Director: Tom McLaughlin
Year: 1986
Country: USA
Alternate Titles: N/A
Genre: Slasher
Plot:
Attempting to disprove the Jason legend, Tommy Jarvis inadvertently revives him and sets him out to continue his rampage against a group of clueless teens preparing a summer camp session and forces him to try to stop him.
Review:
Frankly this one was one of the most underrated efforts in the series. One of the better qualities here is the high amount of action found throughout here, which not only gives this one an unbelievably exciting pace but gives this so much to like. Starting off with the fantastic opening sequence where Jason's resurrection in the cemetery with the grand Gothic action of the metal rod and the lightning bolt, the attack on the campers on the shortcut in the woods and the car-chase through the woods leading the police back to the graveyard all manage to give this some highly exciting scenes along the way here. Other fine action scenes here include the camper attack where he takes out the couple in their RV before a fantastic crash along the highway, a second fairly exciting car chase with the police that also manages some fine humorous moments as well, and the final battle at the lake is one of the better confrontations in the series not only for doing the gender switch of the guy rather than the girl but the brawling on the boat and getting dragged down to the bottom requiring intervention anyway makes this a lot of fun and only adds to the action.
The fine acting here is just another tip of the cap. Thom Matthews becomes third in the series to essay Tommy Jarvis, and he's back in fine form after the disappointing previous installment. He's headstrong, active and determined to end Jason as well as having the audience on our side with the sheriff's wrong decisions making him truly sympathetic. He makes for a fine final boy and gives this a great leading duo as they have to handle the masked madman. Jennifer Cooke as Megan the sheriff's daughter is a great co-lead in the duo, offering a spunky and sassy female counterpart who lives by her own rules and tries to downplay her fathers' connection to live on her own terms which makes her quite a fun, charming figure. She disappears into the background at the end which does lower her somewhat, but this one is the one main downfall to her as she has nice charming chemistry with Thom which helps us nicely root for them. As well, the rest of the campers here are great with some light, breezy moments that are quite realistic in helping to give them a nice sense of suspense to their cause.
That's not just for the rather enjoyable slasher moments here, as those makes this one even better by featuring some great parts here with him stalking the group of paint-ball players in the woods, the attack on the campers in their cabins as he picks them off in some really chilling scenes where they have to keep the safety of the children accounted for as the discovery of the bodies is made, and the wiping out of the police force at the camp makes for a series of great kills as the numerous bodies pile up rather quickly, allowing for some truly fun stalking scenes as well. The after-affect here of all this is that there's such a great body-count of dozens of deaths here and it's filled with some clever, unique kills here. While also packed with some fine humorous moments and a fun, striking-looking Jason, there's enough to like here that makes this one enjoyable to be able to hold off the one big flaw in this one.
What really causes this one to come down somewhat is the rather lame plot here of the police to be wrong throughout here merely to be shown up later because Tommy has to be proved right, which really flies in the face of true police behavior. Almost all of their encounters here are meant to have him be right at the expense of the rational way most police conduct their business, especially at the beginning as the sort of story told should warrant an investigation into the claims rather than throw him in jail and then hold that over him the entire rest of the film. It's a little troubling, but it's the only flaw here.
Overview: ****/5
With plenty of enjoyable elements overall, there's not a whole lot of disappointing elements present here which manages to hold this one up quite nicely as being a franchise strong point. Give this one a shot if you've been following the franchise so far or if you're a genre fanatic as well, while this might be a fine entry point for those looking for a nice and easy look into this one to get going in the franchise.
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