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I'm here to tell you something. This may come as some kind of sacrelidge, but I hate, hate, hate the Friday the 13th series. It sucks big time, but that's not the only reason. I hate it because the entire series is a rip-off of the vastly superior Halloween series. Here's how it happened. (Oh, and by the way, stop laughing at me for starting the column with the giant letter. There's no law against it. Let it go. I just wanted to spice things up a bit.) After the stunning "event" success of films like Star Wars and Jaws, theater chains stopped seeing film exhibition as a niche in the cog of capitalism, and started seeing a money tree. They built cramped, poorly designed complexes on pretty much any empty space, and shoved as many movie theaters into them as they could. They called them "Multiplexes." Customer comforts be dammed, they only wanted one thing: asses in seats. Fat asses that buy tons of popcorn, soda, and hot dogs, and don't really care what they see, as long as they spend some cash. Movies got shorter, and an assload of really crappy movies started getting the green light. Films that were designed to make a fast buck then disappear. Along came Mr. Sean Cunningham, with his film Friday the 13th. Two years after the success of Halloween, writer/ director Sean Cunningham, who made his career making cheap-o knock-offs of successful Hollywood films, (Manny's Orphans is nothing but The Bad News Bears, but with soccer players. Even a decade later, he ripped of The Abyss with the piece of crap Deep Star Six) showed up like the second kid on the playground with a "Michael Jackson Beat It Jacket" with the woeful Friday the 13th. He basically removed all the charm and story from Halloween, slapped a hockey mask on a tall guy, and released this atrocity on the American public. What happened? Humanity let us down, that's what. Friday the 13th made a lot of money. An obscene amount of money, based on nothing but the fact that it was playing everywhere, especially in multiplexes. The teenage crowd went nuts, because it was about teenagers, and looked like it might have some nudity. When it became obvious that there wasn't any skin, they started enjoying the inventive way that Jason killed the camp counselors. It has spawned ten sequels, more rip-offs, and is one of the most successful franchises in film history. The problem I have is that so many people call this film a "classic," and "the one that started it all." It wasn't. Halloween was. Imagine if you will, that, in 1964, right on the heels of Dr. No, some jag-off came out with a film called Professor Null. It starred a hero named Clive Brand, and pretty much stole every single frame of its essence from Ian Flemming, except that it wasn't as good; the gadgets were all the film was about. Hour after hour of Clive killing bad guys with new and interesting gadgets. No story, no wit, just gadgets. Now, imagine that, forty years later, this franchise is still around, and people credit it for launching the action movie genre. Knowing what you do about James Bond, wouldn't you really resent Mr. Clive Brand? (Before anyone says anything, I must disclose that I am named after Ian Flemming, the author of the James Bond books. It doesn't matter at all to what I'm talking about, but I take some measure of pride in my father's style.) Wouldn't you groan every time another one of these god-dammed films came out? Wouldn't you be upset that the Bond franchise had suffered, because it too had devolved into nothing but a stupid gadget fest, and had taken all action films with it? Remember, this business called show always takes the path of least resistance. The easiest and safest way is always the best way. Now, the horror film is an absolute joke.
It's not about anything anymore. The Halloween
series is a farce, and gore has been substituted fear anxiety
and tension. People are so hungry for a good scare that they
went and saw The Blair Witch project to the tune of two
hundred million dollars. And forgive me, but that film was atrocious.
One of the worst films ever released, and people lapped it up
with a spoon. I actually heard people I know, some of them good
friends, tell me that it was scary because "they didn't
show anything. They made you use your imagination, which is
what made it so scary. I guess you need to have a good imagination
to enjoy it." Okay, first of all, fuck you for the dig
at my imagination. Secondly, what the hell are you seeing a
movie for if you're going to use your imagination? Isn't
the purpose of seeing a film to experience someone else's? Isn't
the whole purpose of art to see the world from another's point
of view? Blair Witch, of course, spawned it's own knock-off's
and sequels. My only hope is that Sean Cunningham makes a Blair
Witch Project knock-off soon, and the film becomes wildly
successful. So successful, that, in twenty years, people herald
The Shelbyville Ogre Venture as "the one that started
it all," and "an absolute classic." Maybe Mr.
Cunningham can become like Todd MacFarlane's (another rip-off
artist) Spawn and use his demonic-in-origin powers to
do some good. |
Past Columns: Why Can't We Be Friends? It's Time to Turn in My Geek Card Academy Awards Diary A Sure-Fire Way to Pick Best Actor Future Oscar Death March Clips |