A group of young adults set up tent near the abandoned summer camp where a series of gruesome murders are said to have taken place back in 1980. The perpetrator was a grieving mother, driven insane by the drowning of her child, Jason, whom she believed was neglected by the camp counselors. As legend has it, the last survivor of the attacks beheaded the woman. But then Jason came back, and now he is a vengeful and inexorable killer, wielding crossbows, swords, axes and other sharp instruments. The legend proves horribly true, as these campers quickly discover. Six months later, the brother of one of those campers distributes posters of his missing sister. The police believe she took off with her boyfriend; but he knows better. The brother crosses paths with an uptight young rich guy who is having his girlfriend and friends over at his parents' cabin. The brother ends up at the cabin himself just before his sister's attacker sets upon them all.
In brief: we meet a group of annoying people who, happily, are quickly dispatched. Then we are unhappy to meet a new group of even more annoying people who take longer to get killed off. Didn't we sometimes see things from Jason's point of view in the original "Friday the 13th" series? I would have preferred to see everything from his point of view because I was squarely on his side.
It's depressing seeing this old schlock revived with a glossy sheen, a generous budget and a certain amount of technical efficiency. A certain cold, mechanical efficiency. Everything is shot too dark, with extreme close-ups of the action and in tiny little bits of film that race by too quickly for us to get a good read on what's going on until it's over. My frequent thought: "Oh, that would have been scary." Viewers unfamiliar with the original series will wonder about the superfluous back story regarding the mother, the single hint of the supernatural that isn't followed up on until the end and the mysteriously dwelt-upon moment where the killer discovers a hockey mask and decides to start wearing it. "A MYTH IS BORN!!" Give me a break.
