I’ve never seen a Friday the 13th movie with so many musical numbers! I don’t know at what point Jason Voorhees decided to dress up as a frog-shaped hand puppet and pursue his Broadway dreams. And with his new buddies Miss Piggy, Fozzie Bear, the Great –
…Wait, hold on…
Oh. It seems I made the same mistake before. So let’s get up the real poster for Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan. It’s the best thing about this movie, by the way.
That being said…I’ve never seen a Friday the 13th movie with so many musical numbers! I’m serious. From the atrocious ‘80s rock that opens it, to two separate music video-inspired murders, to an actual (off-key) caterwauling of “New York, New York,” I’ve never seen a more tuneful tale of mass homicide…Well, maybe Sweeney Todd.
All this musical arrangement is just one of the ways Jason Takes Manhattan tries to distract us from the fact there is nothing here. With both Paramount and the MPAA disinterested in the series’ original promise of exploitation delivered to a mass audience, Jason Takes Manhattan is barely allowed to present us with death at all. Oh sure, it maintains a brain-damagingly high body count (second so far only to A New Beginning, the Jasonless entry), but without the means to make that much more than certain irritating characters just vanishing on occasion. This is a major flaw, not just as a Friday the 13th, but because of the way it undermines the movie’s underlying premise.
That’d be the switch to New York. Take it as a sign of Friday’s substantial creative stagnation, that “location switch” didn’t even emerge until Part Eight, all other creative outlets drained – and this is when something like Police Academy did “location switch” in its Part Five. Putting Jason Voorhees in New York City cannot yield a good movie, but it can yield some exploitative goofiness, if they take the idea to its logical extreme. But “logical extreme” in a Friday involves far more violent death than the R-rating can contain. So for all of you who think “take” means “murder everyone in,” forget it! Censorial do-goodery ensures New York plays essentially no substantive role.
Budget ensures it barely shows up at all! Despite being the priciest of Paramount’s Fridays (and also the paltriest of that studio’s grosses, making this the stage where profits officially cease), apparently they hadn’t the funds to actually feature New York – which seems something they ought to have thought of before announcing a marketing-based title to the world! B.S., we all cry, in light of the super cheap dreck New York’s played host to – it being where a great deal of ‘70s exploitation is set. But writer/director (yes, an auteur) Rod Hedden has no real grasp of money-saving, not when the original script sent Jason to Madison Square Garden, the Statue of Liberty, Central Park, the Empire State Building… Jeepers, not even Die Hard with a Vengeance could’ve shut down all of Manhattan in such a way! No wonder the only verifiably New York thing we get is Times Square, considering Hedden’s dumb gawking tourist concept of the city.
Before I continue with my suicidal contemplation of Manhattan, from whence did Rod Hedden spring? Why, from 1987 to 1990, “Friday the 13th: The Series” ran (on television). It had nothing to do with Old Man Voorhees; rather, shared producer Frank Mancuso, Sr., insisted upon the “Friday” title for its market cachet, in favor of “The 13th Hour.” Taking a notion you’d think a movie called Friday the 13th would run with, the series explores the notion of bad luck itself, telling the tale of cousins tracking down accursed occult relics. Really, it sounds like “Supernatural.” Anyway, this is where Hedden first came to Mancuso’s attention. You’d think a TV background would make him a better moneyman.
Anyway, Hedden’s approach to New York means 70% of Jason Takes Manhattan is simply in the getting there. It’s on a boat. Jason on a boat ain’t a horrible idea – The Voorhees Adventure, A Night to Dismember – but it must be a purgatorial pile of nothing when watching the movie sans prior knowledge.
The vessel Lazarus – you may groan now – is due to carry the final class of Lakeside High to Manhattan as a graduation party. This doofy notion – needed to transport a mute, lumbering retard – grows screwier under inspection. First of all, we’re left with the craft Hedden no doubt paid a premium for – an undersized freighter (for the “spooky” factor), serving the function of a cruise liner. As time aboard the ill-fated vessel plods along, one becomes aware how few locations there are, that the very edge of the frame reveals the boat’s edge, not unending Lovecraftian horrors as one would wish.
Piloting is Admiral Robertson (Warren Munson) – presumably, Crystal Lake has a navy now, owing to the grand threat that is a submerged Jason (Kane Hodder again). No, wait...is this ship in Crystal Lake? The geography is mighty confused. We know that’s where Jason starts off, brought to life as – bear with me – a bouncing and twirling anchor (ineptly mooring a party boat with the traditional duo of opening corpses) severs an underwater electrical power line. Electricity brings Jason back, as it did in Jason Lives, but now without the gothic ambience of that one (or its humor). So my point was, Jason starts at Crystal Lake. Killing the party boat’s teenaged inhabitants, he lets the thing drift casually along where the Lazarus is. The Lazarus, which is about to sail to Manhattan…
So…maybe the Jason boat found some hitherto unknown river, and made it down to a proper dock. Eh, that, or the Lazarus is itself on Crystal Lake – which still has some direct watery connection with New York City, either way. (Using Vancouver as a stand-in does confuse matters more.)
And let’s explore the geography further… We know Crystal Lake is in New Jersey. So the Lazarus is set to make the lengthy trek from New Jersey to New York City…a voyage which, at its shortest, can take a single step. Except this boat apparently sees the need to head out to sea first, then make its way back around. Which be like flying from L.A. to San Francisco by way of Katmandu. Eh, either that, or it’s just sailing up the Hudson from inland – which makes the ship-sinking storm they encounter all the more unbelievable. Or…or New York City is itself on the shore of Crystal Lake, which I can readily buy as well as anything else.
So, no, the Lazarus on its own does not make a whole lotta sense.
Nor does Jason’s notion to stow away on this ship, which he gains access to from the river-level hull’s exterior. (See, things are confused.) Actually, Jason’s motives are most bizarre today – and we’re talkin’ the zombie Jason who’s inarguably been reduced to a randomly murdering force of nature. There’s some suggestion – by expositing nameless teenager victims, always a trustworthy source – that Jason under Hedden’s guidance specifically seeks to rid “the area” (that is, however far beyond Crystal Lake he prefers) of its teenagers. Tell that to the assorted adults he’s murdered, guys!
And teenagers? Okay, so slasher movies generally victimize teens, largely because that’s their target audience as well. But Jason’s never had a grudge against them as a group, except their stoned and fornicating ranks make for the easiest, most omnipresent prey. This is more of a Freddy thing – “revenge against all teens of Crystal Lake” sounds an awful lot like “hunting the children of Elm Street.” And what if Jason succeeds? – Something it’s suggested he will do on the Lazarus, which somehow marks the distinct end of a generation, ala Children of Men. (Yup, apparently the high school is closing after this class, as they’re the last teenagers!) If Jason succeeds, does he just wait for the region’s children to reach arguable maturity, then kill them? GOD, I could digress at any stage in Jason Takes Manhattan, and explore equally moronic thoughts.
And Jason’s actions grow even more confused upon reaching New York, but we’re a long way from there, as first we must run through a condensed Friday flick upon the leisure cruise. This invokes the usual sickening array of Hodder fodder. As is my wont, I shall now run through them – as opposed to “run them through,” more of a Jason thing…
Rennie (5’6” Jensen Daggett) is the Final Girl. She writes. But wait, there’s more! Rennie is afraid! (Good thing someone is, ‘cause it ain’t the viewer.) As though this were some gigantic bomb, Hedden delays the truth – she’s afraid of the water (hydrophobia is often a sign of rabies). Ho-hum! Even then, Hedden thinks the reason for Rennie’s fear is intriguing and useful – skipping ahead, it’s because boy Jason tried to yank her into Crystal Lake when she too was a youth. There is more Stupid to that eventual reveal, especially as it makes a tasty hash of the series’ chronology. But let’s leave at least one scab wound unpicked.
Also, Rennie has a dog called Toby, for no reason except to engender a non-functional false scare at the very end.
Sean Robertson (Scott Reeves – another future soap star! Whoo!) is the standard Final Boy. He is also the Admiral’s son. He has less personality than the dog.
Accompanying Sean and Rennie are – Oh the hell with this! I’ve contempt for Jason Takes an Exceedingly Long Boat Ride, and Then Manhattan, Eventually. Thus, I shan’t hide who dies, and when. Rather, deaths and “character” descriptions, they shall all occur chronologically!
J.J. (Saffron Henderson – American dubber of anime) like to turn on a big ‘80s tape player, then pretend she’s playing a guitar beside it. She also decides it is a good idea to do so in the engine room, because that’d look more like a music video. Jason misinterprets the slang of guitars as “axes,” and she’s dead.
Some completely unidentified guy (he even has a towel over his face, out of shame) enjoys the sauna. Jason places a sauna rock in either his chest or gut, depending upon the shot.
Then there’s Tamara (Sharlene Martin), a rich bitch clone of The New Blood’s Melissa. We totally expect her to live for longer than she does. But the movie does its damnedest to earn Tamara our hatred in the scant time it has. So she snorts delicious cocaine, shoves Rennie overboard (!), tries seducing the school’s principal by painting internal organs all over her body – Pause! This is the most asinine invocation of sex in a Friday! It’s post gradation, yet the principal – the principal, not a teacher – goes to get Tamara’s final biology project – in her stateroom, alone, at night…after she’s graduated. And what high school senior takes biology?! I think I took that one freshman year!
Anyway, Jason stabs her with a mirror shard. She, like basically all the female victims in this one (and half overall for the series), employs the “beg uselessly and not move” strategy to avoid murder.
The ship’s assistant is a character so useless, he appears solely so he can die in another minute. Pad that body count, you desperate maniacs! He gets speared.
The Admiral gets his next. Jason gives him just about the lousiest throat slitting in cinematic history. I swear, give me a sheet of paper and I could slit my own throat more effectively!
Intermission. Rennie, Sean, and all the others I haven’t mentioned yet now discover a killer is aboard. Thus it’s proactivity from now on, which is at least something we don’t normally see. That’s because usually if Jason’s would-be targets knew he was afoot, they’d get the hell out of Dodge. On a boat, you cannot. Making it eternally easy for Jason, they oblige formula and split up. Instantly. Fools!
Eva (Kelly Hu – aka X2’s Lady Deathstrike) is the nerdy Asian valedictorian. Ain’t it just like a Friday the 13th to cast a Miss Teen USA as the nerd? Asian, ya know! Smarts don’t serve Eva well, as she flees Jason and seeks the welcoming safe embrace of…the disco? Buh?! “Stayin’ Alive,” indeed. Jason strangulates her – strangulates her! See how pathetic the kills in this are? C’mon, buddy, bash her skull in with the disco ball! Do something!
Wayne (Martin Cummins) then goes and shoots a deckhand with a spear. One of two deckhands on the whole ship! It behooves me to mention this craft is severely understaffed, but it’s under-guested as well at this moment, in the effort to pare an entire class down to slasher quantities. Anyway, Wayne is the AV nut, and prefers to experience life through the voyeuristic medium of his ever-present video camera. It ain’t Peeping Tom, oh Lordie no, but it’s neither those later efforts like Blair Witch Project, all which do something with this rich horror notion. Oh well. Jason electrocutes Wayne.
Miles, a student who exists solely to die (he has apparently zero lines, and prefers to just stand about slack-jawed), dies. Jason hurls him onto an antenna (more importantly, this also kills the radio). Oh, and Jason employs downright teleportation to get (miles) ahead of Miles. And not just the standard “crappy editor” teleportation; nope, this is intentional. And it goes on throughout the picture; I just choose to highlight this particular moment.
The nameless second deckhand, the one who takes after our beloved Crazy Ralph, has an axe in his back. Snore!
Okay, at this stage Rennie, Scott, the dog, and three other humans I haven’t discussed yet escape the ship. And it sinks. Off screen, of course, though I imagine Hedden still scuppered the real ship, in a fitting metaphor for the series. And for those wondering why a graduating class is as parsimonious as this one (Crystal Lake teenagers aren’t quick-witted enough to usually qualify as high school grads), well… Dialogue (in place of one or more death scenes) explain to us the unnamed rest are all dead…presumably. Drowned, at any rate. Desperate to verify what Jason’s kill tally is at this point, I go back to the Lazarus’ first scene, and count out roughly 45 extras also on the cruise. So let’s say 45, why the hell not, added to the twelve inarguable corpses thus far.
And now we’re at New York. A whole new glorious miasma of idiocies thus emerge! But first, who’s survived along with Rennie, Sean and dog?
Charles McCulloch (Peter Mark Richman, crappy ‘70s TV regular) is the aforementioned principal. Imagine the more stereotypically petty school authority figure possible. The sort who spouts “I’m in charge here!” with such regularity, there’s a drinking game waiting in the wings. The sort who most likely irons his suits while wearing them. That’s McCulloch; he is the asshole whose death you anxiously await, which is perhaps the real reason for Tamara’s early departure.
Colleen Van Deusen (Barbara Bingham) is…a teacher…mother figure…boring.
Julius (V.C. Dupree) is black. But that’s not all! In a marvelous example of innovation, he has even one more trait: he’s a boxer. This leads directly to his death, and the film’s highlight. Cornered by Jason upon a tenement roof (after Jason has again cheated the laws of reality), Julius fights him. It’s the Rumble in the Urban Jungle! And one cannot say Julius isn’t tenacious. By my count, he punches Jason a whopping fifty-three times! A shame most blows hit the hockey mask, to no effect; a shame, too, Jason is an unkillable zombie, but Julius don’t know that. And he gets his block knocked off – that is, Mr. Voorhees punches his head into a dumpster.
There’s one further character in Jason Takes Manhattan, and that’s the city of New York itself. Like any Friday character, it is rancid – hence the New York Board of Tourism’s rejection of this masterpiece. New York’s portrayal is unflattering. First thing our out-of-towners meet is a duo of raping gangbanger heroin addicts, who lurk the otherwise abandoned wharfs awaiting drifters form sunken cruise ships, apparently. And that’s one of the less cartoony details! Did you know New York is simply littered with Troma toxic waste barrels everywhere, opened? There’s not a single street, but rather a never-ending series (hmm, where’ve I used that phrase before) of alleyways and sub-alleyways. (However Times Square – the sole landmark remaining from Hedden’s first draft – remains a land of innocence, awe, and strip shows.)
Jason barely interacts with these new environs whatsoever. Rather, he persists in chasing those boat people. Why?! ‘Cause they’re from Crystal Lake? Jason’s never cared before! I mean, he strolls through a jam-packed subway car, casually ignoring the multitudes of commuters – who pay him zero attention (as would I, to be honest). This is so diametrically opposed to the Jason Takes Manhattan everyone imagines, it should be illegal! In all his exploits, Jason actually does New York City a favor, by doing in those pervy gangbangers. He balances it out, by murdering a cop and a sanitation worker (and arguably a line cook), amounting to a zero sum impact upon the Big Apple.
Pretty soon only Rennie and Sean are alive – oh, and also the entire urban population, and that MIA dog. With an entire metropolis to race around, they head straight for the sewers. Tactical errors this glaring must take effort. Jason corners them, is demasked (revealing himself to be Frankenberry, essentially), and only Rod Hedden can save our heroes now – through stupidness. Because every night, at midnight, toxic waste flushes out New York’s sewers, a city-wide enema. What mechanism causes this? Is it some untold property in the toxic waste itself?
If it is, it does some flabbergasting things to old Jason. First he spontaneously vomits water – Kane Hodder’s proudest talent, and something this movie causes many to do. Then Jason says – in a child’s voice – “No Mommy! Don’t let me drown!” Our mute retarded antihero’s first words, folks! … And then Jason de-ages. Yup, he reverts back to Elephant Man child-boy, as in the end of Part One.
God knows if Hedden thought a sequel could naturally follow from this. Logical thought of any form dies in Jason Takes Manhattan’s wake. I slept on this movie prior to writing, to regain my composure; I now have the flu. I blame the movie.
Indeed, this ballet of insanity has all the earmarks of a franchise killer. It thoroughly challenges the most meager notions of continuity. Indeed, Paramount ceased producing Fridays instantly, and Mancuso washed his hands of the things in cleansing toxic waste. But it wasn’t the end. The most tenacious of franchises can continue on indefinitely beyond normal ends, and Friday the 13th would do just that – though it would be a very different beast as a result.
RELATED POSTS
• No. 1 Friday the 13th (1980)
• No. 2 Friday the 13th Part 2 (1981)
• No. 3 Friday the 13th Part III (1982)
• No. 4 Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter (1984)
• No. 5 Friday the 13th: A New Beginning (1985)
• No. 6 Friday the 13th Part VI: Jason Lives (1986)
• No. 7 Friday the 13th Part VII: The New Blood (1988)
• No. 9 Jason Goes to Hell: The Final Friday (1993)
• No. 10 Jason X (2002)
• No. 11 Freddy vs. Jason (2003)
• No. 12 Friday the 13th (2009)
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