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Visitors since
April 1999.
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JASON X
 
Starring Kane Hodder, Lexa Doig, Lisa Ryder,
Chuck Campbell, Peter Mensah, Melyssa Ade and Jonathan Potts
Director Jim Isaac
Canadian Rating 18A
Released by New Line Cinema - 04/02
After nine “Friday the 13th” movies, it’s become rather comforting to watch machete-wielding psycho Jason Vorhees butcher idiot teenagers without a clear conscience or identifiable motive. If you remember back to the 1980 original, Jason’s mother was the killer at Camp Crystal Lake, hacking up Kevin Bacon and his fellow counselors because of an earlier incident when Jason drowned in the lake due to the negligence of two other counselors (they were getting nekkid). In “Friday the 13th, Part 2”, Jason (who apparently survived the drowning) comes calling to avenge the death of his mom. Ever since, he’s been on a rampage, chopping his way through a death toll of about 200. Jason will go out of his way to slaughter people. It’s kind of a sick formula, repeated over and over, but there is a twisted appeal to the mayhem - and that has kept fans coming back over the years, turning this enduring franchise into a real success story.
"Jason X" takes Mr. Vorhees away from the comfort and serenity of Camp Crystal Lake and (like so many recent horror series’) into outer space. The prologue finds a clan of scientists (including horror director David Cronenberg, in an amusing cameo) plotting to freeze Jason in cryogenic suspension, realizing that if they cannot kill him they can attempt to maintain him. Of course the procedure goes to hell, and our babelicious heroine (Lexa Doig) gets frozen along with the freak in the hockey mask. Over 400 years later, another dumb scientist (Jonathan Potts) opts to bring the two human popsicles aboard his space craft, which is also populated by med students and macho marines. He wants to revive Jason so he make a profit off of the notorious frozen relic. When he does, of course, Jason starts killing folks in the same fashion he always does, except it’s now a rip-off of “Alien” in addition to “Halloween”.
I had my hopes for “Jason X”. Hopes that the filmmakers would wise up, embrace the absurdity of their tired slasher formula and approach this tenth installment with a tongue-in-cheek agenda. Now, most animals won’t attack an electric fence more than once because of a learned association between the high-voltage shock and the pain it causes. The filmmakers behind “Jason X” are not so bright. The movie stinks to high heaven because it adopts the same old routine, and the novelty of its formula has long since expired. Jason is once again played with convincing ‘unstoppable killing machine’ resilience by veteran stuntman Kane Hodder. Otherwise, the acting is tragically poor, with a few welcome exceptions, like Lisa Ryder as an android chick and Peter Mensah as a buff commando. Even with a bigger budget, director Jim Isaac and his technical team have succeeded in making “Jason X” look as cheap as possible. The production design and special effects are unbelievably crummy. It is bewildering to think that this rancid mound of incompetent schlock didn’t go straight to video.
Not that I was expecting a profound and artistic experience. I just wanted to enjoy myself. I can admit to having a certain fondness for a few “Friday” installments, like the suspenseful and influential original and the amusing sixth entry, “Jason Lives”. “Jason X”, with an awful score by Harry Manfredini (who created the memorable “chi chi chi” theme) and an almost total lack of wit, is one of the worst films in this series -- and that is really saying something. Ok, there are a few inventive kills, and two rather inspired sequences (the first a mano a mano battle between the android chick and Jason, the second a hilarious campground hologram simulation that pokes fun at everything the rest of the movie should have), but “Jason X” remains utter garbage, and a complete chore to sit through. In space, it seems, no one can hear you run from the theater screaming.
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©2003, 2002 Jamey Hughton |
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