Friday the 13th Part 4

Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter starts as the authorities are cleaning up the dead bodies left by murderer Jason Voorhees (Ted White), he himself was supposedly killed & his body is taken to Wessex County Medical Center. Everyone thinks Jason is dead but they are wrong & it's not long before he has killed yet again & is on the loose looking for more victims. Six teenage friends, lovers Paul (Clyde Hayes) & Samantha (Judie Aronson), Doug (Peter Barton) & Sara (Barbara Howard) plus Ted (Lawrence Monoson) & Jimmy (Crispin Glover) have hired a log cabin out for the weekend in the Crystal Lake area & become prime targets for the hockey mask wearing homicidal maniac Jason Voorhees who has no intention of stopping his killing spree... Directed by Joseph Zito this was the fourth instalment of the highly successful Friday the 13th series of slasher films & there's a strong case to say that it could be the best one of them all. The script by Barney Cohen follows the same simplistic pattern as before but Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter manages to be a lot darker in tone & a lot more brutal than a lot of slashers before or since. The kills come thick & fast, there's never too long to wait before the next victim & the kills are nice & brutal. There's enough nudity to satisfy including a couple of cute twins, the teenage character's aren't that annoying for a change & as a whole the film works very well within the context of what it sets out to achieve. I really like the Friday the 13th series as a whole & this is definitely among the best of them if not the best outright. I liked it, a lot. Director Zito does a pretty good job, he keeps things moving along & manages to inject some tension & atmosphere to the film. The infamous hockey mask barely features in this one as Jason is kept as a killing machine & nothing more, he has no real character or likability in this one. The gore is strong in this one unlike other entries in the series which were cut to shreds, Jason hacksaws someones throat, people are stabbed, have meat cleavers stuck in their heads, people are impaled on various objects, someone has a knife plunged into the back of their head while someone else has a knife stuck through their throat & Jasons death in this one is great thanks to some top special effects by Tom Savini. With a supposed budget of about $1,800,000 Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter apparently made over $11,000,000 on it's opening weekend, now you know the reason why this wasn't the final chapter. Generally speaking it's well made & competent throughout. The acting is pretty good all round & better than one might expect from a film of this nature, even Cory Feldman didn't annoy me. Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter isn't art, it isn't going to win any awards & it's not going to change your outlook on life but it is just about the perfect slasher. An absolute must for Friday the 13th fans & those interested in the horror genre.

If this had truly been the final chapter of the franchise, I think people would have been much more satisfied. Everything about this film feels bigger - like an event. Jason's meaner, the kills are nastier (and less chopped up by the MPAA), and the cast is likable.

Has the bloodiest kills of the series and the most nudity in the entire series. Cory Feldman plays the young Tommy Jarvis who will be finally the match Jason is looking for. The film starts off just like Halloween 4 starts off Jason in the morgue but it is not long before Jason is back on his way to Crystal Lake for more mayhem. A young Crispen Clover is on top as well so this little instalment had some star power it was unaware of. The gore factor is really turned up in this sequel that features the most gruesome killings in the series. This entry and maybe part 5 must be the reasons why the MPAA got their little hands dirty with parts 6,7 and 8 which were so heavily edited that compared to today's standards could be viewed on Saturday afternoon with the kids.

After being mortally wounded and taken to the morgue, murderer Jason Voorhees spontaneously revives and embarks on a killing spree as he makes his way back to his home at Camp Crystal Lake. The cinematography is stark and bare, with only the soundtrack adding some effect. This is one of the bleakest films I have seen in a long time. All characters are surviving in a grim world. From an artistic standpoint, there were some plot elements and character developments I didn't think were needed. They do however drive the story, which seemed to be their purpose, so I can accept them. The film is dark, brooding, intense and most of all violent. I give it 7/10.