So, eight movies into this franchise and I keep forgetting that these films were originally released by Paramount Pictures, who's logo comes up in the beginning of each film. We come to the campiest part of the series. The time when the parody replaced the horror film. Camp Crystal Lake is now big enough for 20 foot boats. And, after a couple movies, it turns out Jason can be woken up by electricity, but only on Friday the 13th, yeah, ok. So, in the original film, Camp Crystal Lake was located in New Jersey and was big enough to be an over-sized pond, but in this film, it has room for a 20 foot boat and a river big enough for that boat to float upstream to Iceland (subbing for Canada?), it looks like, where Jason hitches a ride on a mini-cruise ship, bound for New York. The ship then looks like it is cruising over Lake Michigan in a brutal storm, which I guess is supposed to be the Atlantic Ocean. For a majority of the film, we are on the cruise to hell, while Jason chases after graduating students from Lakeview High. Jason makes it to New York City with 30 minutes left in the movie.The basic plot, especially the scenes on the ship, in some ways, reminds me of Bram Stoker's story about Dracula. Having Jason preying on the people on the ship, like Bela Lugosi in Dracula (1931) or Max Schreck in Nosferatu (1922), has an interesting similarity. It is even more evident, when the New York City police are inspecting the ship, that ran aground, full of corpses, just like in the different depictions of Dracula. I noticed a few things in this film, that reminded me of other movies. Part of the plot reminded me of The Poseidon Adventure (1974), too. There is an extra side-story, involving the captain of the ship and his son. It had the similar character development pattern found in disaster movies. It was appropriate though, because of the impending doom we know is coming to everyone. This was really the only interesting part to the film. Once Jason gets to Manhattan, he seems to be ignoring the New-Yorkers and just keeps chasing the people from Crystal Lake. I guess we are to assume, he only kills those from the lake? So, he is ignoring the New Yorkers? Jason is much faster in this film. Jason is also an excellent swimmer. I did not know Jason bellowed like a dinosaur when you throw toxic chemicals on him. Jason can read, "In Case of Fire, Break Glass". Jensen Daggett, who plays Rennie, keeps seeing premonitions/visions of, I guess, Jason drowning. It makes no sense and comes out of nowhere. That is just part of the paper thin plot found in Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan (1989).The majority of the film has very unlikeable characters, which is typical of these films. It is a believed idea, that the point to making the characters unlikeable is, that you root for Jason to kill them. That is the point. Jason is the anti-hero in this. Composer, Harry Manfredini, left the series after doing all of the films up to this point. Fred Mollin, who co-composed with Manfredini on the last film, took over the reigns, to fully compose this film. There is a stark difference in the music. That is not a commentary on the quality of the music, but the music seems to accidently emphasize the camp-atmosphere felt in the film. Veteran television and film actor, Peter Mark Richman plays Dr. Charles McCulloch, the chaperone of the students. On the flip-side of the career scale, making one of her early film appearances is Kelly Hu (Nash Bridges, 1997-1998 and Arrow, 2012-2019), as Eva Watanabe. The film is a slight mess in its design. There are some strange edits, found in the wrong places. It contains a ridiculous ending to an even more ridiculous movie. Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan (1989), is a failure and I am not alone on this. You can see the results, that the critics came to, as well as, the audience scores, anywhere online. I remember the noise heard, even back in 1989, when everyone said this film stinks. I'm pretty sure I saw it in theaters, so I probably read some of the bad reviews or saw an episode of Siskel and Ebert (1975-1999), back in the day. I do remember people being almost-angry about it. Even though this film is a failure, I still think it should be seen, because you have to see it to believe it. Other than the Dracula comparison, a few clever scenes and Peter Mark Richman being a jerk, I would tell you to skip this one, but it was the end of an era for this franchise. Is this the end of Jason? No, but it sure looks like the producers wanted to kill him. That makes sense considering New Line Cinema would pick up the franchise for the ninth film, Jason Goes to Hell: The Final Friday (1993). 3.5 (F MyGrade) = 4 IMDB
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