and the giggly ginger kid laughs. It's a nice scene.
Out of all of the random kids featured in this movie, I think my favorites are the guy in the wheelchair (who seems like a pretty good guy all around) and the girl who aggressively seduces him. They're a charming pair, who are quickly bumped off. Sandra, the girl in question, might actually have one of the more visually interesting deaths: Jason pops out of the bed wearing a bag over his head (never forget the potato sack, guys, it's always important to have in your back pocket when someone takes this franchise WAY too seriously), slashes her leg and then she backs against the wall...the camera keeps the knife in frame the whole time as it moves forward, only bringing Sandra into focus when the knife suddenly drops beneath frame...and then it's jammed into her off camera. Wheelchair guy gets the physically most interesting death: throwing knife to the skull, and then his chair careens off into the wilderness, it's rider now very dead.
"Paul, there's someone in this room." Ginny says, almost nonchalantly. When she gets no response, "Paul, there's someone in this fucking room!" It works pretty well.
The third act moves itself along nicely enough, complete with a nice call-back to the original. I didn't mention Henry Manfredini during my write-up of the previous film, so I feel like I should call it out now. I'm not sure how many of them Manfredini scores-I know it's at least the first four films-but the score has a nice mix of drive-in schlock and classy cinema...it's really some fantastic work.
The sweater bit, where Jason believes Ginny to be his Mother, is...slightly convoluted but generally works due to Ginny's earlier pontification on the subject. Paul appears out of nowhere, which is odd (I literally said "Where the hell've you been, Paul?!" when he appeared)....then Ginny buries a Machete half-way through Jason's left shoulder.
Yay! Muffin the dog is okay! But, surprise, Jason jump scare! Actually, that was pretty well done. Another nice sequel hook.
Final Thoughts: There isn't much to think about, really. It's a pretty run-of-the-mill slasher film, even if those weren't necessarily a thing yet. Amy Steele makes a good if not underdeveloped "final girl"but that's about it. That being said, it isn't really a BAD film. It's not poorly made or anything, it just...well, it is just is.
Final Rating: Two Stars.
No comments:
Post a Comment