Freddy VS. Jason - 8/28/03

Written by: Wes Craven & Victor Miller (characters), Damian Shannon & Mark Swift (screenplay)

Starring: Robert Englund, Ken Kirzinger, Monica Keena, Jason Ritter

Official Site

This was one of a few fan-boy dream films that must have been stewing in the heads of executives for years. Aliens VS. Predator (especially when the comic book came out). Superman / Batman. For some reason, my mind is a blank right now, but there have been head to head films in the minds of fanboys for decades... and I'm glad that Sean S. Cunningham got this one off the ground.

Originally to be directed by effects genius Rob Bottin... then some others including Blade 2 and Hellboy director Guillermo Del Toro... Ronny Yu, fresh off of Bride of Chucky and Formula 51 (which did 0 business) got a chance to helm what could have been a great film, or a train wreck. Though I'm not sure who was actually worried. I know the fans weren't. They were going to see the film regardless... it's what you do when you're a fan. I'm not sure how many people who weren't fans of either franchise went to see this picture, but it couldn't have been that many.

The Freddy franchise was pretty much in the trash, after New Nightmare. A decent concept, but I think audiences had been inundated with Freddy films (there are 7 of them, not including this one), and were a bit tired of the worn out storyline. Doesn't mean that people stopped being fans... I think they were just bored.

The Jason franchise perked up some after Jason X, which I thought was a very well done movie. The later films hadn't done so well... I think, at the time, horror films were being overshadowed by big budget Oscar films, and arthouse pieces... but it seems that the horror genre is coming right back where it's supposed to be. At least, for me, it is.

Freddy VS. Jason is just one of a long line of great horror films audiences had in store for it this year. 28 Days Later..., Cabin Fever (which has gotten about as much internet buzz as Blair Witch did), Jeepers Creepers 2, Identity, May, House of 1000 Corpses, Final Destination 2, Willard, along with a slew of others. Whether or not the films did well with critics is an obsolete point... I mean, what do critics know? (heh)... but for those of you who have been watching internet rumor sites like JoBlo, AICN, CHUD... these films have all gotten a decent buzz... some more than others... and I think that the production companies are now able to publicize their films to a much larger audience, via these sites.

For those of you interested, here's a great article, from JoBlo.com - great stuff, some interviews, from the showcase from this past San Diego Comic Convention! Another great interview is with Kane Hodder, who played Jason in most of the series films. The interview deals with Hodder and his picture Darkwolf, but Arrow-In-The-Head asks some questions about Hodder's being replaced by Kirzinger.

I think that this was probably a difficult story to get right, the first time. I have no idea how many re-writes there were, how many script doctors... how many drafts there were... but by the end of the film, I thought they had gotten it pretty damn right! I was very impressed with the storyline (although the characters who were not in the title tended to be like every other mid-to-late teenage kid out to die in a horror film), and the plot. I remember reading a review somewhere where the reviewer stated that Jason was just in a few scenes, and that basically it was a Freddy movie. I can say to you now, that is completely not the case.

Even though we weren't given a Kane Hodder Jason, Kirzinger did a good job. It was certainly a possibility that a replacement would not get under the skin of Voorhees... but he pulled it off pretty well. Englund has always given the Freddy character as much depth as possible... the first film is still the best, and I think he really outdid himself there. But with this film, I think he was happy to don the make-up again. He seemed to be having a blast, it shows in his acting... and it made the film that much more enjoyable.

Keena and Ritter were fine in their respective roles, as were Kelly Rowland, Katharine Isabelle, Christopher Marquette and Brendan Fletcher. One character I loathed, only because he was a blatant copy (or homage, depending on how you look at it) was of Freeburg (Kyle Labine), who was a take on Jay from the Kevin Smith films... I don't like it when they do that. He wasn't funny or even slightly amusing... and the only connection between the two characters were their pot smoking and their clothes.

In regards to director Ronny Yu, this was the first film of his I've seen, and I was impressed. He kept a lot of elements from the first Freddy movie (it's hard not to regard Craven as a genius, in his own right), and did a lot of interesting, original work that kept the pace going well throughout the film.

Films like this, especially when connected to successful franchises, can live on to produce other such combinations. There was a rumor, not too long ago, that brought Ash, from the Evil Dead films, into the picture between these two bad guys. I mean, another Freddy VS. Jason film, with Ash being a part of the plot... cool, but Jesus, that would be some story to figure out...

A release date for Alien VS. Predator has already been set, according to IMDB.com, with Paul W.S. Anderson writing and directing the film... we'll see if it actually comes to fruition... but with the success of F VS. J (which has already grossed more than $65 million), I'm sure that movie execs are scrambling to come up with more winning characters to fight each other.