Friday the 13th: A New Beginning (Hor-RIFF-ic Productions)

Film Year:  1985
Genre:  Horror
Director:  Danny Steinman
Starring:  Jason Voorhees ::snicker::snicker:: No seriously, he's in it.

The Movie

*I HAVE SURVIVED WATCHING THIS MOVIE UNRIFFED*

Truth in advertising has always been a hot topic.  Promising a "final chapter" and then blatantly ignoring that promise the following year is probably one of the more glaring examples of lying to get butts into seats, at least in the movie biz.  It helped the previous Friday the 13th sell tickets, but here we have another one, an attempt to keep that revenue coming but try and put a fresh spin on it to at least promise "a new beginning."

And by "fresh spin" I of course mean do the exact same shit all over again.

This story picks up around a decade after the previous film.  Tommy Jarvis has grown out of being Corey Feldman (good for him!) but is now being housed in a home for troubled teenagers.  One day a hockey-masked killer starts murdering everyone around him.  Has Tommy snapped or has Jason returned from the grave?

Turns out it's neither.  And legions of people in the audience simultaneously ask for their money back.

Friday the 13th:  A New Beginning is thought of being one of the lesser Friday films, with fans citing "Derz no JASON!" as being the reason why it sucks.  It doesn't suck for that reason.  It sucks because it has the Friday the 13th title.  Jason not being in it is merely incidental.  And hell, while we're at it Jason wasn't the killer in the first movie either, so it's not really a reasonable excuse anyway.

As a social experiment I almost wish I could test Friday the 13th fans who were watching this movie for the first time and stop it before the reveal of who the killer is and poll whether or not they were enjoying the movie.  My theory is that most would say "yes."  But I'm not really a Friday fan, so I have no experience in this myself.

Is there anything else in this movie that makes it distinct enough to be singled out like that?  It's a lot broader than the previous films, with sillier and more absurd stabs at comedy.  At the same time the victims of the film are mostly innocent outcasts (a good chunk of them anyway), which makes them more sympathetic than usual, so seeing them get mowed down doesn't have the same effect as teen characters defying morality.  And then there is the reveal of the killer himself, which is absurd to say the least.  The character is given a very specific reason to be angry and psychotic, but he goes after a group of innocents while the person who wronged him gets away scott free earlier in the movie.  That said, the character is someone who was introduced earlier in the movie, which makes the reveal just barely more satisfying than Mrs. Voorhees' reveal in the first film.

A New Beginning is a bad movie, but it gets too little credit in series of films that aren't really that much better.  I can't quite get into the mindset of the average Friday the 13th fan, but from an outsider's point of view I'd dare say this movie is underrated.  But then I remember that it's bloody awful regardless.

The Riff

While I personally don't believe A New Beginning to be particularly better or worse than the previous films, I will have to admit there is something about it that just clicks with the riffing format.  Maybe it's the fact that it's broader, zanier, more cartoonish.  Because of that it offers something a bit different to work with, and maybe it's the big shot in the arm that Hor-RIFF-ic Productions needs to keep doing these Friday the 13th riffs.

The movie presents itself as a cartoon, so Gary, Erin, and Satan treat it like one.  This riff pretty much takes what's happening on screen and over-emphasizes it to humorous effect.  It's an effective approach and the gang seems very enticed by a film that brings something new to the table.  They find amusement in the film's emphasized lewdness and underline it, as if saying "Really, movie?"  They take the characters' caricature personalities and enhance them, turning them into something more memorable than they are in the film itself.  This riff is seriously a blast to watch.

After watching the first four Friday films I was concerned that maybe taking on the entire series was simply too impossible a task.  Watching this fifth film I'm glad to have been proven wrong.  Friday films can feel exactly the same, but if there is something new to discover in them then maybe just maybe the right riffing team can tap an oil well.  The team behind Hor-RIFF-ic Productions taps the oil well in Friday the 13th:  A New Beginning and laughs are aplenty, bringing about the best Friday the 13th riff yet.  It makes me rub my hands in excitement for them to tackle Part VI should that day ever come.

Classic