Friday the 13th Part VII: The New Blood (1988) - Opening thoughts.

So I hope to be working on this and maybe another piece later. I’m still searching for the write final words for a film that has been a favorite at times and less so other viewings. I think it is because I liked the change of pace even if it ultimately follows some of the same beats as the other sequels. Someone critical might ask what Kane actually does differently, but I think you see that when the hockey mask is “pried off” by Tina’s “will” and the rotted face is exposed. That frustration and anger is quite expressive.

I went ahead despite planning initially to watch “Friday the 13^th Part VII” (1988) Friday evening at some point and instead viewed it Thursday night. Unlike the others, I’m not sure this will be the final time I write about the seventh film. Mainly because I wasn’t quite in my review form tonight. I don’t think it was as much “Friday fatigue” as just writing so much on “Halloween 5” and “Dracula” the previous days this week. And I have spread out the Friday movies enough not to wear myself down too much. I think the novelty of the “telekinetic Tina” addition to the film and some knockout rotted makeup and slimy rag clothes for Zombie Jason (and that superb fire sequence and house explosion at the end) really benefit an otherwise paint-by-numbers, body count Friday sequel. The stunts and special effects (Tina’s using what is available as weapons against the rampaging Jason such as gasoline, powerlines, light fixtures, and nails are certainly neat, and when he sets off a matchbook and hurls a television at Terry Kiser’s opportunist psyche doc this Friday film has its own wow factor to it) are really fun, even if the next batch of visiting teenagers, smoking pot, contemplating scifi stories (one among them is a wannabe writer, mentioning when he is denied getting laid he’s “got a date with a soap on a rope”!), hooking up (Liz Kaitan, high as a kite, drops her sheet momentarily to give the audience a brief look-see, later tossed out a window by Jason, dumped in a heap to the ground, flopped into silence; despite the 80s fashions, Kaitan is fetching as always), and preparing for a birthday party that never materializes because the one it is meant for is impaled with a tent spike (yes, this poor guy’s car breaks down, his girlfriend, who set up the party, bought the cabin, the works, is killed, and then he is hunted down, dropped by the tent spike to the back, and is lifted up and tossed like a dart afterward).

Jason is often more or less the killer who drops by to take out one victim after another while Terry Kiser is the real star villain of the film, a real heel looking to exploit Tina’s power for his own profit. And when he could be exposed by Tina’s mother, he makes sure she is a victim of Jason just to shut her up!