| Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan Released: 1989 MPAA Rating: R Genre: Slasher Nuts and Bolts: Jason LOVES New York. But he’s got some pesky teens to kill. And just like Frankie, he’s going to do it HIS way. Summary: We start off with Jim Miller and Suzi Donaldson. Now Jim and Suzi are getting funky inside their boat on the shores of everybody’s favorite family playground, Camp Crystal Lake (Although they’re calling it Camp Forrest Green now). Jim fucks around by scaring Suzi with the legend of Jason Voorhees (Kane Hodder). Now it just so happens that Jason’s waterlogged corpse happens to be resting on the bottom of the lake right beneath them. The boat’s anchor drags along a power cable or something and the resulting electrical discharge revives Jason. Now electricity has been used to get Jason motivated before (See Friday the 13th Part VI: Jason Lives), but as this movie will soon show, this is not always a consistently reliable result. So our boy climbs his moldy skank ass up onto the boat and sets to killing Jim and Suzi before the boy can even get his dick wet. He tries firing a harpoon into Suzi, but his aim seems to be a little off. Hey, cut the guy some slack. He’s been sitting in swamp muck for a few years now. He breaks the harpoon in half and shoves the business end through Jim’s gut. Suzi tries to break north but J tracks her down and stabs her in the gut as well. So now we move a little farther north where we find the graduating class of Lakeview High School about to embark upon a luxury cruise aboard a ship called the Lazarus. Here’s the run down of the latest gang of idiots. First we have Rennie. Rennie is an aspiring writer with a tragic past (Easily identifiable as the would-be heroin of this flick). We also have Sean Robertson, the son of the Admiral of the ship and all around nice guy (The obvious love interest). There’s also Rennie’s step mom Colleen Van Deusen as well as step-pop and school principal Charles McCulloch. We also have a sailor wannabe named Miles Wolfe; the token blonde whore Tamara Mason; Tamara’s friend Eva Watanabe (Kelly Hu); Julius Gaw (the jock), JJ Jarrett (the Joan Jett wannabe); and lastly there’s Wayne Webber, the amateur film geek. Oh yeah…and there’s also a ship hand that plays the part of the ubiquitous doomsayer. Now believe it or not, Jason has actually discovered that pickings are kind of slim out by Crystal Lake so he swims on over to the Lazarus and hops on board. The first one that J decides to take out is JJ the would-be rocker. He corners her below deck and beats her to death with her own Flying-V electric guitar. Now before Jason can claim victim #4, we learn that Rennie has this bizarre fear of the water. Not a helluva lot of info is given at this juncture but she does her best to stay clear of the railing. Rennie has a dog with her named Toby. Toby runs off and Rennie goes chasing after him. Now she ends up finding Tamara and Eva in the midst of snorting some coke. She ignores them and continues on her way. But that crafty principal McCulloch happens upon the two junkies and busts them. Tamara thinks that Rennie narced on them and plans revenge. She executes her revenge by pushing Rennie off the side of the boat. Rennie is brought back on board, but she suffers a bizarre vision wherein she sees a retarded looking kid who looks strangely a lot like the childhood version of Jason. Speaking of Jason, let’s see what he’s up to shall we? Ahh yes. Jason is now taking care of some nameless punk in the sauna. He kills the kid by plunging a hot rock through his chest. Pretty short and sweet. Some time later, Principal McCulloch goes to Tamara’s stateroom to read her the riot act. But Tamara is ready for him. She strips down to her tighty whities and momentarily seduces McCulloch. Now what Principal Chuck doesn’t realize is that Wayne (the AV geek) is filming the entire affair. The film is Tamara’s leverage against McCulloch for busting her with the drugs. Unfortunately, Tamara’s diabolical plan isn’t enough to save her ass from getting killed. Jason pops in to her room just as the ho is taking a shower. He plasters her face into the bathroom and uses a broken shard of glass to finish her off. Now he goes upstairs to take care of the Captain and crew. He shoves a harpoon through Captain Stubing’s ass and then slices Admiral Robertson’s throat open with a knife. Sean eventually wanders topside to find his dad dead. He tries to signal the coast guard but naturally Jason tears out all the radio transmitter wires (How is it that he ALWAYS know where the primary electrical lines are to be found?). The rest of the crew gather in the Captain’s quarters and tries to devise a plan. Sean says that the killer is Jason Voorhees but nobody believes him. Everyone splits up to try and track the killer down. Eva is the next to go. Jason follows her to the dance hall and chokes the crap out of her. Not very graphic. After that he goes back down below deck. Next on the list is Wayne. Wayne is plodding about with his camera when he finds the body of a ship hand that was killed off-screen. Now here comes one of the more ridiculous deaths in the movie. Jason lifts Wayne up and chucks his ass onto some electrical equipment. For some reason this causes Wayne to catch on fire. The fire begins raging throughout the ship and before long the entire lower cabin area is engulfed in flames. Whatever. J then goes back topside and kills Miles by throwing him on top of some sharpened piece of rigging. Julius tries to stop him, but Jason just chucks his ass into the water. Julius lives, for now. Jason then tries to attack Rennie in her cabin but she fights him off by stabbing him in the eye with a pen. I guess the pen IS mightier than the sword. Who knew? Rennie has some more freaky visions of a young Jason flash before her eyes and she suddenly makes the logical leap that this hockey-masked psychopathic zombie must be the disfigured little prat from her visions. Jason gives up on Rennie for now preferring to put an axe in the back of that idiotic doomsayer. Now the boat is sinking fast due to all of the explosions and flooding. The only ones left are: Rennie, Sean, McCulloch, and Van Deusen. They jump into the lifeboat at which point they scoop up Julius’ drowning ass. They scoot away to safety as the Lazarus sinks. A three-hour tour. A three-hour tour. Now they paddle on in the lifeboat for endless hours until they finally reach the docks of Manhattan. Joy! But as luck would have it, Jason actually manages to SWIM all the way to Manhattan in order to finish these fuckers off! But as the group sets foot on dry ground, they notice that they have more pressing issues than Jason. Two muggers jump out and decide that they want to rape Rennie. They hold everyone off at gunpoint while they drag her into a back alley. Mugger #1 injects her with Angel Dust and prepares to ravage her. But ironically enough Jason shows up to the rescue. I guess he figures that no one else but he is allowed to commit acts of a violent and unspeakable nature. He picks up the discarded hypodermic needle and actually plunges it through the rapist’s back. Mugger #2 tries to stop him but J just slams his grill into a steam pipe. Now although Rennie is stoned out of her gourd, she manages to run away and regroup with the others. But wait! It appears that Julius has taken off in his own direction. Jason manages to chase Julius up the side of a building. Once on the roof, Julius uses his boxing skills to give Jason what-for. Julius fights him for all he is worth, but just as you begin to hear the strains of the Rocky theme song playing in the background, Jason punches Julius’ head clean off his body. Now the others manage to flag a cop, but this relief is short lived. Jason appears again and kills the cop. They all pile into the officer’s car and Rennie succeeds in running Jason over. But since she is somewhat judgment impaired at this point, she actually manages to crash the thing into a brick wall. Everyone but Mrs. Van Deusen manages to make it out before the car explodes. The shocking death of her stepmother prompts Rennie to have another vision. This is where things begin to make a little more sense. When Rennie was roughly ten-years-old or so, her step-pop McCulloch tried to force her to learn how to swim. He chucked her ass into Camp Crystal Lake at which point the young mutant Jason attacked her. She has carried the traumatic memory of this event ever since. The flashback ends and Rennie and Sean run off leaving McCulloch behind. Jason gets up and dumps McCulloch inside of a barrel of green gook. He drowns naturally. He then chases Sean and Rennie into the subway. They run through a couple of the subway cars and back out onto the track. But Jason makes a misstep on that ever-perilous third rail and gets 6000 volts sent through his system. For some reason this knocks him out when we all know that electricity should actually make him stronger. Oh well. He gets up soon after and the chase renews. We are now treated to a quick tour of the sights of New York. We see some groovy shots of Times Square, Broadway and a quick little scene at Mel’s Diner. Jason finally forces the two to retreat to the sewers. They meet a sewage worker that warns them that the sewer will soon be flooded by hundreds of gallons of toxic waste. According to him, this is a nightly occurrence! Only in New York. J shows up and beats the worker down with his own monkey wrench. Rennie chucks a pale full of toxic waste into Jason’s face and our boy begins reeling in pain. He takes the mask off and we get to see his nasty-ass face melting away. He tries for one last chance to nab Rennie and Sean. Fortunately for our two little lovebirds, they manage to reach the access hatch just as the gallons of toxic waste floods the tunnel. Okay take a deep breath, here’s where it gets really fucking strange. The toxic waste washes over Jason and he actually screams “Mommy!” No, I’m not kidding. Not only that, but for some reason the toxic waste transforms Jason into a normal looking twelve year old boy! It even changes his fucking clothes for him! Jason is either dead or unconscious and remains laying on the floor as Sean and Rennie get back to the streets of New York. As the two are slowly walking off towards the horizon, Rennie’s dog Toby comes running up. Go figure. Total Body count: 18 (Although only 17 are confirmed Jason kills) Acting/Dialogue: Now Kane Hodder is considered by many to be the definitive Jason Voorhees. Unfortunately, Kane’s work is showcased in the worst of the Friday sequels. This is his second time beneath the mask and he’s bigger than all hell. Maybe a little too big? To be perfectly honest, I’m not a big fan of this casting choice. Kane is just too damn muscular to be playing this role. Jason was a fair to average sized guy during his breathing days. But as a zombie he’s fucking huge! You would think that the opposite would be in effect here. After all, he’s a rotting fucking corpse. He certainly shouldn’t be buff. Kane’s movements are too fluid and animated for this sort of a character. A zombie Jason should be more rigid and composed. Methodical even. Strangely enough, after watching a few interviews with him, I find Kane Hodder to be 100 times more frightening than Jason Voorhees could ever hope to be. The guy is just a maniac! Seriously. He’s sack of hammers; a whack-a-loon; a real nutter! Okay…disclaimer time here folks. Kane, if you happen to be reading this I want you to know that presently there is a homicidal madman standing behind me with a gun to my head forcing me to say these bad things about you. Naturally, a true horror fan such as I could NEVER believe such offensive opinions as stated above. So in lieu of my plight, please don’t hunt me down and eat my family. Well…okay. You can eat my family. But just don’t hunt ME down. ‘kay? Thanks duder. Gore: Okay, if gore could be measured based on Charles Atlas advertisements, then the material supplied in this flick would definitely be the guy getting sand kicked into his face. It’s just weak. I suspect the MPAA had their fascist fingers poking around in this particular pie. Everything is pretty conventional by this point. Half the cast is bludgeoned by blunt objects while the rest go to their graves courtesy of your standard garden-variety gut stabs. Everything is very subdued and watered down. So far as splatter cinema is concerned, this movie is a disgrace. Guilty pleasures: We get a quick flash of Suzi’s little apple titties (For what that’s worth). Tamara does a nude shower scene but we don’t really see anything. Actually we see more of her stunt double crashing into the bathroom mirror. Now as an added guilty pleasure, it’s interesting to note that Kelly Hu plays the part of Eva Watanabe. Kelly has been getting some top brass exposure lately for her contributions to the Scorpion King and X-Men 2. But here’s your chance to see Kelly 80’s style! The Good: There is very little in the way of positive opinion that I can say in regards to this movie. But the most important thing to note is that no matter how it is presented, Jason Voorhees is a beloved icon that refuses to go away quietly into the night. As of the release date of this movie, it has been nearly ten years since his inception and fans are still clamoring for more. You can take the boy out of the lake, but you can’t take the lake out of the boy. Guiltily enough, I approached the title of this movie with great zest and an equal measure of trepidation. Now taking your primary serial killer out of his native habitat is always a big no-no. This has been done several times with other characters and it never works (See Leatherface, Halloween: H20 and Freddy’s Dead for good examples). But at the same time, there is something childishly appealing about Jason taking on the Big Apple. It’s the kind of thing that pisses you off because you know that no matter what, they’ve got you hooked. It’s kind of like observing a car wreck. You don’t really WANT to look, but some primordial sadomasochistic desire for pain forces you to. Rather than wax poetic about the merits of this film, I think it would be easier to simply run down the grocery list of items that I actually did enjoy from this turkey of a movie. 1. One of the few scenes worth watching is the rooftop showdown between Julius and Jason. Now Julius realizes that he’s in a fight that he can’t win. But Julius has a real John Henry “die with my hammer in my hand” attitude about it. No matter what, he ain’t going down like no punk. Now Julius is a boxer so fisticuffs are his stock and trade. He slings a flurry of blows at Jason and you cringe listening to the dull wet crack of his knuckles slamming against Jason’s mask. His hands are bloody and raw but that doesn’t stop him. He keeps on moving. Jason remains primarily on the defensive, but I think this is more out of a sense of curiosity than anything else. Jason always seems childishly amused whenever a potential victim fights back. Even through the hockey mask he seems to have this expression as if to say “Awww look. He’s being assertive! Isn’t that cute.” Julius gives it his all until he has absolutely nothing else to give. He never backs down. In this one scene, they manage to give more depth and personality to a single character than all ten Jason films put together. 2. There’s a hilarious shot that occurs just as Jason comes up out of the river. He looks across the street where he sees a huge billboard advertising the Eastern Hockey League. The picture on the board is an over-sized shot of a goalie’s mask. Jason peers at the thing curiously and tilts his head to the side. 3. One of the deaths shows a bit of depth and symbolism. I actually have to credit the lovely Bride of Headhunter for pointing this out. You see, she was actually paying attention to the film while I was busy stuffing my face with Cheese Doodles. Jason kills Tamara by smashing her face into a mirror. He then picks up a broken shard of mirror glass and stabs her to death with it. Now considering that Tamara represents the token blonde slut archetype in this gig, it is somehow poetic that she should be killed by an object of her own vanity. Good call Mrs. H! 4. I also found the name of the luxury ship to be symbolically amusing. The ship is called the Lazarus after the character from the book of John in the New Testament. Now Lazarus was a leper who died from his wounds. But with the help of a bloke named Jesus, he rose from the dead and was able to attend a huge banquet. Now if this isn’t a parable to the character of Jason Voorhees then I don’t know what is. As far as being a social misfit, Jason can certainly be construed as leprous. And like good ole Saint Lazzy, he too rises from the dead. The banquet reference is naturally a metaphor for Jason’s victims. Although in Jason’s case, it’s more like a buffet. 5. I also liked Rennie’s little childhood flashback. Throughout the course of this turd we see her having visions of young Jason but we are not sure why. So it turns out that Rennie was attacked by frog boy when she was but a wee lass. Because of this, a surreal sort of mental connection is established between the two. Now while I feel this origin segment acts as a decent catalyst for fleshing Rennie’s character out, there’s no real sense of closure here. There is nothing in the movie that brings the relationship of the two full circle. It seems like it is thrown in there as a convenient way to prime Rennie as the provincial heroine in this flick. Oddly enough, Rennie is not the first Friday gal to have a retroactive Jason experience. This scene reminds me a lot of Chris’ foible from Friday Part 3 (She too had an historical encounter with a pre-zombie Jason prior to actually seeing her in the film). 6. And lastly, there is one final scene that makes me bust a gut every time I watch it. Jason is stomping down the sidewalk in Times Square. There are a group of punks sitting on some crates listening to rap music through a boom box. Without even breaking stride, Jason kicks the boom box shattering it. Now Jason’s a Jersey boy so it strikes me that he’s probably more of a Country-Western man. I can more readily see him whooping it up with some Hank Williams Jr. or Waylon Jennings before I can see him ‘raising the roof’ with ‘Pac or Snoop-Dog. Regardless, Jason makes his distaste for rap music very well known. The punks try and get tough with him, but Jason just raises his mask to reveal his nasty-ass face beneath. The punks are sufficiently grossed out and decide to leave him be. 7. There is an original teaser poster that I would LOVE to get my hands on. The original poster for this flick featured the classic “I love New York” print with Jason ripping through it from behind with his machete. Now as it turns out, Frank Sinatra’s people apparently copyrighted the stylized slogan “I love New York” (The one with the heart replacing the word “love”) Well Sinatra’s lawyers threw a rod and Paramount had to recall the posters. What we ended up with is a composite shot of Jason’s mask looking downward atop the city of New York. But even this concept art has gone the way of the dodo in favor of some crappy looking Photostop editor DVD box-set artwork. The Bad: This movie fucking sucks. I’m embarrassed to admit that I even watched it. Watching this movie makes me wish that I was a character from Friday the 13th Part VII. At least that way, my ass would be dead and I would’ve been spared the torment of having to subject myself to this abysmal piece of ass-trash. After suffering through this I began spinning around in circles like Linda Blair screaming, “It burns! It BURNS!” Director Rob Hedden should be strapped to a chair and forced to eat stale Moon Pies for five days straight. And after he pukes the rancid marshmallow mess onto the floor, shove some more into his goddamn hole until he pukes again. I’m talking Clockwork Orange style baby! Somebody has to PAY for the pain we were forced to endure. Now I realize that after seven films it become pretty tough to keep the Jason myth fresh and invigorating. But at the same time, Jason is easy money. Anybody can make a Jason flick! You have to actually make a concerted EFFORT to create a film as overwhelmingly shitty as this one. These things don’t happen by accident. I suppose I should have paid better attention to the flashing warning signs when I first heard of the movie’s title. As said before, taking the boy out of Camp Crystal Lake is a sure fire indicator that crappiness will ensue. Now whenever you create a film, there are certain laws that must be obeyed. You must adhere to the reality that you create. Even when dealing with fictional concepts these laws still apply. In the supplied reality of Jason Voorhees, people DO come back from the dead. Fine. It may be ridiculous in the real world but I accept it in this altered reality. However, Friday 8 does not adhere to the laws of reality set forth by its own canonical history. The most offensive example of this is the fact that Jason SWIMS to New York! Jason CANNOT swim! The entire story behind his character revolves around the fact that he cannot swim! This has been hammered into us in every goddamned movie! Even if Jason COULD swim (which he can’t) the very fact that he goes to New York is yet another bastardization of established Voorhees canon. Jason isn’t the type to just go around willy-nilly hacking people up wherever he feels like it. He only kills people who encroach upon his territory. This was established back in Friday 2! So long as you are within five miles of Camp Crystal Lake, you are considered fair game. But Jason couldn’t be arsed about a bunch of people twelve miles down the road let alone people from another state. Why does Jason go all the way to New York to get these specific people? Is it because of Rennie? Is it because she’s the one that got away? Ennnnnnt! Wrong answer! Thank you for playing. That makes about as much sense as ears on a rainbow. Voorhees is a goddamned potato-head! You think he’s going to recognize the adult version of some chick he met underwater over a decade ago? No fucking way! If you have to change your title character’s personal profile just to satisfy your gimmick, then you are a true-blue hack and have no business getting behind a camera. Hell, you don’t even deserve to OWN a camera. I don’t even want to see you at the one-hour photo in the local drug store. And speaking of ridiculously unrealistic plot contrivances, let’s talk about the boat shall we? As mentioned in the summary, Jason takes the film student guy and chucks his ass on top of some electrical equipment. Well, whoever set this stuff up is obviously not an electrician. As soon as the punk lands on the shit, sparks shoot out of it and the kid catches on fire! Now I don’t know a great deal about the physics of electricity beyond the fact that it hurts when you stick your dick into an electrical socket; but be that as it may, there is no way in hell you are going to convince me that a few sparks from some instrument panel is going to cause someone to burst into fucking flames! Not only that, but the fire engulfs the rest of the ship within seconds. Now fire can be pretty fast, of that I have no doubt. But give me a fucking break. Once again, Rob Hedden throws caution (as well as plausibility) to the wind in favor of moving the plot along. Oh and let me speak up for a brief moment concerning our friendly neighborhood Doomsayer. Does this character archetype have to appear in EVERY single Jason movie? It was cool in the first two flicks, and it was an amusing in-joke in Part 3. But now it has become an overplayed gag that has long since run its course. I bet Hedden is one of those guys that goes to college dorm parties and repeatedly does the “Pull my finger” trick even though it stopped being funny in the sixth grade. Enough with the Doomsayers already. Ahhh…but now we come to New York herself. This movie may as well double as a Manhattan travel brochure since it effectively illustrates every single stereotype that has ever been made about New York. Now I know that many of you may find this a bit of a hard pill to swallow, but not everyone meets a mugger as soon as they set foot in the Big Apple. It’s not like you cross the Lincoln tunnel and are instantly greeted by the New York welcoming committee waving a gun and saying “Gimme your money.” Sure, there are a lot of muggers in New York. There are muggers in every city. But this was a poor and cheaply crafted way to segue into the second act of this film. On top of that, we also have the stereotypical New York diner. This is the kind of place where all the waitresses are middle-aged divorcees with smoker’s cough and thick makeup that makes them look like two-dollar crack whores. There is also a scene on a New York City subway. This scene wouldn’t be so bad if not for the fact that it plays up on another famous stereotype. There’s this mentality in movies that seems to suggest that nothing strange ever fazes a New Yorker. After all…this is ‘New fulking Yawk’ right? These guys have seen it all. Now while I’m apt to believe that many New Yorkers have probably seen their fair share of oddities, credibility is stretched just a tad when a seven foot, moss-covered, ass-smelling, blood-soaked rotting fucking corpse with a hockey mask and a machete can stroll down the street without anyone batting an eye. Let’s get back to the muggers shall we? I only want to harp on this issue for a bit, because this scene includes a particularly idiotic death. Mugger #1 is trying to rape Rennie. Jason comes up behind him, picks up a spent hypodermic needle and drives it into the guy’s back. Now since the needle is empty, it really becomes nothing more than a stabbing weapon. Stabbing a guy in the back with an empty needle isn’t going to cause instantaneous death. But that’s not why I hate this scene so much. The needle actually manages to penetrate the other side of the guy’s body. A good inch and a half of the thing comes poking out through the guy’s chest. What the fuck kind of needle is this? First off, the thing would have broken off long before it ever reached the sternum. Secondly, it would have to be at least twelve inches long just to get through the guy. Not to mention the fact that we see the front of it sticking out of him (suggesting a length longer than twelve inches). I’d hate to see what Jason would do to a guy if he had a dildo in his hand. But sadly, the absurdity of this film does not stop with the super-syringe. The final leg of this miserable venture is so unbelievably ridiculous that even the folks at Troma would be loathe to endorse it. First off, I’m still perplexed by this whole sewer thing. The tunnel worker tells Sean and Rennie that the tunnel is flooded at 10 pm every night with gallons of toxic waste. Is this standard waste disposal in New York? Does Rudy Giuliani know about this? I was going to cut you New Yorkers some slack, but after learning about this I’m not so sure. Why do you guys sling toxic waste through your sewers? That’s not cool! No wonder you guys have mutant alligators living underground. Knock that shit off! Now as incomprehensible as the nightly toxic flooding may be, it doesn’t hold a candle to what comes next. Jason gets bathed in the toxic slop and transforms into a normal healthy looking young boy. Not only is Jason a little kid again, but also he’s sporting a crisp clean pair of BVDs to boot. Shades of Geppetto! Excuse my French but what the FUCK is this about? This is without a doubt hands down the shittiest ending to a movie ever! Is this supposed to be some kind of metaphorical allegory to something? If it is, then I’ll be damned if I can figure out what it’s supposed to be. There is no way you can twist Hedden’s pretzel-logic in a way that makes any degree of sense. Please. I dare anyone to try and justify this retarded fucking climax. And even if you CAN justify it, I don’t care because it’s still fucking stupid. In an effort to reinvent the wheel, Rob Hedden actually ends up throwing the fucker up on cement blocks. Thanks to YOU Rob, I am now forced to give a Friday the 13th movie a LOWER rating than that chunk of shit Swimfan! Fuck you. Great Lines: “Take your best shot motherfucker!” --Julius’ last words right before he gets his ticket punched. “This voyage is doomed!” --These idiotic doomsayers all say the same shit. No wonder Jason kills them. He’s probably sick of hearing their rhetoric. Overall Rating: 2 out of 10 severed heads |
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