Friday the 13th (1980) - film review

On Friday 13th June, some time in the late 1970s, a group of young people are busy renovating an old camp site which is due to be reopened.  The site has been closed for twenty years, after a brutal double killing that took place in 1957.  A local resident, Ralph, warns Annie, who is on her way to the camp to work as the cook, that the place is cursed and that all who go there are doomed to die.  Not long afterwards, Annie is hacked to death by a kind soul who offers her a lift.  That evening, the camp’s owner, Steve Christy, sets off to get some supplies, just before a storm whips up.  His young helpers take sanctuary in their cabins, unaware that a killer is stalking the camp.  Each one of them appears to be destined for a grisly death, just as old Ralph predicted...

An all too obvious attempt to capitalise on the success of John Carpenter’s Halloween (1978), Friday the 13th doesn’t quite make the premier league of horror movies but certainly deserves its status as a classic of the slasher sub-genre.  With a score that references Hitchcock’s Psycho (1960) in every other scene and point-of-view camerawork that closely imitates that of Halloween, you can’t help wondering whether the film has anything original to offer, other than a slightly more interesting way to play Monopoly...

However, when you compare this with the numerous slasher movies that followed (including the ten sequels to this film), the artistic strengths of Friday the 13th become readily apparent.   The atmospheric cinematography and slowly building tension, which is ratcheted up a notch with every successive killing, offer a darkly compelling viewing experience.  The pay off is a spectacularly well realised denouement (which provides the film’s biggest surprise: the identity of the killer) and very sinister epilogue (which gave birth to the sequels).

Although the film was generally badly received by the critics on its initial release, Friday the 13th proved to be an immediate box office hit.  It ultimately grossed over 60 million dollars on its first international run, making it one of the most successful horror films of all time – not bad going when you consider that it was made on a budget of around half a million dollars.  The film’s sequels proved to be almost as popular, even if these were pretty well a rehash of the original film and are generally less well regarded.

In common with Halloween, there is an innocence and raw simplicity to Friday the 13th which makes it extraordinarily effective, and it still manages to send a chill down the spine three decades after it was first seen.  What is most frightening about this film is not the gruesome way in which the protagonists are despatched, but the sustained impression that no matter where the camera strays evil lurks just a few footsteps away.  You come away from the film half-believing that the space you inhabit is infected with a ghostly malice, a conscious demonic power that feels ready to rip you apart.  Or maybe that’s just the popcorn I ate.

© filmsdefrance.com 2009

Write a review for this film...

What do you think of this film?