Scenester: Read a review of Friday the 13th

The Web site for the award-winning alternative weekly, the Philadelphia City Paper.

options

Scenester: Read a review of Friday the 13th

POSTED: Thursday, February 12, 2009, 6:35 PM

Filed Under: Movies Scenester

Admit it — you want more from this week’s Movies section.

Friday the 13th (2009)

If ever a series rendered a reboot superfluous, it's Friday the 13th — each installment already pushed the reset button, resurrecting its hockey-masked anti-hero and killing him off again at the end. But like Casino Royale, the fresh start allows the series to disown the ridiculous gimmicks — telekinesis, outer space, Corey Feldman — that increasingly cluttered each entry, and to reimagine its iconic character as an athletic and sadistic upgrade of the familiar old model. Once a force of nature, Jason Voorhees is here transformed into a deranged survivalist. It's obviously modeled directly on Rob Zombie's Halloween remake, but we need to know how Jason survived in the woods all those years even less than we needed to fill in the gap between Michael Myers' childhood killing spree and the night he came home. What hasn't been rethought is the fuck-and-die formula, though it's applied with smug, knowing irony. The standard teens-in-the-woods slaughter is briskly dispatched in a 30-minute pre-title sequence, but instead of freeing the film to veer off in unexpected directions it instead sequelizes itself, introducing a new batch and offing them in the expected order — the final girl is still chaste, and there are grueling deaths in store for the topless water-skiier, the stoner goof-off and, yes, the black guy. —Shaun Brady (Click here for showtimes and to purchase tickets for Friday the 13th)

Related: Freddy vs. Jason

Also in this week's movie section: Sam Adams reviews The Class, and shorts on Azur & Asmar (Azur et Asmar), Confessions of a Shopaholic and The International.

Posted by Molly Eichel @ 6:35 PM Permalink | Post a comment

Comments (0)

Q&A with SHARI SOLANIS: "The goal isn't pornography"
What we're trying to do this weekend
SEXY TIME Q&A: I've never had an orgasm during sex with a man — and I'm 30!
NOW SEE THIS: Transit cop arrests marijuana activist for alleged disorderly conduct.
CONCERT REVIEW: Primus (3D & quadraphonic sound) @ The Tower 10/17
Q&A with Tony Goldwyn: "Life is gray, and relationships are, too"
ICEPACK ILLUSTRATED: The Archbishop meets the Geator, the Mayor goes suit shopping, Le Bec Fin fin.
ICEPACK ILLUSTRATED: Indian fare rules, Dunder Mifflin lives on, Tom Jones is a god
Q&A with Goon’s Seann William Scott
SWIMMING HOLES: Some of our favorite places to get wet

About this blog

Featuring everything from event roundups to concert reviews and sex talk, City Paper's Critical Mass is a space for off-the-wall coverage of Philly's A&E scene.

Follow Critical Mass editors Patrick Rapa and Emily Guendelsberger on Twitter:

@mission2denmark | @emilygee

Search this blog:

Topics:

Blog archives:

May
April
March

February
January

Past Archives: