The highly anticipated prequel to New Line’s excellent 2003 remake of the horror classic hits UK cinemas today (Friday the 13th of October) and I was surprised to see that it wasn’t exactly what I had been expecting. The film, which was set to reveal events leading to the titular event, actually left me with more questions than it did answers.
The story begins with the birth of Tommy Hewitt (before he was Leatherface) in 1939 (in rather grotesque fashion I might add) before jumping ahead to 1969 where a now 30 year old Tommy is given the sack, as the slaughterhouse where he works is closed down.
The town is all but dead and those inhabitants who remain are all packing up to move to affluent cities. When Tommy snaps and kills his boss, the sheriff informs Tommy’s cousin Charlie that he will have to arrest him. What follows answers a few questions before we meet our protagonists Chrissie, Eric, Dean and Bailey; two young couples on a road trip before the guys go off to war in Vietnam.
Eric is set to return to Vietnam for a second tour of duty and he’s taking his little brother Dean with him. Dean doesn’t want to fight however, so he and girlfriend Bailey plan to escape to Mexico. Bailey confides in Chrissie who gives them her blessing, telling them to escape together, but if that can happen, they’re going to need to escape for real.
The group stops off at a familiar looking general store where they encounter some scary looking bikers, so they leave sharply, only to find one of the bikers tailing them, signalling them to pull over with her shot gun. An accident ensues which sees Chrissie thrown clear of the vehicle and Sheriff Hoyt approaches the scene. As Chrissie watches from the bushes, she witnesses Hoyt kill the female biker and take her friends prisoner. Chrissie realizes that all is not right, and becomes the only hope for her friends survival, but what do you do when there’s no-one to help?
The film retains the gritty aesthetic of its predecessor but sadly doesn’t have any of the shocks or scares which made the 2003 remake such an exciting thrill ride.
The cast are wonderful, as are their respective characters, but they don’t have much to do, as the majority of them are effectively tied up for the duration of the film. There’s no denying that the torture they endure is horrendous (in fact this is the film’s strongest point) but it’s drawn out only to have the majority of them bumped off in the last five minutes in all too easy ways.
The questions which are answered in this film are both simple and effective, but I wanted more. Where were Henrietta and Jedediah? What became of the bullies we keep hearing about who forced Tommy to snap? Just who was at the core of the evil nurture that made him what he is? Hoyt?
OVERALL SUMMARY
In the end, the film is good but it’s not as scary as the previous entry and it’s definitely not the best in the franchise (in my eyes at least) as many people would have you believe.
