Halloween Marathon:Freddy vs. Jason (2003)

Suffice to say that I’m pretty happy that this is nearing the end of the franchise for me.  Jason X gave me glimmers of hope that this franchise can still go in the campy fun area and really roll with it.  Next up is the 11th in the Friday the 13th franchise and something like the 8th in the Nightmare on Elm Street one.  I haven’t seen any Nightmare on Elm Street and till 2 years ago I didn’t even know how to differentiate between Jason Voorhees, Michael Myers and Freddy Kreuger and which franchise they went with, nor did I know what it was about.  I’m a bit more knowledgable now especially after this one because I will be experiencing the first time who Freddy Kreuger is while continuing this crazy Friday the 13th journey 🙂

Lets hope its a good one, right? Especially since next year, I’m betting that I’ll be doing the Nightmare on Elm Street franchise provided I find all the movies.

 Director: Ronny Yu

Cast: Robert Englund, Ken Kirzinger, Monica Keena, Jason Ritter, Kelly Rowland, Chris Marquette, Brendan Fletcher, Katharine Isabelle, Lochlyn Munro

Freddy Kreuger (Robert Englund) has been stuck in hell for a long time.  He’s decided to hatch a plan using Jason Voorhees (Ken Kirzinger) to bring back the terror into the kids and teens of Elm Street. Their fear and remembering him will strengthen him.  Except Freddy never imagined Jason to go on an uncontrollable killing spree which leads them to not only leave a blood trail separately but eventually they have to fight each other because either won’t step aside easily.

I’m a bit stuck on how to review this one.  For one, how can I evaluate Freddy when this is one of the later movies (need to check that).  However, as a movie which is supposed to follow that horrific 9th movie where Freddy’s arm shows up to pull Jason to hell, this does tons better.  I think it has to do with the whole being a more recent movie.  Freddy Kreuger is an interesting character and I’m definitely down to watch the Nightmare on Elm Street franchise.  If anything, his burnt distorted face and the premise of entering dreams and killing is an effective one.

Freddy vs Jason is one of the better ones out of the last few I’ve seen.  I had a really good time with it.  Its way excessively bloodier than the others.  Jason goes on killing spree but we get to see how he does it brutally.  There’s never a lot of blood.  If there is blood, its shielded by the rainy weather or the dark surroundings.  This one is different.  I put an example below.

Two crazy men in their ways lusting over killing and both unkillable in their own senses makes this a pretty good flick to watch.  Plus, the idea of tying a new scenario like Elm Street and then going back to the roots in Camp Crystal Lake gives familiarity to both sides of the fans and a refreshing moment for Friday the 13th.  In the 11th film, after travelling to space and all, its a refreshing moment.

For me, the highlight and familiarity came in the director Ronny Yu.  While most of you on the blogasphere is familiar with these iconic horror figures in your youth, I was a child surrounded with Hong Kong films.  Ronny Yu has contributed some good and memorable 90s movies.  I’ve never seen him do something in the horror but I think he brings a nice style to it 🙂

The rest of the cast being teens from Elm Street were all pretty good.  The story is solid.  At least I believed it because I haven’t seen any other stuff from Elm Street.  As usual, there is campy dialogue and teens are teens where some get drunk and others get high and Freddy does the whole getting into their heads and controlling them or something at one point, but thats ok. I can accept it because its a fun movie to watch.  I don’t think I’ve felt this entertained in the Friday the 13th movies in a while. I liked Jason X but there was still something bordering the “so bad its good”.  Something about Freddy and Jason makes this better than that.  Its actually a decent flick and  an unexpectedly good addition to the series.  Maybe its just having two bad-ass killers facing off that makes it all the better.

Have you seen Freddy vs. Jason? What are your thoughts on it? Is it a worthy addition? 

One more to go and its the remake in 2009!  Halloween is right around the corner, so is my work deadline.  Excuse me for the sporadic timing of the final reviews.  I promise you that I have a few reviews to go up by October 31st but it’ll be published at all sorts of times.

Halloween Marathon: Jason X (2001)

A major thanks has to go out to my boyfriend for pushing me forward when this franchise headed down the ridiculous road.  After Jason Goes to Hell, I really wanted to just stop.  However, on Saturday night, after that horrible movie, my boyfriend popped in the next one: Jason X.  Jason already could be all supernatural and body snatching and all that. Its not so hard to believe that its zoomed forward in time and invading space. It really isn’t at this point.  Anything that can happen as far as I’m concerned with this franchise.  Just depends who decides to take it on.

With that thought in my mind, I watched Jason X, still holding on to a little glimmer of hope that it can be okay.

Director: James Isaac

Cast: Kane Hodder, Lexa Doig, Jonathan Potts, Lisa Ryder, Peter Mensah, Melody Johnson, David Cronenberg

Jason Voorhees is captured and there is dispute as to how to be rid of him.  Some want to risk the chances of him escaping so that they could learn from his regenerative genes and others, like Rowen (Lexa Doig) just want to put him into cryogenic status so that he would be frozen forever.  After a mishaps, Rowen and Jason both are frozen until 2455, when a group of astronauts discover their bodies and bring them aboard their ship to defrost them.  Although Rowen warns the professor of the dangerous Jason Voorhees and that he isn’t truly dead, it is too late when Jason wakes up and starts to brutally attack everyone in this new environment.

I can’t believe I need to refer to the last one right now because I really don’t want to. Jason Goes to Hell insinuates that Freddy Kreuger helped pull him into hell.  Its puzzling that Freddy vs. Jason only happens after this movie.  I guess it could be since we’ve obviously jumped into the future.  Goodness knows when he was captured and brought to that lab.  The continuity is yet not there.  Regardless, Jason is in space now.  Funny enough, that last one’s ugly weird alien baby looking thing doesn’t occur and he regenerates into a metal uber Jason (as IMDB calls him).

We’re heading into the millenium so technology should look better but it doesn’t really for some parts.  This one has a lot of cheesy dialogue.  It seems 2455 and 1980 really didn’t make a lot of difference when it came to the level of campy and cheese that it was all about.  At least that part was kept in this.  Other than that, there’s acting and sex (plus weird sex-ish scenes).

To be fair, its not as bad as Jason Goes to Hell (sorry E!).  Its a tad lame and the story is full of predictable deaths and just really silly characters.  Nothing really makes sense as to what happens but its more eventful than the last one and you know what, despite saying that its campy and cheesy, it was pretty acceptable.

At this point, the movies are feeling like the layout is extremely familiar and the deaths are more and more easy to predict.  Jason doesn’t really develop much except the scenario he is in changes.  The first 7 stayed rather true to the whole Crystal Lake thing but after he decides to head to new territory in Manhattan and now he’s in space, there really isn’t much else to feel the continuity.  I mean, you’d have guessed after the last one, we’d be heading for some Freddy and Jason fun but that comes after this one.

Its pretty interesting because I think starting at this one, they start talking about the kill count for Jason Voorhees.  I think they said 83 in this one.  I’m guessing its a random number because there’s sections in between of his life that we don’t get to see because I can’t seem to count anything close to that number in my head.  Or is there?

I’m straying away from the main point.  Jason X is not a bad entry even though its campy and cheesy and the premise is completely out there.  Anything is better after Jason Goes to Hell.  What can I say?  There’s only going up after absolute crap, right?

Have you seen Jason X? Did you enjoy it? What did you think of the whole space premise?