I was in high school when Friday the 13th hit theaters. I had read about it in Famous Monsters of Filmland magazine as well as a fairly new horror magazine called Fangoria. I knew the make up effects were being done by Tom Savini who had dazzled me in Dawn of the Dead, so I had to see this film. At the same time another film opened, a sex comedy about softball called Squeeze Play. Our movie group of Allen Browning, Valerie Austin, and myself, decided to hit both films the same night. Friday the 13th was playing at the Saint Albans Mall Twin while Squeeze Play was playing in Charleston at the Plaza East Cinemas. Based on the showtimes, we decided to go see Friday the 13th first and catch Squeeza Play on the late show. There were several shots in Friday the 13th that were unlike any that I had previously seen. The throat slashing near the start of the film looked incredibly real, and I couldn’t ever recall another decapitation. As a teenage fan of gore effects, I was thrilled. As the peaceful music played and Adrienne King raised up in the boat to see the police arriving, Allen nudged me and said we should go on and take off before the credits to avoid the crowd and hopefully make it to Charleston earlier so as not to miss any of Squeeze Play. I remembered seeing the pictures of Jason grabbing the girl in the boat being featured in one or both of the magazines and told him the movie wasn’t over yet. About then Jason jumped out of the lake and the theater erupted in screams. We stayed until the credits finally started and then booked it to the Plaza East where we arrived in plenty of time to catch Squeeze Play. Thirty years later Friday the 13th is a horror classic and almost no one remembers Squeeze Play.
I bought the original Friday the 13th on VHS and it was also an early DVD purchase, but I don’t know that I ever watched either of them. Last year when the remake was getting ready to hit the big screen, new editions of the first three Friday films were released on DVD. The third one was released in 3D and the first one was released in an Uncut Unrated edition. I wondered what they might have cut out to get the R rating, but it appears it was mostlya few seconds here and there rather than some here to for unseen graphic bit of gore. (I would have also been happy with an extended version of the Strip Monopoly game, but I seriously doubted that ever existed.) It also doesn’t appear that there was any additional topless scenes, nudity or sex that the filmmakers decided to work back in. The topless scenes that were already there are still there, but no topless scenes for Ms. King unfortunately.
So how did Friday the 13th Unrated on DVD measure up to my memories of seeing it in the theater? I don’t guess it’s any surprise that it didn’t have quite the same effect. The plot has been repeated hundreds of time since 1980. It’s no longer fresh. The world of special effects make up has advanced by leaps and bounds. It’s no longer all that shocking. The identity of the killer is no longer a mystery, and of course I didn’t have Allen and Valerie here to watch it with me either. That being said, the film is still a classic. It inspired 10 sequels, a remake, books, a television series, and countless pieces of merchandise although the hockey mask didn’t come into play until Friday the 13th Part 3.
From a nostalgia point of view, I’d give Friday the 13th 3 stars easily, but sadly watching it without rose colored glasses, Jason’s first outing is only gonna get 2 1/2.
365 Days of DVDs 