Thank goodness it's Friday.
*Spoilers for the Friday the 13th franchise*
Friday the 13th has long been associated with bad things happening. With longstanding connotations going back to the Last Supper, the day – and the number thirteen is general – is thought to be unlucky.
However, perhaps the most common association with Friday the 13th today isn't the Last Supper – it's a horror movie from 1980 about a woman "avenging" her young son's death.
By now, almost everyone can recognize the image of Jason Voorhees, a killer known for his iconic hockey mask and machete. However, Jason wasn't the villain of Friday the 13th; that title goes to Pamela Voorhees, Jason's mother, who begins attacking teenagers after her son drowns due to the negligence of two camp counsellors.
Screenwriter Victor Miller has openly admitted that the film borrowed heavily from John Carpenter's Halloween. In fact, nearly everything about the premise spawned from the creator's trying to recapture what made Halloween so successful; they chose a summer camp in order to have teenagers "cut off from all adult help", and they used Jason's death as an inciting incident similar to young Michael killing his sister. They also followed in Halloween's footsteps by killing any characters who had sex, even making it the overt motivation for their deaths, and having a "final girl" who survived to the end and managed to overcome the killer.
The creators of Friday the 13th may have been big John Carpenter fans, but the feeling certainly wasn't mutual – in fact, Carpenter described the film as "very cynical" and "cheap", an opinion he holds about many Halloween rip-offs. However, the audience begged to differ, and Friday the 13th became a mass hit that's still incredibly popular to this day.
So, what is it that people loved about a "cheap", "cynical" movie that was a total ripoff by the writer's own confession?
Well, there isn't one clear answer. The gore factor may have been a draw for many people, but there's no shortage of gory movies that reached nowhere near the sort of prolific fame that Friday the 13th did. The film was made for $700 000, over twice as much money as Halloween, but still a low budget. The kills were thought to be innovative, and the movie came out at a point where slashers hadn't been quite so done to death as they are today. No matter what the reason, Friday the 13th took off and didn't stop.
There are now twelve films in the franchise, which has also spawned a television series, as well as novels, comic books, and various merchandise. The most recent addition, a 2009 film with the same name as the original, had a budget of $19 000 000. Jason Voorhees, both in an out of universe, just keeps coming back stronger.
This Friday the 13th, you might want to kick back at home with a now-iconic 1980 slasher – but if you do decide to go out, remember to wear a mask.
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