Friday The 13th - Judge it on what it was, not what it is now

If you ignore ‘Halloween’ and ‘The Texas Chainsaw Massacre’ you could say that ‘Friday 13th’ ‘started’ the whole ‘slasher’ genre. It was made on comparatively little and made a hell of a lot at the box office, so it must have a certain something. Not only that, but it spawned about ten sequels, a spin-off and a remake.

If you don’t know, it’s about a camp of over-sexed teenagers who get slaughtered one by one by an unseen assailant. Hardly a deep and meaningful plot, but it certainly struck a chord with the audiences of 1980.

However, today, and several thousand similar movies later, it all seems a little tame. We’re all used to the acting not being up to much in these sorts of films, but here, it really is pretty weak. Plus there isn’t much gore (not up to today’s standards anyway!) and the film is effectively watching each character for about five minutes as they wander around a deserted part of the camp, before being killed. Rinse and repeat until you’re left with just the one. And the ‘lead girl’ is no ‘Lara Croft.’ Don’t expect her to be particularly pro-active at fighting back against the killer when they’re finally revealed. She mainly screams hysterically and runs away (occasionally spending five minutes of screen time barricading a door, only to remove her creation about thirty seconds later).

So, Friday 13th actually isn’t that good. However, it’s still a classic. And I still enjoy watching it. Mainly because I look at it from an eighties perspective and can see how shocking it was for its day. It deserves its place in the horror hall of fame, even if it is a little damp compared with today’s offerings. Modern classics like ‘Scream’ outwit it, out-gore it, out-plot-twist it and out-act it at every turn. But, without Friday 13th, there may not have been a ‘Scream’ to out perform it.

If you haven’t seen it, put yourself in the place of the audience in 1980 and don’t judge it by today’s standards. Then you can enjoy seeing Kevin Bacon in a kind of odd role!

7/10 if I woke up on Groundhog Day and had to watch this again, I could live with that