Friday the 13th as a slasher film is quite a humble movie compared to what would eventually be in store as it would evolve into a franchise of an exploitative and later even a self-parodying nature. The first movie establishes the basic rules and storyline and in it does a decent job.
The young cast provide an unusually sympathetic group of characters for what has become a real cliché group of characters. The kills aren't that gruesome but violent enough in their own right to give the movie a morbid energy. Atmospherically the film works and the added of element of nostalgia also gives it a bit of a sympathetic quality.
I'd have to say all in all that the last act of the film is the strongest. Pamela Voorhees is perhaps not the most iconic of movie-killers but still a competent psychotic villain for this film. The ending is also one of the best and most classic scares in any horror movie and its effect has not changed.
Friday the 13th's only problem is its close approximation and indeed rather blatant similarities to other Slashers of the day, mainly John Carpenter's Halloween, compared to which it perhaps lacks the extra finish to make it as memorable a movie, but it's still a fun, scary movie in its own right.
The young cast provide an unusually sympathetic group of characters for what has become a real cliché group of characters. The kills aren't that gruesome but violent enough in their own right to give the movie a morbid energy. Atmospherically the film works and the added of element of nostalgia also gives it a bit of a sympathetic quality.
I'd have to say all in all that the last act of the film is the strongest. Pamela Voorhees is perhaps not the most iconic of movie-killers but still a competent psychotic villain for this film. The ending is also one of the best and most classic scares in any horror movie and its effect has not changed.
Friday the 13th's only problem is its close approximation and indeed rather blatant similarities to other Slashers of the day, mainly John Carpenter's Halloween, compared to which it perhaps lacks the extra finish to make it as memorable a movie, but it's still a fun, scary movie in its own right.