Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan

  This movie makes two fatal mistakes. First is marketing itself as taking place in Manhattan and then spending most of its runtime on a boat. The second is making the actual Manhattan section of the film excruciatingly boring.

Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan was written and directed by Rob Hedden (Clockstoppers) and was released on July 28th, 1998. Jason Takes Manhattan was made on a budget of somewhere between $5.1-$5.5 million, made $6,251,310 upon opening, and made $14,343,976 worldwide. Jason Takes Manhattan received overwhelmingly negative reviews.

Jason Takes Manhattan follows a group of teens, including aquaphobic Rennie (Jensen Daggett, Home Improvement), on a graduation cruise from (the previously landlocked) Crystal Lake to Manhattan. Of course, Jason (Kane Hodder, Hatchet) makes his way onboard and begins slaughtering his way through the cast.

Truthfully, the boat sections of the film are pretty good. Is Rennie the blandest of protagonists? Absolutely. Is the majority of the cast obvious cannon fodder? Very much so. But the boat setting actually works really well. It’s a nice break from the well-trod road of cabins, forests, and lake and it gives the film a claustrophobic air that the other films don’t have.

Unfortunately once the action leaves the boat and enters Manhattan, everything falls apart. The scenery is bland and repetitive and the action is uninspired. The majority of the final act takes place in grungy alleyways that don’t fully utilize the promise of the film’s tagline (unsurprising only the brief Times Square sequence was actually filmed in New York). Worst of all, the last act is boring and nonsensical.

Perhaps this could have been saved if Rennie was a more interesting protagonist, but she’s entirely defined by her aquaphobia that stems from a traumatic experience of being attacked by young Jason in Crystal lake as a child. Does the timeline of this backstory make a lick of sense? It does not. Honestly, even Alice is a better Final GIrl than Rennie. Hell, I’d even take Julie James (of I Know What You Did Last Summer fame) over her.

Jason Takes Manhattan is an unfortunate waste of not one but two premises. This should be a high mark of the series, but unfortunately it falls near the bottom. Not as bad at A New Beginning, but pretty damn close.

Rating: 1 ½ Big Apples out of 5

Other Observations:

• Does the Dog Die? Rennie’s adorable dog is revealed to be alive in the final scene.

• Harrison’s Favorite Scare: Tamara’s (Sharlene Martin, Smallville) death is pretty fun. Could do without the gratuitous nudity (though it seems a bit pointless to complain about that at this point in the franchise).

• When The Fuck Is This Movie Set? We aren’t told how long after The New Blood this is set, but I’m going to place it at one year (the length between releases). That puts us in 1998.

• Jason punches a dude’s head clean off his body. This lands on the right side of ridiculous.

• Okay, the scene in the diner is pretty good.

Next Week: We continue the theme with Jason Goes to Hell: The Final Friday (spoiler, it wasn’t).