4.8 | / 10 |
Users | 0.0 | |
Reviewer | 3.0 | |
Overall | 3.0 |
Jason's evil spirit finds its way into a series of host bodies, thus continuing the carnage at Crystal Lake, where Jason confronts a long-lost sister.
Starring: John D. LeMay, Kari Keegan, Kane Hodder, Steven Williams, Steven CulpHorror | 100% |
Thriller | 34% |
Supernatural | 15% |
Mystery | 12% |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 1.78:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.85:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 (48kHz, 24-bit)
German: Dolby Digital 2.0
Spanish: Dolby Digital 2.0
English SDH, German SDH, Spanish
50GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Digital copy (as download)
Region A (B, C untested)
Movie | 1.5 | |
Video | 4.5 | |
Audio | 4.5 | |
Extras | 1.5 | |
Overall | 3.0 |
Jason Goes to Hell: The Final Friday is being released as part of Friday the 13th: The Complete Collection. The biggest problem with what is effectively the ninth film in the Friday the 13th series is that it isn't a Friday the 13th film. An obvious clue is the title, the first in the series to omit the signature phrase "Friday the 13th". In the four years since The New Blood, New Line Cinema, which was still an independent operation at the time, had acquired the rights to the Jason Voorhees character and was developing the film that would eventually be released in 2003 as Freddy vs. Jason, pitting New Line's signature villain from A Nightmare on Elm Street against the unstoppable monster in the hockey mask. At the time, New Line intended Jason Goes to Hell to be the final film in the newly acquired franchise, which no doubt accounts for their total disregard for everything that fans had come to expect from a Friday the 13th film. The film may have been produced by original part 1 director Sean Cunningham, but you'd never know it from the results. That Jason Goes to Hell is probably the least respected by fans among the films in The Complete Collection may account for its lackluster treatment. The commentary from New Line's 2004 DVD has been eliminated, and so has the unrated cut included as an alternative. I have never seen the unrated cut, but it runs 3-4 minutes longer, and my understanding is that it mostly ups the gore quotient. I doubt, however, that these additional minutes of violence are sufficient to make this problematic entry a member of the Friday the 13th family. It remains a foundling left on the doorstep.
Whatever the shortcomings of Jason Goes to Hell as a film, the image on Warner's 1080p, AVC-encoded Blu-ray is excellent. The passage of four years and the move to New Line Cinema upgraded the series' technical quality. Jason Goes to Hell was shot by William Dill, an experienced DP for TV and independent film, who now teaches cinematography full time. Dill photographed the film in a largely realistic manner that has since become commonplace in major TV productions, but in 1993 was ahead of its time. Except for sequences requiring stylized lighting (e.g., the all-out assault on Jason early in the film, the autopsy sequence and the spooky visits to the long-abandoned Voorhees mansion—wait, there was a mansion?), the lighting is gentle and the color palette isn't overstated. It's an ordinary world into which extraordinary events suddenly erupt. Warner's Blu-ray image is finely detailed, with solid blacks, good contrast and colors that are distinct without becoming overassertive. The sole exception is Campbell's TV broadcasts, where colors have been exaggerated into NTSC-style primaries; these portions of the film have been windowboxed at 1.33:1. The film's grain texture is fine and undisturbed by digital tampering. Jason Goes to Hell shares a BD-50 with Jason X, but the absence of major extras has allowed enough room for an average bitrate of 22.92 Mbps, which is sufficient to avoid any compression-related issues.
Jason Goes to Hell was released in Dolby Surround, but by 1993 studios and sound designers knew that multichannel formats were the future and most of them were saving their tracks and stems for future remixes. The Blu-ray's lossless DTS-HD MA 5.1 track begins quietly enough with echoes of Harry Manfredini's original score announcing the possibility of Jason's presence, but it kicks in with authority and presence when the man in the hockey mask reveals himself to his intended victim. The military assault on Jason is classic movie overkill, with rifles, small arms and grenades exploding around the room. Until the film's fiery conclusion, no scene quite matches this one in sonic intensity, but there's plenty of loud gunfire, bone-cracking (not all of it by Jason's "carriers") and various roars, screams and wails to fill out the track. Ambiant noises from distinct environments appear in the surrounds, and Manfredini has taken the opportunity of composing for a different kind of film to write a more expansive score. If nothing else, the film sounds great.
If you make it all the way to the incongruous closing shot of Jason Goes to Hell, you're left with the sense that the entire film is simply a detour designed to set up Freddy vs. Jason, which, at the time, New Line expected to put into production shortly. Instead, that film became stalled in development, and the studio created Jason X to fill the void. Either way, it's hard to defend Jason Goes to Hell as either a Friday the 13th film or even a decent prequel to the "smackdown" film it was designed to introduce. The Blu-ray is technically presentable, but missing enough features (including the unrated cut) to call into question the accuracy of the title The Complete Collection. I'm not recommending it, but obviously one can't acquire The Complete Collection without it.
1988
2001
1981
2003
Limited Edition
1980
1982
1989
Limited Edition
2009
1985
1986
Friday the 13th: Part IV - The Final Chapter
1984
1998
1982
Unrated Producer's Cut | Halloween 6
1995
Collector's Edition
1989
Collector's Edition
1988
Halloween 8
2002
30th Anniversary Edition | Includes "Terror in the Aisles"
1981
1988
1984