Friday the 13th Part 3 feels about 20 minutes too long, and there is a very specific reason for this.
With the series already becoming tired after only two instalments, Paramount decided to cash-in on the Reagan-era 3-D movie fad, a dismal period which included the likes of Jaws 3-D and the woefully absurd Amityville 3-D, an atrocity […]
Intruder is something of an anomaly.
Made at the tail-end of the 1980s, it was released long after the MPAA had stepped in to curtail the wanton bloodlust of the slasher boom, an imposition on civil liberties that would lead to years of the kind of tepid horror that would turn the genre stale. Just as Jason Voorhees was setting sail for Manhattan in perhaps the most censored of an ever-diluting formula […]
It took producers a whole year to renege on Friday the 13th’s promise that part IV would indeed be the final chapter, and the $22,000,000 it raked in – more than ten times its allocated budget – tells you exactly why.
Jason was far too big a draw to put to bed in 1984, and you have to believe that the studio was aware of this; in all likelihood, Jason’s demise was nothing more than a cynical marketing gimmick […]
Sometimes a movie comes along that really takes you by surprise.
Brain Damage is much more than just a trashy B-movie horror. It is that – but beneath the one-dimensional characters and schlocky special effects there is a film with a social conscience, a dreamy, often brutal commentary on the pitfalls of drug addiction which far exceeds its budget, displaying visual ingenuity one can’t help but admire […]
Whatever happened to Eddie Murphy?
For those of you who recall his comedic prime you will remember a man of great wit and enthusiasm, a star attraction who sold out arenas with his cutting edge act of irresistible profanity. So unique was Murphy’s off-the-cuff style it was inevitable that he would follow idol and mentor Richard Pryor into the movie world […]
The New Blood is a mutilation of a movie, and not as a result of Jason himself, but because of the Motion Picture Association of America, who hacked away the majority of the gore and set out to castrate the franchise forever.
Because of this the movie is particularly bland. Forget the total lack of dramatic tension and technical ingenuity; more disconcerting is the complete lack of good, honest gore […]
The last time we saw Jason Voorhees his head was sliding along the edge of a machete.
That particular instalment was advertised as The Final Chapter, and although Part V stayed true to the studio’s promise by introducing a copycat killer, you never really believed it was the end for the madman in the hockey mask. There was simply too much money at stake […]
