There are so many horror icons out their and out all of them only two have tried to kill people in New York City. Out of those two only one of them has succeed and well I thought that i'd check out the film that failed to take over New York just because not only is this the latest film n the Friday The 13th franchise for me to take to look at anyway but it's also one that is rather infamous and so then join me as I review the film that is the last Friday The 13th film to be produced by Paramount Pictures until the 2009 remake with the film in question being called simply just "Friday The 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan" enjoy.
The plot of this film is a cruise ship full of teenagers heads to New York while on board tho Jason Voorhees trys to make sure that they never make it to New York City. Now then interms of what I personally thought / felt about the actual plot that's actually featured / presented to us in this very film well then in all honesty I in all honesty personally thought / felt that the actual plot that's actually featured / presented to us in this very film was in all honesty pretty bad with this films being nothing more then a stock slasher plot and nothing really more then that in my freaking opinions anyways / at least.
Starring in this film is Kane Hodder as Jason Voorhees , Jensen Daggett as Rennie and Scott Reeves as Sean Robertson. Also starring in this film is Barbara Bingham as Colleen Van Deusen , Peter Mark Richman as Charles McCulloch , V. C. Dupree as Julius Gaw , Martin Cummins as Wayne Webber , Gordon Currie as Miles Wolfe , Kelly Hu as Eva Watanabe , Sharlene Martin as Tamara Mason , Dragon Ball Z star Saffron Henderson as J.J. , Alex Diakun as The Deck Hand and Warren Munson as Admiral Robertson.
Now then interms of what I personally thought / felt about the actual acting that's actually featured / presented to us in this very film well then in all honesty I in all honesty personally thought / felt that the actual acting that's actually featured / presented to us in this very film was in all honesty not that bad with this films acting being alot better then what it really had any right to be. However what lets the acting down is the fact that this films script just isn't that good which means that this films cast just can't turn in that good of a performance as this films script just simply won't allow for it as that's just how ad this films script is.
There were several ideas for this film during it's early days with scripts being written by Lar Park Lincoln and her husband with her script seeing her character Tina helping out in a mental hospital for young girls. The other was by her Friday The 13th Part VIII: The New Blood co-star Kevin Spirtas which would have been a remake of The New Blood except with his character from that film as the killer with the original version being nothing more then a dream there was also a part 8 being developed by The New Blood's director John Carl Buechler which would have seen the character of Tina escape a mental hospital before facing of against Jason Voorhees one last time.
For a film that meant to take place mostly in New York alot of those scenes was filmed in Vancouver as such the title now makes no sense. Granted we d get a few shots of Jason that was actually filmed in New York but alot of the time the only locations that we see are locations that could be anywhere as all they are is a dock yard and an alley way neither of which scream New York city granted Paramount did sign of on the script which makes me wonder why they didn't give the film a big enough budget to actually film in New York as the very idea of having Jason Voorhees stalking teenagers around New York City is a good idea.
If this film feels like two different films stitched together that's because that's exactly what it is as Paramount agreed to two different films scripts one which set upon a cruise ship and the other being set in New York City. With this films writer and director Rob Hedden writing both scripts and so he stuck the cruise ship script to the front of the New York City script and as a result of that this film does feel like it's two different films as the first half of the film feels like a claustrophobic sea movie whereas the second one feels alot more like a more goofier Friday The 13th movie with Jason even making jokes all of which clash with the more serious tone look and feel with the first half of the film which itself contrasts with the really alot more lighthearted and really goofy tone and feel of the second half of this film.
I think that we can all agree that the Charles McCulloch is just a terrible character which is really saying something as alot of this films victims just aren't that interesting. Even our main final girl character just comes across as being bland and annoying with her having nothing that makes her stand out or come across as being likable but what makes Charles McCulloch a terrible character tho is the fact that he pretty much mentally abuses Rennie into getting what he wants and he openly leaves several students and colleague to die and is openly willing to kill an innocent person when he doesn't believe that Jason has comeback to life which is something that also doesn't make a whole lot of sense as these characters are meant to be from Crystal Lake and so they would no that Jason comes back to life quite often.
Now then this film has / had an exact grand total running time of exactly one hour and forty minuets and twenty seven seconds. Which is a solid running time for this film to have as it doesn't have that much of a plot to begin with which means that the films plot is already being stretched pretty thin but at the same time tho when this film gets going you really don't notice it especially when the group finally arrive in New York City but the issue there is that the film takes well over an hour to get to New York with the vast majority of the film being spent on this slow moving boat but I will admit that this film does have some really solid pacing to it tho.
So now then as this is a slasher film that means that I have to actually talk about the actual kills that are actually featured / presented to us in this very film well then in all honesty I in all honesty personally thought / felt that the actual kills that are actually featured / presented to us in this very film were in all honesty not that bad. As this film does have some really solid and pretty enjoyable kills in it the issue is tho is that alot of this films kills happen just off screen and so don't really get to see the kills in this film alot of the time and alot of the ones that we do get to see are pretty lame for the most part in my freaking opinions anyways / at least.
Overall I can quite easily see why this film is considered to be one of the worst films in the Friday The 13th franchise as this film is pretty bad and is a sign that this franchise should have ended with this film in my freaking opinions anyways / at least. Now then i've talked about all of the good and as well as all of the bad things that are in this very film in this very review and as such that means that this very film earns itself a grand old score of exactly a 4.5 out of 10 from me.
Now then as for where I personally got all of the images that I personally used in this very review well then boys and girls and as well as ladies and gentlemen I personally got all of the images that I personally used in this very review from IMP Awards . Com and Google Images. With my personally preferred website to use to get images from this film being Google Images simply because Google Image actually has images from this film up on Google Images and plus pretty much much all of the images that I personally found on Google Images were all really very fairly high quality and as well as being as really very fairly high definition as well and so then horror fans we end this review as we always do with really our one and true goddess Elvira wishing us all some really very unpleasant dreams.
