Friday the 13th

[BroomJockey]

Scratch that. Horror movie remakes in general.

Remakes often seem to miss the point of the original, what was scary about the original, and why people liked it.

Horror movies are about taking something and twisting it to the point where it becomes ruinous.

Zombies play on fears of crowds, unheeding of your needs and fulling willing to trample you for their own desires.

Vampires are sexuality unchecked.

Frankenstein's Monster is science without ethics.

The Mummy (not the Brendan Frasier movie) is the implacability of death.

Freddy is what lurks in the dark that CAN hurt you.

Michael Myers is babysitters' nightmare of something going wrong and no one can help.

And then Jason is supposed to be Wrath. He's the embodiment of punishment for violating morality. He cannot be reasoned with, he cannot be stopped, he cannot be killed. If you transgress within his domain, you are doomed. He will find you, and kill you suddenly and abruptly.

But I just got through watching the remake of Friday the 13th. And Jason is human. He turns on lights. He uses a bow and arrow. He sets up trip lines rigged to alarms. He steals kerosene. He's got a prisoner. He stops his rampage because of a locket. He's manhandled by one of the "heroes."

Now, it's still a decent flick, but it loses the spirit of the original. Jason just feels like less of a threat. He's no longer Wrath incarnate, but just a psychopath with a big knife. Which he doesn't even use that much. I think he kills maybe 4 people with it out of the dozen or so. That would have been fine if they'd been more inventive with the kills, but they weren't. What's worse is that the first kill of the movie hasn't even done anything yet that qualifies. He'd come to Crystal Lake looking for weed, and that was it. He'd only just found it. He hadn't smoked, gotten naked, had sex, broken laws, been a jerk, or anything. He was just a random guy at that point. Again, Jason's supposed to be Wrath. How's about waiting until the guy does something?

And don't even get me started on the LAST kill. Just a perfect bookend to the movie. Start by killing a guy who hadn't done anything yet, finish by killing a girl who'd done nothing the whole movie. If they continue on and make a sequel to the remake, I hope they learn and steer Jason on to the right path again.

[powerboy]

Scratch that. Horror movie remakes in general.

I hear you on that. I honestly hate remakes of horror flicks. They always ruin it.

[guywithashovel]

There's also a remake of The Stepfather coming out soon.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tSVmrqAMQZA

There were a few of those movies back in the late 1980s, but I don't think they were as popular as Halloween or Friday the 13th.

I guess that when people remake these movies, they try to put their own spin on it and therefore lose some of the magic of the original.

However, I actually thought that Rob Zombie's remake of Halloween was better than the original. Michael actually was scarier in that one. He was human, but he was super strong and nothing seemed capable of killing him. Also, getting a good look into Michael's childhood was nice, too.

[BroomJockey]

However, I actually thought that Rob Zombie's remake of Halloween was better than the original. Michael actually was scarier in that one. He was human, but he was super strong and nothing seemed capable of killing him.

Have you seen the original Halloween? He was still super-strong, and invincible. I haven't seen the remake since I refuse to see any of Zombie's flicks, but I've been told that Myer's narrates in it. That just blows my mind. That's a huge faux pas as far as I'm concerned.

What really scares me though, is that shortly after making this thread, I learned there's going to be a Nightmare on Elm St. remake. And from the trailer, it looks like they're going to fuck it up royally. Worse than any other decently-budgeted remake to date. It looks like Freddy's got a body count of a good size, and that's just wrong. He lives through fear, he's not supposed to kill a lot of people.

[Pedersen]

Have you seen the original Halloween? He was still super-strong, and invincible. I haven't seen the remake since I refuse to see any of Zombie's flicks, but I've been told that Myer's narrates in it.

Wait, what? You can't be serious. That was part of the horror of Michael Myers. He never spoke. Not one single word. You could not reason with him, you could not negotiate, you could not do anything except run and pray not to die.

Michael Myers talking is just... I have no words to describe how wrong that is.

[Gravekeeper]

Jason is suppose to be an unstoppable, almost supernatural killing machine. Thats where the fear comes from. You don't know who or what he is or how to stop him, and he might show up anywhere at anytime. Than kill you in a horrible, unpleasant way.

There's no need to humanize him ( Or Michael Myers ) because the whole point is they're inhuman.

The movie you describe is not a Friday the 13th movie. Its just another generic serial killer movie with a guy that happens to be named Jason. >.>

[AdminAssistant]

Y'know...at a certain point don't people figure out that Crystal Lake isn't a good vacation spot? That Elm Street might not be the best place to live?

[BroomJockey]

That Elm Street might not be the best place to live?

You'd think they'd figure it out about Elm Street, though the parents coming up with the whole "no dreaming" drug is a bit wacky.

As for Camp Crystal Lake, if you think about it, people continually going there makes perfect sense. Usually it's late teens-early 20s people going, who think they're invincible, and who think they know everything. They write off stories of supernatural killers as myths and legends. Hell, that legend probably attracts most of them. "Go prove your balls by sleeping in the place where the psychotic murderer is."

Finally, they actually did provide an in-movie explanation, sorta, in the remake. One guy mentions the story of Mrs. Voorhees killing the counsellors, and someone responds "You know how many Crystal Lakes there are? What makes you think it's this one?" Lame, but also reasonable.

[AdminAssistant]

Yeah, that's always been my trouble with that particular brand of 'scary movie'. I want these dumbasses to die. The only good film with the "teens in the middle of the woods" premise is Evil Dead.

[BroomJockey]

Yeah, that's always been my trouble with that particular brand of 'scary movie'. I want these dumbasses to die. The only good film with the "teens in the middle of the woods" premise is Evil Dead.

While I agree with your assessment of Evil Dead being a good movie, I think you've missed the point of the other brand of scary movie. You're supposed to want them to die.

They're basically morality plays, or Aesop's Fables. An unlikeable character engages in either immoral (sex/drugs) or idiotic (acting like a jerk, etc) behaviour, and they are punished for it in brutal and horrible ways, and you applaud the application of punishment. Thus it spurs you to not emulate said behaviour, as you've now hated someone who engaged in it, and supported bad things happening to them. The horror in the films comes from the idea of you being able to find yourself in a similar situation, and knowing you too could be judged unworthy. This is also why there's supposed to be one person who survives, and at least temporarily defeats the "monster" because they didn't do any of the things the other people did.

That's where remakes fail. They don't follow the "rules" of horror movies. They think you just throw a bunch of people in a situation and then have them die messily. (Note, this only applies to 'monster-y' horror movies, movies with human killers operate differently)

[Lace Neil Singer]

I hate the remake of The Wicker Man, so I get what you're saying. -.- Most of the time, remakes just completely bugger up the whole premis of the movie, so you're better off just watching the original.

[AdminAssistant]

I hate the remake of The Wicker Man,

Plus, I believe that stars Nicholas Cage - a double-whammy of fail right there!

[guywithashovel]

Have you seen the original Halloween? He was still super-strong, and invincible. I haven't seen the remake since I refuse to see any of Zombie's flicks, but I've been told that Myer's narrates in it. That just blows my mind. That's a huge faux pas as far as I'm concerned.

What really scares me though, is that shortly after making this thread, I learned there's going to be a Nightmare on Elm St. remake. And from the trailer, it looks like they're going to fuck it up royally. Worse than any other decently-budgeted remake to date. It looks like Freddy's got a body count of a good size, and that's just wrong. He lives through fear, he's not supposed to kill a lot of people.

Yeah, I've seen the original, and Myers was a lot more deadly in the remake (I thought so, anyway).

Also, I'm not sure where you're getting that Myers "narrates" in the remake. I have seen the remake, and Myers never narrated anything. It did show him as a kid, and he did talk as a kid (he stopped after he had been at the asylum for a while). But he never narrated.

[Depot Denizen]

Jason was never just "Wrath". He killed everything in his path, with the sole exception of children. And even then, I'm not sure if he would stop. It didn't matter if it was an innocent teenager or a law-abiding shopkeeper and his wife (see Part III). If they were even remotely in his way, they died.

He was a mortal until he was killed by Tommy Jarvis in part IV, then after that was the whole copycat killer, and then Jason's Undead phase in Part VI and beyond.

Freddy was a different class of villain - the witty, despicable child killer that came back even after death. In Part II he had a high body count when he killed off the teens at the party, I think he maimed and injured most of them.

I actually liked the remake of Friday the 13th. Some of the characters were Meh, but the plot was there. I liked how Jason was cunning predator, it made him more complex than just the psycho in the hockey mask.

[gremcint]

You guys need to read the comic series that came out a while ago, Freddy vs Jason vs Ash (evil dead)

Jason is actually given a bit of intelligence for awhile, do you know what he does? he gets 2 machetes.