His Name Was Jason 2-Disc Splatter Edition DVD Review
Posted by Shawn S. Lealos on 02.07.2009
With Friday the 13th getting a reboot, we pay a visit to the past with some very familiar faces as they talk about what made the franchice so great to begin with. Its a great trip - let me tell you why.
Directed By: Daniel Farrands
Written By: Thommy Hutson, Anthony Masi
Cinematography By: Pete Young
Music Composed By: John Corlis
Hosted By: Tom Savani
The Film
His Name Was Jason is almost everything a Friday the 13th fan could ever want in a documentary. There are some who will complain that they wanted to see the actual original end to Part 3 or whatever, but for those who want an all inclusive discussion with almost everyone involved, you get it here.
Tom Savini is the host of the feature, walking through the Halloween Horror Nights Exhibit at Universal Studios as he takes us through the various sections of the feature presentation. There are some cheesy moments during these transitions as a woman runs through the haunted exhibit screaming from set to set but Savini has fun playing with some of the props. It is really cool to see the master of gore effects taking us on this journey.
The first section is a walk through the narrative of the franchise. The fact that we get through all the information about the plot in just under fourteen minutes should not be a surprise, as Friday the 13th is not about the story but about the kills. We do get initial information about the influences (Psycho) and hear from almost everyone involved from the original feature to the upcoming reboot, including a look at Freddy vs. Jason as well.
There are a couple of glaring omissions in the interviews. Corey Feldman is not involved in any way. Why the hell is he not here to talk about Tommy Jarvis, Jason’s greatest nemesis? Also missing is director Steve Miner, the only man to direct two Friday movies (Parts 2-3).
Despite these absent collaborators, we get the cool sight of Betsy Palmer chanting “kill her mommy, kill her.” Also featured are a number of Internet journalists including Ryan Rotten (ShockTillYouDrop.com), Mrad Miska (Bloody-Disgusting.com) and Staci Layne Wilson (Horror.com). Interestingly, we get comments from James Roday (Shawn Spencer from TV’s Psyche), Adam Green (the director of Hatchet) and Joe Lynch (the director of Wrong Turn 2).
The feature then discusses what - or who - Jason is. There is a disagreement on the subject matter of Jason’s humanity. Dick Wieand (“Roy/Jason” from Part 5) believes Jason has no soul. Kane Hodder does not believe Jason is mindless. Seth Grahame-Smith (Author How to Survive a Horror Movie) reminds us that Jason was a drowning victim who then saw his mother murdered and is therefore a survivor, a victim in his own right.
The next section talks about what makes a Jason movie and ticks off the items that have to be included in every Friday movie. Cunningham mentions you can’t go more than 10 minutes without a kill and they finish it off with a discussion with Harry Manfredini, who did the score for the first eight movies.
The feature then dips into trivia including the best kills, best effects and the various Jason’s and the differences in their movements and reactions. We get a look at the victims and survivors and the cast talks about the qualities it takes to be a survivor. The cast and crew then bring up various bits of trivia an information, some interesting (Judie Aronson (“Samantha” - Part 5) was left in the water so long for her kill scene she got hypothermia) and some funny (Lawrence Monosoon (“Ted” - Part 4) actually got stoned for a scene where his character was supposed to be stoned and says it was a huge mistake because he was paranoid the entire scene).
This is also where director John Carl Buechler (Part 7) lets loose on the Ratings Board for “raping” his movie. He compares a horror movie to telling a joke. “Everything’s in the setup and then the payoff has gotta be, ‘Whoa, that’s great!’ We were telling the joke and we weren’t allowed to give them the punchline. So what you see in the final cut of Friday VII, which is not really my cut, is a very watered-down version of what we hoped it would be.” Between this and the extra interviews, this man appears very bitter.
They discuss the lingering inconsistencies, which no one but fans seem to care about, and then finish off with the discussion of the new movie. Cunningham says he is excited about the new look and feel of the upcoming release. Producer Brad Fuller mentions he wants to give the movie new kills the audience has never seen, or old beloved kills with something new added to the mix, plus a ton of nudity. Jared Padalecki was conspicuous by his absence.
At the end of the day, His Name Was Jason is a great documentary that brings back almost everyone who was anyone to talk about what made this franchise so great. They were all honest and many proved not everything was roses but they were all allowed to speak their minds. I would have loved to see some Feldman but that is a small loss in an otherwise solid feature presentation.
The Video
The picture quality is up and down. For the feature, all the interview clips look great and the clips from the movies look how they originally looked. However, when you get into the hours of bonus interviews and pictures it is clear how much they cleaned up the feature’s picture because they left the bonus interviews as is, and very below average in spots.
The Audio
The sound is just fine, as it is mainly just interviews. No problems here.
The Packaging
Both discs have secure holders in the case and there is also a poster included, as well as $5 movie cash for the new movie. Yea for free stuff!
The Extras
THE MEN BEHIND THE MASK (46:45) - The first feature includes extended interviews with all the men who played Jason. This includes Ari Lehman (Friday the 13th), Steve Dash (Friday the 13th Part 2), Warrington Gillette (Friday the 13th Part 2), Richard Brooker (Friday the 13th Part 3), Ted White (Friday the 13th Part 4), Dick Wieand (Friday the 13th Part 5), Tom Morga (Friday the 13th Part 5), CJ Graham (Friday the 13th Part 6), Kane Hodder (Friday the 13th Part 7, 8, 9, 10), Ken Kirzinger (Freddy vs. Jason) and Derek Mears (Friday the 13th [2009]). Highlights include:
* Lehman admits that Sean was inspired by Carrie for the end scene and added it during the shooting of the film. Tom Savini suggested the final scene that happened but wanted to have her wake up in the hospital, showing it was a dream.
* Dash says Warrington Gillette was going around telling everyone he was the only Jason from the movie and did all the stunts, even though he did none of them. Dash finally agreed to do the Memories book explaining what part he played and suddenly was asked to do conventions. He never knew he had fans.
* Gillette never talks about the controversy with Dash, focusing instead on what was done to turn him into Jason.
* Brooker claims the mask Winston made for him made him look too much like a monster and three guys on the set were hockey fans and suggested the hockey mask.
* White talks about how he hated Corey Feldman, calling him a mean little brat and saying he wanted to kill him desperately. He thinks Feldman was a spoiled little kid.
* Wieand was pissed because he wasn’t allowed to do his own stunts. He also was mad because he and stunt “Jason” Tom Morga didn’t look alike or move alike.
* Morga talks about the controversy with him not “really” playing Jason, but instead an imposter.
* Graham mentions the change of Jason as, not really a zombie, but like a Frankenstein character.
* Hodder talks about a lot of great stuff. When he approaches Freddy vs. Jason, he says he could have done everything that Jason did in that movie just as good as it was done. He seems to still be confused as to why he was not asked to play the role.
* Kirzinger says he was leery about stepping into the role because of the negative fan reaction in the beginning. He mentions how he was able to show Jason with specific fears and humanity. He also touches on how the final battle used no CGI.
* Mears compares his Jason to John Rambo from First Blood in that he is a hunter, Tarzan in the way he is the alpha of the forest, and the Abdominal Snowman from Loony Toons, or more accurately Lenny from Mice and Men. He then laughs at people on the internet message boards who took that statement too literally.
FINAL CUTS (01:17:43) - Over an hour of extended interviews with the directors of most of the films. They include Sean S. Cunningham (Friday the 13th), Joseph Zito (Friday the 13th - Part 4), Danny Steinmann (Friday the 13th - Part 5), Tom McLoughlin (Friday the 13th - Part 6), John Carl Buechler (Friday the 13th - Part 7), Rob Hedden (Friday the 13th - Part 8), Adam Marcus (Jason Goes to Hell), James Isaac (Jason X), and Marcus Nispel (Friday the 13th [2009]). Highlights include:
* Cunningham says he believes it is not important to get to know who the characters are and to just introduce what they are and then dispose of them because more and more people are on Jason’s side.
* Zito said it would be fun to keep Jason moving slowly and then later in the film, have him move quickly to really scare people. His Jason is intelligent and is manipulating the kids.
* Steinmann said the producers were the ones who decided that Tommy would be Jason and there would be a kill every 8-9 minutes.
* McLoughlin said original idea for the end was for a man to show up who had been paying the caretaker to keep Jason’s grave and it would turn out to be Jason’s father, whose eyes showed the same evil as Jason’s. Producers nixed this idea.
* Buechler really hates the way the MPAA cut his film to pieces. He was the man who brought Kane Hodder aboard, although the producers didn’t want him. He fought for his Jason to go the last section of the film with no mask and when it was vetoed did it anyway. Because of this, when he wanted to use a disfigured animatronic as the ghost of Tina Shepard’s father it was immediately vetoed and he had to use an actor with a dirtied face instead.
* Hedden said it was his idea to move it away from Crystal Lake to make it different.
* Marcus takes credit for the idea of Freddy’s glove pulling Jason’s mask into the ground. His idea was Freddy vs. Jason to immediately follow this - a contest proposed by the Devil that whichever killer brings him the most souls can remain on Earth as Hell’s Assassin and the other is gone forever. The targets would by Tommy Jarvis and Nancy Thompson, on the run with Creighton Duke (from Jason Goes to Hell), with Freddy and Jason chasing them.
* Isaac said a sequel to Jason X would start off on Earth 2.
* Nispel says he chose to only do one movie per franchise but would like one more franchise to have his own personal box set.
FROM SCRIPT TO SCREEN (31:15) - The third set of interviews are with the screenwriters, including Victor Miller (Friday the 13th), Barney Cohen (Friday the 13th - Part 4), Todd Farmer (Jason X), and Damien Shannon & Mark Swift (Freddy vs. Jason, Friday the 13th [2009]). Highlights include
* Miller plainly saying the original film was a rip off of Psycho, Carrie and Halloween
* Cohen saying his ideas of continuing the series would have been transferring the evil to different people through each movie, starting with Tommy Jarvis
* Farmer showing a level of disgust at what resulted from his script, saying he wanted it to be dark but they went the same route as Schumacher went with Batman
* Shannon & Swift saying the fear of water in Freddy vs. Jason was not in their script and they want the new movie to be less goofy and more hardcore
DRAGGED FROM THE LAKE (20:52) - This is a bunch of trivial recollections of various incidents. It does include the scary story about the stalker that came after Adrienne King and how she dealt with that trauma. The chapter headings are: Homoerotic Shaving, Jason’s Greatest Kicks, Worst Monologue Ever, Hypothermia, The Giggles, Times Square, The Stalker, Adrienne’s Paintings, Where’s Ted?, Rat Pee, Dating Goes to Hell, Shelly’s Magic Lunch Pail, “I’m a Proud Freak!”
FAN FILMS -
* Freddy vs. Jason in 30 Seconds with Bunnies (00:43) - Yep, that was the entire movie alright... It was actually pretty funny.
* The Angry Video Game Nerd: Friday the 13th Episode (08:06) - The filmmaker introduces the episode, almost trying too hard to make us understand it is comedy. It was alright for what it was.
* Jason Hurts (02:08) - This is a depression commercial featuring Jason. Once he takes his medication, he is able to kill again. Decent.
* Rupert Takes Manhattan (03:58) - Jason’s brother Rupert (he wears a catcher’s mask) but could never beat his brother to the victims. He was invited to Manhattan to join his brother for mass murdering but ended up in Manhattan, Kansas on accident and went to school there. Once again, decent.
CLOSING THE BOOK ON THE FINAL CHAPTER (12:40) - E. Erich Anderson (Rob) and director Joseph Zito are at the house from The Final Chapter and discuss the filming of the movie as they take us on a tour of the house. This was a pretty fun little feature.
FOX COMES HOME -(03:49) - Gloria Charles (Fox) takes us through the barn from Friday the 13th Part 3. The house they used burned down a year before the interview. She also showed where the lake was (they shipped in the water for the movie) that Jason first appeared with the mask. They also talk to the ranch owner who thanks the fans for their support. This wasn’t anywhere near as informative as the prior one, but still had some interesting trivia about the lake.
FRIDAY THE 13th IN 4 MINUTES (04:08) - Adam Green (Hatchet), Joe Lynch (Wrong Turn 2) and Steve Barton (DreadCentral.com) describe the entire series in four minutes. Fun.
JASON TAKES COMIC-CON - (04:30) - DreadCentral.com interview with Derek Mears, Amanda Righetti and producer Brad Fuller - Fuller said no one gave him balls but they wanted to give him big brass balls and nothing supernatural. He said they ignored everything after the fourth one. Informative.
THE CAMP CRYSTAL LAKE SURVIVAL GUIDE (04:35) - Cast and crew members in an old time public service announcement of how to survive an encounter with Jason. Very funny.
INSIDE HALLOWEEN HORROR NIGHTS (07:03) - This is a tour of the Universal Studios theme park attraction. I am not into haunted houses so this was nice to show me what I won’t ever see.
SHELLY LIVES! (02:21) - An advertisement for the law offices of Sheldon P. Finklestein (Larry Zerner, Part 3), Camp Crystal Lake - Manhattan. He is an attorney who represents slasher victims. He would sue various companies (wheelchair designers, spear gun manufacturer). Kind of stupid.
The Film: 10.0/10.0
The Video: 6.0/10.0
The Audio: 9.0/10.0
The Packaging: 10.0/10.0
The Extras: 10.0/10.0
The 411: A fantastic documentary that gives you a lot of great information and video from the Friday the 13th series. It would have been nice to hear from Corey Feldman, and someone even joked in the interviews about why he didn’t show up. Steve Miner, the director of 2 and 3 would have been nice to hear from too. When the feature ended there was still over two and a half hours of extra interview footage to listen to. The features are all fun to watch and adds over an hour to the disc to give the viewer almost five hours of information about the franchise. You can’t get more than that outside of the wonderful Crystal Lake Memories book. Between this video and that book you will know everything there is about the most famous horror franchise of all time. This is a fantastic DVD!
