Friday the 13th: A New Beginning

                                      Friday the 13th Directed by Danny Steinmann 

If Jason still haunts you, you're not alone!

The fifth movie in the franchise is the one I like the least, aside from Jason X. This is more of a "who done it" kind of movie where we are lead to believe that Jason is dead and Tommy is going crazy, or that maybe Jason is back. Either way, this movie deals with psychological trauma. It is set ten years after The Final Chapter. Look at the poster.  It sets the tone for the whole movie.

After the dream sequence, we find out Tommy Jarvis is now in a halfway house. Then BOOM hockey mask into title with more explosion than you can shake a stick at. I don't understand why they keep using the intro. F13 is not an action series.

I must say the actor does look like Corey Feldman grown up. Speaking of Feldman, he is only in the movie for the intro. Feldman was off making the Goonies. Tommy still feels like Tommy. He makes masks and carries around a picture of his sister, mother, and dog, but his intelligence is played down. Where is the kid who can restart a car engine or reroute electricity? On the plus side, John Shepherd, the actor playing Tommy, does a great job acting as a psychologically damaged adult. We are also introduced to the main cast: Reggie, "the reckless" a boy around Tommy's age in part four, who is visiting his grandfather and likes playing pranks on the patients; Pam, the female lead and assistant to the doctor that runs the rehabilitation home; Joey, a fat, orphan slob of a teen with mental issues; Vic, a musclebound insane man; Violet, the punk; and Robin, a slightly ditsy girl. Joey does not last long and is killed by Vic 3 minutes after we meet him. Vic gets carted away by the police. This is important because it sets up the "who done it" story line.

Slob Joey on his way to meet death

Our first "Jason" killing comes right after the scene where Joey dies, with two greaser kids getting killed after their car breaks down. There is a lot of supporting cast: the redneck mother and son duo that live around the town, the policemen and EMT's picking up the killer's dirty work, the people at the halfway house, and Reggie's Prince-esque brother Demon, who lives in a trailer park. There are a lot of people in this movie. I personally think there are a few too many people in the cast for a horror movie. I know they are setting up who the killer could be, if not Jason, but there are so many characters that it is hard to keep track. Halfway into the movie, we are still being introduced to new people.

There are a lot of jump scares, almost on par with today's horror. There's the big toy spider that gets dropped down, a cat that falls right in front of the screen, multiple practical jokes that involve appearing out of nowhere with scary masks, and the old "the killer is about to grab you but its actually your friend" trick. The New Beginning is chalk full of jump scares. It feels out of place with the rest of the series. Well, this movie is out of place with the rest of the series, so I guess it makes sense.

Tommy's psychological trauma is shown in detail. There are scenes where Jason shows up behind him in the mirror or in a field outside of the house. The movie uses this to remind you that you're watching a Friday the 13th movie and not a random slasher flick. The psychosis only gets worse as the movie progresses and the body count piles up. They keep bringing Jason back in the form of hallucinations or flashbacks from The Final Chapter.

Is Jason really there or is this another hallucination? 

The dialog in this movie appears to be written by multiple people, with one of them not taking his job seriously. For the most part, the lines work, especially for the redneck mother who swears like a sailor, and they are delivered competently. But then there are scenes where some of the lines are barely there, like "she's going to kills us, fuck you" "yes... fuck me, *whispers* fuck me". The finale is literally ten minutes of screaming and incoherent yelling, The script feels like it's written by multiple people at the same time and, well, it is, but those three or four people had different takes on the feel of the movie and I'm guessing they never sat down to address the issues.

Ethel is the most colorful character in the movie.

Some of the mental patients are vaguely mental, in the sense that they seem to have no problems. Violet is a moody teenager.  Robin is in no way a mentally handicapped woman. And the only problem with Tina and Eddie is that they do things without thinking. And are in love. That's a handicap right? There is a young adult with a stutter, but that's not a mental condition.  Why are there so many normal kids at this halfway house?  Tommy is affected by trauma, Vic is insane, Joey was mentally handicapped and an orphan, and Jake has a stutter. Only four of the nine people in the rehabilitation house actually suffer from mental disability. Maybe it's because Paramount was against the killing of mentally disabled people.

Lets talk about said killing, There are a gratuitous amount of kills in this movie and they come in all forms, be it ax, machete, gardening shears, or even just a plain leather strap. People fall left and right in this installment. Midway though the movie, we get 3 deaths in under 2 minutes. That's value. The life taking in A New Beginning is also fleshed out. Practical special effects were at their peak in the mid eighties, so any horror movie around this time will look great. The variety of ways to murder is on full display here and most of them are colorful and well executed. 

New meaning of "see no evil"  

Nudity has always been a staple of horror since it made the transition from black & white, and A New Beginning has it in spades. No woman in this movie wears a bra. I am not kidding. Be it the girl at the diner, Robin, or Tina, every female says no to support. There is as much nudity in this installment as there is swearing and this movie sets the bar. It's a trend we will see in a lot of horror flicks from the 70's onward. I was surprised by the amount. I don't remember seeing this much. I was a kid the first time I saw this, so I guess it went over my head. It's easy to forget about something as trivial as boobage when you're that young, especially when people die every 5 minutes.

Now for the finale, the main reason that a lot of Friday fans, including me, are not big fans of this movie. You can easily discern that the imposing figure is not Jason and, with a bit of scouting, you know exactly who it is during the mud chase. The hockey mask has blue lines instead of the usual red. Coupled with the person's obvious human-colored skin, you know he is alive. Tommy left in a huff earlier, so the film makes you believe it is Tommy but this guy is way too tall for that. The motive the killer has is pretty strong but there is no way he put all of his plan together in one day. The ending was an idea the studio thought of and might have worked if fans didn't passionately want Jason and I, for one, am happy they brought him back to stay. 

Its Red Herring!

Body count: 19 (22 with dream sequences)

Audio 9/10

For a movie I don't enjoy, I must say the score in this one is exceptional. The scary parts have a great ambiance to them. The song that plays while Violet is dancing in her room, "His eyes" by Pseudo Echo, is my favorite track in any Friday the 13th movie. The studio got with the times and added some new wave and it worked out perfectly with Violet's character. Some of Pam's screams are out of sync, and she screams a lot for the last 10 minutes of the film, but it's a minor bother when the music is this good.

Video 7/10

The video quality stands the test of time. Likewise, the setting and atmosphere are well balanced. I could not point out a single glaring problem in the cinematography. There are a few times they reuse shots, like Junior the redneck riding around on his motorcycle or when Pam and Reggie are racing back to the house in the truck. 

Effects 7/10

With the rise in quality of special effects and makeup, this movie looks great. The deaths are articulated. The series has come a long way and with it has come the advancement in technique. Kills are varied and fully fleshed out, the blood looks real, and the storm actually looks and sounds like a thunder storm.

Story 6/10

I may be judging this installment too harshly, but people came to the theater to see Jason and what we got was a copycat. The studio will play with this idea again in Final Friday, but that's for a different time. The inclusion of Vic and the death of Joey plays an integral part in the plot. You'll understand when you see the ending. We know three quarters of the way though the movie that we won't be getting Jason but with so many characters thrown at us we start to guess, and Vic is the most obvious choice. I don't like that they never once mention Tommy's sister, Trish. She survived, and at least one line could have been used to let the audience know what happened to her. A New Beginning has its strong points, especially when it comes to dealing with trauma and the hardships it brings.

Overall 70/100

I said I did not like this movie, and that it was my second least favorite. That latter still holds true but I do appreciate it more now that I have seen it recently. I still do not like that Jason was excluded save for the hallucinations. I give much praise to John Shepherd for playing a traumatized character well. I docked 4 points for the lack of the main antagonist. I feel I should have taken more points away but I'm being generous. The film was going for a different approach and setting up Tommy Jarvis to take his place, I get that but the ending could have hinted that Jason was still out there, even if they had no plans to bring him back.

.-Rosanderman