Friday the 13th Part VI: Jason Lives (1986)

Directed by Tom McLoughlin. Starring Thom Matthews, Jennifer Cooke, David Kagen, Renée Jones, Kerry Noonan, Darcy DeMoss, Tom Fridley, Bob Larkin, Matthew Faison, Whitney Rydbeck, Alan Blumenfeld, Ann Ryerson, Ron Palillo. [R]

The stale Friday the 13th series gets a much needed change of pace with a looser, funnier, slicker, more action-packed outing that sees the iconic killer get resurrected as a supernatural zombie killer whose immortality makes it easy for him to keep coming back for even more sequels. The formula isn’t demolished by any means—Jason still butchers everyone who crosses his path in creative and/or repulsive ways—but the opening titles, which spoof the gun barrel sequences from James Bond movies, promise that, at the very least, this is going to be a self-aware horror pic ready to tease its own clichés and repetitiveness. Also features shootouts, vehicular stunts, fourth-wall breaks, multiple Alice Cooper songs, a victim trying to bribe Jason from slashing her, and actual children attending Camp Crystal Lake (renamed “Camp Forest Green” because not everyone is as stupid as the onscreen characters in these movies). Pointed toward the new slasher generation from Scream onward by having some of the characters acknowledge horror movie “rules” (that knowledge ain’t gonna save ‘em, though). Best in the series, but some diehard fans may not be as willing to accept the new direction.

30/100