Review of Friday the 13th Part 2 (1981) by Timothy S — 06 Aug 2012

The so-called "dead teenagers" movies have always gotten a bad rap from the critics, and no film series seems to be more reviled than "Friday the 13th". However, the second film in the series has always been my favorite, and there are a lot of reasons why.

First off, the murders are fairly imaginative without being terribly nauseating. My favorites are the wheelchair bound Tom McBride, simply because I love the way it's set up and executed (no pun intended), and the double impaling of a couple after sex. That one had to be trimmed to avoid the X rating, and in its current form it's depressingly tame. This is one film that cries out for a director's cut.

Harry Manfredini's score always seems to be under-appreciated in the world of horror cinema, and it's just dandy this time out. There are times during the film's final showdown that it becomes eerily similar to Bernard Herrman's untouchable score for "Psycho", but it usually maintains its originality. I much preferred Jason's look in this, his first outing before he donned his iconic hockey mask. The burlap sack is much more frightening. I also liked the fact that he's vulnerable in this, at times even clumsy and oafish. Definitely not the hulking and unstoppable killing machine he would later become.

It's pretty much the same story as the first film, but there is a story punctuating all of the murders regardless of how paper thin it is. It squeezes in all of the cliches, however, like the car that won;t start and the screeching flying cat. It's kind of comforting in its predictability, I think. "Friday the 13th Part 2" is actually kind of refreshing considering how stale the franchise would become. It's hardly great art but it is entertaining.