Halloween may have opened the door to the slasher films of the ’80s, but it was Friday the 13th that set the table upon which these ripoff films would feast. It took some time for the franchise to find its voice, and when it did it devolved into self parody over the span of only a few movies. There is a sweet spot in the series, and it is noticeable.
Here, now, is the definitive ranking of the Friday the 13th franchise, scrutinized and analyzed and… who am I kidding, I just watched these things and ranked them based on what I liked. And along the way, I added a few tidbits of information where it was warranted. Enjoy… or get mad. It’s up to you.
4Friday the 13th (1980)
Screenwriter Victor Miller made no secret out of his desire to ape off the success of John Carpenter’s Halloween. But Miller’s film is Penthouse to Carpenter’s Playboy. There is very little room for suggestion and the super low budget ($550,000, still a couple hundred more than Halloween) camp counselor murder fest leans into the geek show gore where Carpenter let suggestive violence do the heavy lifting.
This franchise kickstarter feels almost forgotten in the canon. It’s not Jason (anyone who remembers the cold opening of Scream will know this), but his mother, a milquetoast madwoman played by Betsy Palmer. Very little happens aside from teens smoking pot, drinking, having sex and being wiped out by Mrs. Voorhees. These are the archetypes for the entire series, but they’re absolutely done with more style and panache later on in the sequels. Part of that is due to the fact that Jason is a much more formidable, threatening baddie than his sweater-clad momma.
Director Sean S. Cunningham does the best with his limited resources – the point-of-view murder scenes are a clever touch – and there is some charm in the micro budgeted violence. Friday the 13th was inspired by Halloween, and it most certainly served as some sort of inspiration for Sam Raimi’s The Evil Dead the next year. And it did it’s job, raking in an astounding $39 million, but as a standalone slasher flick it’s a little thin.
