MY SUMMERS WITH THE VOORHEES FAMILY:
PART 1:THE BIRTH , EVOLUTION AND DEATH OF A HORROR ICON

In 1980 Paramount pictures and Sean Cunningham unleashed on the world one of the most loved and at the same time , most reviled horror franchises of all time . With the original FRIDAY THE 13TH they gave to us a film that would spawn 11 sequels , novels , comic books , a T.V series and a ton of tie in merchandise . Since its humble beginnings as a low budget slasher inspired by such films as HALLOWEEN , TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE and the under appreciated movie it borrows most from Mario Bava's TWITCH OF THE DEATH NERVE (aka BAY OF BLOOD) , it has managed to gross over $465 million worldwide at the box office.
Its often cited as the catalyst for the slasher movie boom of the 1980's where studios released countless imitations trying to strike the same box office gold as F13 but most paled in comparison , the sequels themselves , save for a couple of films and despite the increasing box office earnings never came close to the original.
Whether your a huge fan or a casual viewer who occasionally watches a movie here and there or you absolutely hate them , no one can deny the impact this franchise has had on the horror world and pop culture in general, even if they have never watched any of the movies almost everyone knows who Jason is and know where the now iconic CHEE HEE HA HA refrain on the soundtrack are from.
This is part 1 in a 3 part series covering the films. For better or worse here it is, my impressions of FRIDAY THE 13TH and its sequels , 3 of which i could safely say would make my top 50 all time favorites list(if i were to make one) .Enjoy.



FRIDAY THE 13TH (1980)

Sometime in the spring of 1980 I was looking at a copy of the newest FAMOUS MONSTERS OF FILMLAND magazine at the local convenience store , in that particular issue they had an article about an upcoming horror movie called FRIDAY THE 13Th , it looked really cool and it struck a nerve with me . As my young, impressionable teenage eyes poured over the gory pictures contained within the article, i thought to myself this is neat, i need to ask mom to take me to see this when it comes around , well sometime later, on SISKLE AND Ebert's show they totally ripped this movie a new butthole , they said it was sick and disgusting, a total piece of trash and even went as far as to say the producers should be ashamed , it was sick sick sick!!! We the public should stay away at all costs. Well that sealed it , i really knew then that i had to see this movie and soon! Time to sweet talk mom because it was going to be playing at the drive in starting next weekend , lets hope she will be cool about it. .
Right from the start this movie lets you know what your in for , a dark night , full moon ,kids around the campfire singing while a young couple sneaks off to do what kids that age do, and right in the middle of the act their lives are snuffed out by an unseen maniac. Yep folks this is where it all began , all the cliches of the slasher film are here , only at this time it wasn't cliche , it was new to all of us and if like me , you were lucky enough to catch this movie during its initial release, you thought wow! this is different ! This is f''n cool! Its scary (well , when it came out i was 13 years old so it was scary to me at the time) its bloody , plus the way the killer is not revealed until the last 15 min . of the movie is cool and the ending will make you poop yourself , one of the best jump scares ever.
We find out that years after the killings in the opening , someone is going to re-open the summer camp ,the locals don't like it , they should just keep it closed , that place has a death curse they say, of course no one listens , after all if they did we wouldn't have a movie. Annie , a young lady we find out is going to be the cook at the camp strolls into town, she asks some folks in the local diner if they can point her in the right direction, a trucker in the diner offers her a ride part of the way , in the truck he tells her to go back home don't go to the camp , she doesn't listen. After exiting the truck she is soon picked up by another driver ,we never see the drivers face , they soon pass by the road that they are supposed to turn on and the vehicle speeds up , getting scared Annie jumps out of the car and takes off running through the woods , all the while being stalked by our unknown villain , Annie trips and falls and as shes getting up the killer is in front of her and Annie pleads for her life , it doesn't help , she is backed up to a tree , a hand holding a knife comes up and slits her throat , poor Annie. Cool effect how did they do that? WOW! this just keeps getting better! Teen after teen gets systematically slaughtered, axe to the head , arrow in the throat and other various , inventive ways are used to dispatch the kids, awesome! I'm eating this up! Thanks mom your the best!
In the days before Jason Voorhees put on the hockey mask , there was Pamela Voorhees , big J's mother , hell bent on revenge because the counselors at Camp Crystal Lake were boozing and whoring instead of watching the children. Because of them her young , mentally handicapped son Jason , drowned . Now she will have her revenge, she will kill them all she vows., and she nearly does too but right in the middle of all this vengeance along comes a girl named Alice who inconveniently lops off Mrs. Voorhees head with a machete to end the killing spree , the end ,well not exactly.
Morning comes , the sun rises and Alice ,who has been sleeping in a boat drifting in the middle of the lake all night awakes , she spots the policeman on the bank of the lake , she's safe now , everything is o.k , then WHAM!! ARRRGGGG!!!! This ugly little ,moldy ,rotting shit kid jumps out of the lake and drags her under the water and we the audience throw our popcorn , drinks and candy all over the car and/or movie theater. COOL! Not since the ending of Carrie had there been a scare that made me jump like that , and sadly not many since. Next we see Alice , our hero, in a hospital bed "the boy , wheres the boy" she asks "Ma'am , we dint find a boy" says the policeman and the credits roll. Cool movie , I'm glad i talked my mom into taking us (me and my friend Brandon Hemrick)to see it , she even thought it was pretty good too , she enjoyed horror movies also , that's where i got my love for the genre from , she didn't even mind all the food and drink all over the interior of the car from our little scare at the end. This was bold ,bloody and the dawn of a new era in horror , aided by makeup maestro Tom Savini's ground breaking FX it blazed a gory trail for the slasher film and we loved it. We didn't realize it yet but we would spend more summers with the Voorhees family.



FRIDAY THE 13TH PART 2(1981 )
Around a year or so after being thrilled by F13 I'm sitting in front of the TV late one Sat. night watching SNL and a commercial catches my eye , OH SHIT!! I exclaim FRIDAY THE 13TH part 2! Its coming out in a couple of weeks! Time to start sweet talking mom again. Well once again shes cool about it and she takes me and Brandon to see it at , this time its playing at the theater on the north end of town , i was a little disappointed that it wasn't on at the drive in because i loved going there, but ill take what i can get and i was soon in my seat with my popcorn,drink and box of raisenettes.
The theater goes dark and i soon forget about the drive in. After a couple of coming attractions the movie begins , a pair of combat boots step off a curb into a puddle , chee hee ha ha, we hear the familiar sound that lets us know the killer is near, but who is it ? Mrs. Voorhees , the killer in the first movie is dead , no head , nope it cant be her. A phone rings and we see Alice the lone survivor from the first film , she answers the phone , its her parents , she has a brief conversation then goes to the kitchen , she hears a noise outside , she investigates , nothing oh well just nerves i guess , she leans over to close an open window and a cat bolts though and enters the kitchen , it startles us and Alice , good scare . She turns to get milk from the fridge to give the kitty , opens the door and GASP! there in all its gory glory is Mrs Voorhees head , mouth open like she was frozen mid scream , dried blood around the nose and mouth , Alice screams , suddenly a hand covers her mouth and she gets a icepick shoved into her temple , all she went through to survive that night , the running , the hiding , the anguish of discovering her friends dead , the fight she put up to get away from the killer , all for nothing , shes now dead too. Cool start this is going to be good i thought.
A counselor training camp is opening on the other side of Crystal Lake a few miles from where the original bloodbath took place , night falls and the group of teens are gathered around a camp fire are told the legend of Camp Blood , as the original camp is now known by the locals , they are also told they better stay away, its off limits.
After they hear the tale of the slayings half the kids leave to go to a bar to blow off some steam , the others stay behind at the camp and are soon killed by a maniac in various ways , machete to the face , two young lovers speared mid sex, claw hammer to the back of the head , this time though its not as shocking as before , a lot less blood , apparently the MPAA made them tone it down some, and the fact that Tom Savini didn't return to do the fx made this one seem a tad lackluster compared to the first movie.
Now comes the important part , this is where HE comes in , we find out that the killer is Jason , apparently he wasn't dead after all , he has been living in the woods all these years and he witnessed his mothers death and he deals with it the only way his warped mind knows how to , by killing. Not to long after Jason kills off all the teens that stayed behind at the camp the two head counselors Paul and Ginny return and discover the mess J. has left , they , much like Alice are soon running through the woods trying to escape the killer , they happen upon a dilapidated cabin and inside they find a shrine with lit candles , dead bodies all over and right there in the center of it all Pamela Voorhees head and sweater, Jason has created a sick alter to worship his fallen mother.
Jason soon arives , a potato sack with eye holes cut in it is used as a mask to cover his hideous face, Paul and Jason go at it , a fight for survival , during the struggle Ginny whacks Jason with a machete , he falls to the ground , Ginny removes the mask from the killer , we dont see what they do but the look on their faces tells us all we need to know , they leave the make shift home thinking the nightmare is over, is it? Dont bet on it kids. The two weary survivors head back to thier camp trying to make sense of the whole night , Ginny is sitting on the bed , Paul is pacing around the room , both in shock from the events of the evening , they hear a noise at the door OH NO! HES BACK ! in walks Terri's dog Muffin who has been missing the last few hours , they are both releaved and relax a little , suddenly SMASH! ARRRGGG!!! Jason crashes through the window , sack now gone , we see his deformed visage , ugly , scraggly hair , all mongoloid looking with one eye lower than the other , nasty. A dissolve and we see Ginny being loaded into an ambulance no Paul , no Jason . The credits roll. Even though it didnt measure up to the 1st this was still a fun movie and in the end i was happy , and thats all that matterd. I had a good time at camp that summer.


FRIDAY THE 13TH PART 3(1982 )
Another winter comes and goes and its almost time for summer vacation , i cant wait to have a couple of months off with nothing to do but hang out with my friends and one thing was already planed. We had recently heard a new chapter in the F13 series was going to be released that summer and that was cool enough but what really got us excited was the fact that we heard it was going to be in 3D ! WOW! Blood flying from the screen , severed body parts being loped off and appearing to land in our laps and other grisly effects filled our brains , the anticipation of what we were going to see was soon the everyday topic in my circle of friends, this was going to be awesome!!
Well school let out for the summer and we waited and waited for what seemed like forever in our impatient teenage minds and finally the time came , on Aug.13th the 3D event of our lifetime was unleashed on the horror world. This time mom for some reason i cant remember , couldnt take us but Dad stepped up to bat and said he would go , so dad , me and Brandon piled into his 1975 AMC Gremlin X and off we went to the Northgate Plaza cinema. We get there and the line waiting to get in is HUGE , we wait about 15 min. and someone from the theater comes out and informs us that both showings are sold out for the night, DAMN!! We go back to the car ,heads down , dissapointed that we didnt get to see the movie , Dad being cool tells us he will bring us back tomorrow and try again , at least there was light at the end of the tunnel. Saturday arrives and i wake up early in anticipation of seeing the movie , we decide we will go to the 1pm screening and we will get there an hour early at 12, when we get there another long line is outside the theater but nothing like the night before, we wait , butterflys in our guts wondering will we get in this time or not ? We finally get to the window and WOOHOO!! we get our tickets and a pair of 3d glasses for the three of us , we make our way to the concession stand for our provisions then its inside to find our seats. As the movie begins we are back to the ending of the 2nd film with Ginny and Paul battling Jason , the makers for whatever reason choose not to include the glass shattering jump scare at the end of part 2 and insted we have Jason pick him self up off the floor of his cabin , machete in hand and off he goes to start the killing again , then the camera zooms in for a close up of the shrine with Pamela Voorhees rotting head perched on top and the credits start , and what credits they are! Shooting from the severd heads eye sockets , jumping off the screen and stopping just before they appear to hit you in the face! Incredible ! The score this time was a take on the original theme with a blaring disco /breakdance beat thumping loudly , different from what we were used to but cool. This is going to be awesome!
After the amazing opening i was ready to witness the greatest movie ever made , it just had to be after that! Cut to a home in the Crystle Lake area , time line wise it is immediatly following the end of the last film , a woman is watching the local news, the news caster , played by Director Steve Miner , is detailing the grisely events of pt.2 . Her husband is in the couples general store feeding rabbits and eating the merchandise , the couple are unaware that Jason is lurking just outside their doors. They soon enough find out though as the womam gets a large knitting needle shoved into her , the husband a meat cleaver to the chest , population reduction at its finest , this community will be desolate if Jason has his way.
Now its time to meet the teenagers who will be Jasons victims for the evening , this time the kids are not camp councelors like the first 2 films but rather a van full of folks lead by a girl named Chris , who are going to party at her chilhood home that is located on Crystal Lake. While on their way to the house they pass the store where the couple were killed earlier , as the van slows down they look out the windows and they see body bags being loaded into an ambulance , then they come apon a man lying asleep in the middle of the road , the group of friends get out of the vehicle to asess the situation and the man leeps up off the dirt road brandishing a human eyeball thrusting it outward , a 3d effect with the orb wiggling and jiggling off the screen and into the theater audience and the old man saying something about the place he found it having other body parts strown all over the place , they hightail it back to the van and as they drive away the old coot , much like the profit of doom Ralph in the first two movies , he yells to the kids " He wanted me to warn you! Look apon this omen and go back from whence thee came! Ive warned thee! Ive warned thee!" Do they listen? What do you think?
They soon arive at the house and meet up with Rick an old boyfriend of Chris .
After a bit of milling around the place the peacful scene is inturupted by a scream inside the house , the kids run up stairs to investigate and from an old closet Shelly falls out with a hatchet buried in his head , but we find out its a joke , Shelly is a prankster always trying to fool the others. After a little bitching and moaning about how the prank was stupid and juvenile , Shelly and a girl Vera go to a store and encounter 3 bikers , Shelly ends up running over the gangs motorcycles and they flee the scene.
After more lighthearted 3d scenes such as yo yos and popcorn popping from the screen we find out the bikers have arived at the house and intend to burn down the barn , but before they can do thee deed they encounter Jason and he puts an end to their plans.
Now finally the movie kickes into gear and becomes a F13 film we are used to , the kids are killed off in various gruesome ways , a slit throat , one is split in half with a machete , one a knife to the neck , another gets an arrow in the eye , an eletrocution for another , one is ran through with a fireplace poker and in the main 3d death scene Rick gets his head squeezed until his eyball pops out and it flies through the air zooming out of the screen and comes straight into the audience , zooming passed our heads , all pretty cool , but now , in hind site all this takes a back seat to the fact that this is the movie where Jason aquires his iconic hockey mask , he gets it after he kills Shelly who earlier used it in a prank on Vera . After all is said and done Chris is the lone survivour and like the other films she runs around trying to escape the killer and in the end she delivers an axe to the head of the maniac . Chris then takes a boat out on the lake and the next morning awakes and sees Jason peering out of a window in the upstairs portion of the house , he quickly makes his way outside and as Chris screams the rotting corpse of Pamela Voorhees jumps out of the water and drags Chris under , a fade out and next we see Chris being put into a police car freaking out and screaming , cut to the barn and Jason is lying on the ground with the axe in his head, cut to the lake and bubbles appear in the water. So what actually happened in the last few minutes of the film ? Was it real , was it a dream ? We are never told and it is of course left open for a sequal . A strange ending indeed but maybee it was because orginally the ending was supposed to be Chris being beheaded by Jason but for some reason at the urging of the actress playing Chris it was scrapped , there is some footage of the original ending and some stills to be found if you look around the net. Well , was it the best movie ever , hell no , not even the best of the series, but in my opinion this ranks as my 3rd favorite of the franchise , part 1 being my # 2 fave and my # 1 fave being.....................


FRIDAY THE 13TH PART 4: THE FINAL CHAPTER(1984 )
Well here we go again this time we have to wait awile for the newest instalment , all the others were realeased around a year apart , with pt.4 we had to wait almost 2 years for a new flick , this one coming out April 13th 1984 . With such a long delay in its release people were either saying it sucks so bad they dont want to release it or they really took their time trying to make the best film of the series. The later actually being the reason for the longer wait , it seems that there were several script revisions including endless discussions on how to end the film , one version that was talked about and scrapped was apparently concieved by fx guru Tom Savini , back again to give us the gore we crave , in Savini's ending Jason has his head blown up by our hero Tommy using a lamp he re-wired , smasing it onto Jasons head and turning up the voltage until BOOOM!!! Im glad they scrapped that one it sounds kinda goofy.
The memory of going to see this one for some reason are kind of fuzzy , i do remember going once again to the Nortgate plaza Twin Cinema theater to see it and i think i was with a couple of different friends but the details escape me this time. What i do know is that this was by far my favorite F13 film . We start out with the campfire scene in Friday pt.2 and a brief synopsis of the events of what has transpired in the 1st 3 films and then we pick up immediatly at the ending of part 3 with police and news crews swarming all over the farm from the last film , the EMT's load Jasons body into the ambulance and take him to the morgue and we meet morgue attendent Axel , who seems to get off watching aerobic exercise shows , soon after a couple of bad jokes and a silly jump scare and Axel trying to seduce a young nurse with Jasons body close by , Axel finds out our favorite slasher is indeed NOT dead when he cuts the docs neck with a surgical hacksaw and then finishes the job by twisting his head off , he then proceeds to kill the young nurse and makes his getaway to once again reek havoc in the Crystal Lake community.
We are then introduced to the cast / victims of the movie , a station wagon full of kids going to a vaction home to party and the next door neighbors , the Jarvis family , the youngest being Tommy , a fx / monster mask making enthusiest , played by the soon to be teen star Corey Fieldman . In the car Teddy played by Lawrence Monsoon (THE LAST AMERICAN VIRGIN) is having a discusion about sex , or lack there of , with the great Crispin Glover who gives his usual wacky perfomance as a sex starved socially akward teen named Jimmy . While Teddy is explaining to Jimmy the reason for his lack of sexual activity is because he is a "dead fuck" , an attempt at humor that falls a tad short , the vehicle full of teens passes a hitchhiker whom Jason sneeks up behind and shoves a knife into , i guess she wont make it to her destination.
Ater the kids arrive at the house we are introduced to 3 more characters/ victims . While the partiers are on their way to go skinny dipping in Crystal lake they meet twins Terri and Tina , and we are introced to hunter/camper Rob when he stops to help the Jarvis' when they have car trouble , we learn that Rob is hunting for Jason to get revenge for the death of his sister , who was supposedly killed by Crystal lakes most wanted .
Later the gang are back at the house partying and Jimmy , in a truly hilarious scene, does a dance to a bad heavy metal record , this scene still gets a big laugh out of me to this day , it was said that this was not originaly in the script but that Glover , as he often does on his films , improvised it on the spot . The kids then all go their seperate ways , some pairing up for the inevetable sex scenes. This of couse setting up situations so they can be knocked off one at a time by the masked maniac .
This time for the most part , the killings are not overly gory , a girl floating in the water is stabbed from beneath her raft , her boyfriend when he discovers her dead body , is stabbed in the crotch with a spear gun , ones head is crushed against the wall while in the shower , his girl recieves an axe to the chest , post sex of course , you know the rules , one of the twins is impaled and stuck to the side of the house with a spear , we only see the shadow of the act , the other twin in a brutal but bloodless scene is thrown from a second story bedroom window and lands on top of a car absolutley destroying it in the process , this is again post coitus , she just did the deed with deadfuck Jimmy who while in the kitchin gets his hand pinned to the countertop with a corkscrew then recieves a meatcleaver to the face , and poor Teddy who has been by himself down stairs watching old stag films and getting high is stabbed from behined in the head. Mrs. Jarvis is apparently killed off screen , we see her get startled by Jason and we are left to our on imagination to ponder what gruesome end she met. Rob the hunter , is soon taken care of by being beaten to death in the Jarvis basement while trying to help brother and sis , Tommy and Trish escape.
Now down to only two survivors , we have the obligitory running around trying to escape the killer stuff and as soon is that is out of the way the duo are seperated , Tommy in attempt to use some psycology on the killer shaves his head and uses makeup to try and make himself look like a young Jason from a police sketch in an old newspaper article , Trish is downstairs and is eventualy cornerd by the maniac , she slices his hand with a machete and after he asseses the damage he is right back after her , but don't fret folks little brother with his freshly shaved head and mascara comes to the rescue , he hits Jason in the head with the machete exposing his hideous face , then he takes the weapon and buries it deep into his skull , big J. falls to the floor and in the most gruesome scene of the film , his face slides down the length of the blade , twisting , distorting and making all kinds of disgusting noises , Tommy then completly goes nuts and takes the machete and chops the monster repeatedly with Trish screaming and beging him to stop.
Cut to a hospital , big sis Trish is lying in a hospital bed and is discusing Tommy's freak out with the doc , he is explaing the psycology of it to her assuring her he'll eventually be ok , Tommy enters her hospital room , they embrace and Tommy opens his eyes wide with a crazed look on his face and the movie fades and the credits roll.
This was really supposed to be the final installment , Paramount and the producers said they had done all they could do with the series and thought they brought it to a fitting , satisfying end and it was over , but we all now know that wasnt to be and now here we are more than 30 years later with 10 sequels and a remake/reimagining and another film which will be #13 seriously in discussion.

Thanks for reading i hope you enjoyed it , coming soon (hopefully) part 2 where i discuss parts 5-8 and part 3 covering JASON GOES TO HELL - the 2009 remake.

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PARANORMAL ACTIVITY(2007)
This movie starts with a man purchasing a camera to record the paranormal phenomena that he and his girlfriend have been experiencing at night. As the film progresses, the ghostly happenings become more intense until they eventually turn very aggressive and physical , all the while the camera documents the ever intensifying terror the young couple experience. Alot of people passed this off as just another BLAIR WITCH knock off and while yes there are similarities there are no more here than in any other film of the genre, most films after all are inspired by another movie , even the the best films out there give a tip of the hat to something else. What it does have in common with BLAIR WITCH besides the handheld camera thing is the subtle use of noises and other small things happening in a low key way and then slightly getting more intense as the movie moves along until BAM ! at the end a big shock and the movie is over. Ive said before that I'm a sucker for these cinema verite / handheld camera movies so i really enjoyed this. It just goes to show you don't need a billion dollars and butt loads of special effects to make an entertaining movie , a good story will do more for a film than anything else.


PARANORMAL ACTIVITY 2(2010)
With part 2 we get , time line wise, a prequel but in reality its more of a tie in with the first film that kinda of meshes the 2 movies together to make one story that intertwines and overlaps both films , in fact if someone would edit the two movies together it would make one hell of a film. . It does a good job explaining whats going on within the movies and why the haunting is happening to this particular family .This movie concerns a family, the mother who is the sister of the girl in the first PA , who start to experience strange ,seemingly ghostly happenings in their home. Like the first movie it starts out slowly and gradually builds to a horrifying climax, all the while the events are being captured on security cameras placed in the house. Over all this is a little slower than the first film and there is not as many intense moments , however to me,the one thing that made this a little more cringe worthy than the 1st, is the fact that the haunting is centered around the family's infant son , it really creates an effective sense of dread when you think something is going to happen to the baby.Over all this is a good franchise with both films complementing each other very well. I recommend that you watch both movies together to get the full effect of terror.


TRAILER PARK OF TERROR(2008)
This is one of the many zombie/comedies released in the last 10 years and like most of the others its a pretty lackluster affair , this whole zom/com or whatever catchy little thing they are calling the genre these days is beyond played out, as a matter of fact it was never very good to begin with .
Anyway the story here is about a busload of troubled teens and their Priest / chaperone who are returning from a camping field trip that was cut short because of bad thunderstorms , they have a wreck and are stranded in the middle of nowhere . They seek refuge in a trailer park that they happen upon, much to their horror it is full of hillbilly zombies who end up offing the field trippers in various gruesome ways , the best of which is a sex scene with a female zombie riding the priest and in mid coitus she rips his head from his body. This movie features a rockabilly guitar playing zombie , hooker zombies and a guest appearance by country singer Trace Adkins , his brief scene as the devil , along with the gore scenes , are the best things this movie have going for it. Apparently this is also based on a comic book of the same name.


TOWER OF BLOOD(2005)
This tries real hard to be a 1980's style slasher and i guess in a lot of ways it is , its cheap , cheesy and stupid , filled with really bad acting ,dumb dialog terrible music and cheap gore just like all of the direct to video FRIDAY THE 13TH and HALLOWEEN knock offs released in the 80's. In this disasterpiece a group teenagers that all look to be 30ish, go to an abandoned high rise to party ,while there they encounter an escaped mental patient with a machete , so I'm sure you can guess what happens next , yep that's right ,the teens partake in sex, drugs and alcohol and are slaughtered by the masked wearing maniac.
So if you've ever watched more than 2 or 3 slasher movies this has absolutely nothing new to add to the genre. Besides being completely unoriginal , this thing has an insanely short running time , i guess i shouldn't complain about that though since that means i wasn't being forced to endure anymore of this crud , but the running time is 80 min., the opening credits are 5 min . of elevator doors opening and closing , the credits and a really bad nu metal rap rock song, then through out the movie there are long scenes of people sweeping , running and doing other mundane stuff with more of those crappy nu metal songs , then the actual movie ends at the 70 min mark and the credits roll for 10 min. with more bad music, so in reality there is only about 55 min. of actual story. This is crud , don't bother with this mess.


MY SOUL TO TAKE(2010)
Wes Craven returns to the world of teen horror with not so successful results ,Ive never been a huge fan of his anyway so i wasn't expecting a whole lot going in to this. He has a very sizable following out there but even his fans were disappointed with this for the most part , this thing was also ripped to shreds by many a critic during its theatrical run , and i can see why both felt the way they did about this movie.
There are a million reasons to absolutely hate this , it misses the mark in so many ways but for some reason i just cant hate it , i tried ,but something wont let me. Its filled with some of the most obnoxious teens ever seen , if my kids ever were to act like this id give them away to crackheads, most of the characters are total pieces of trash assholes and it also has one of the most confusing , twisting, turning , no sense making plots ever in the history of film. My head still hurts from trying to figure out what the hell happened . Craven just tries too hard to be clever and it just doesn't work,
In the town of Riverton there is a serial killer on the loose , he is caught in the act of slaughtering his family and is shot by the police , on his way to the hospital the ambulance crashes and catches fire , they find the gurney he was being transported on but no Riverton Ripper is to be found , he is presumed dead , believed to be drowned in the river. Jump ahead 16 years and we find out 7 children were born the same night the Ripper dies ,and now every year on the anniversary of his death these kids hold a ceremony commemorating the end of his reign of terror by destroying a dummy of his likeness, but this time they are interrupted by police and never finish the ritual and legend says if they don't destroy the dummy the Ripper will return to kill the 7 kids.
Pretty soon the children start to die and we are supposed to wonder has the Ripper returned or is one of the teens possessed by his spirit , even when its over we don't really get a real explanation.
Besides being confusing this is very derivative of other Craven films . Parts of NIGHTMARE ON ELM STREET, SCREAM and SHOCKER are all somewhat Incorporated into this. Cravens attempt a humor also falls flat , its all just very awkwardly done . Also another reason this was disliked so much was that it was released theatrically in 3d but there are no scenes that justify a 3d release ,so people were pissed they paid the extra $ for the tickets . Now all that being said and with the above statement about the horrible teen characters , the one plus here is the actor who plays Bug, the main focus of the movie and in the end our hero , this guy does a great job and is extremely likable and because of that one thing this is somehow watchable , i cant understand it , being there are so many negatives here but i still enjoyed it. That much like the plot twists has also left me confused. My brain hurts.

CROC(2007) A giant man eating crocodile is gobbling up people in a tourist area in Thailand and Michael Madsen is a hunter out to stop him , he is helped by a foreigner who owns a croc farm/animal refuge. A subplot has the croc farm owner being framed by a local land developer who wants the land his refuge is on to expand the resort he is building. The subplot is thankfully only around through half the film as the land developer and his cronies are eaten by the carnivorous reptile , we then are able to focus fully on the hunt for the beast. This is one of those nature runs wild films that often seem to play on weekends on the SYFY CHANNEL . It was originally released in Canada on an on demand movie channel and has the feel of an 80's straight to video movie. While this could definitely be improved upon it is still a decent movie with a few good gore effects. Not a bad way to spend 90 min. It is available in a 3 disc set with SEA BEAST and SHARK SWARM, 2 more SYFY CHANNEL films, that you can pick up fairly cheap.

SEA BEAST(2008) This one starts with a fishing vessel caught in a storm, which is obviously a model ship in a pool, one of the crew members goes overboard and the crew assumes he was swept off by a wave but us and the captain see that he was taken by some kind of monster, the beast then latches onto the ship and follows them back into port where it starts to reek havoc in the small fishing community when it begins dining on the locals. Not a horrible movie but it comes close, the story itself is not so awful but the special effects are down right atrocious , so bad in fact that they almost sink this thing to the bottom of the sea. I'm not a fan of CGI in the first place and this film is a perfect example of why , the monster looks like some bad cartoon rendering superimposed on top of the film stock , totally out of place. That on top of the fact that we never get an explanation of what the creature is or where it comes from and that this movie is supposed to be about a sea beast and this thing spends more time on land stalking its prey than in the water , makes this one extremely flawed film with tons of plot holes. The only positive are a few gore scenes . You can Watch if you like but my advise , don't go into the water.

YETI (2008) aka Curse of the snow demon

Yet another entry in the MAN EATER SERIES by the SYFY CHANNEL and GENIUS ENTERTAINMENT , this one directed by Paul Ziller who the same year gave us the far superior LOCH NESS TERROR. While on a plane to Japan to compete in the countries first college bowl game , a Virginia football team crashes in the Himalayas ( which by the way you wouldnt fly over if you were on the way to Japan from the US). Besides the fight for survival against the elements and the worries of if they will be rescued or not the survivors of the crash are soon under attack by a hungry Yeti who has a taste for human flesh. The college students are led by star quarterback Peyton Elway (damn , thats terrible) through a series of events after the crash such as being forced to contemplate the canniblism of their dead teamates and how that act would effect and alter the rest of their lives , what to do about the unrelinting attacks by the monster and eventually the rescue of one of the cheerleaders who was kidnapped by the beast. This has a couple of good grisly moments such as a survivor using a severed arm as a splint for his broken leg and people being torn apart and eaten by the Yeti and while the gore is executed fairly well the Yeti itself is not , sometimes its a man in bad make up and other times they use horrible CGI effects , mainly when the monster is running or jumping ,and like the INCREDIBLE HULK this thing is given super powers and is able to jump 50 feet in a single bound. Like most SYFY productions its watchable with decent acting but its nothing special. Also for some reason the DVD release contains the tv soundtrack in which the cursing is edited out , while no cursing is no big deal its obviously edited because you can read the lips of the actors and tell what they originaly said , it just seems sloppy.