There are two Friday the 13th fan films that go by the rather unimaginative title Friday the
13th: Fan Film, both of which were
released in 2016. One of them is classically bad, and the
other especially terrible.
The bad one is directed by Riley Lorden
and, to its credit, features a body-positive Jason. It offers little
else in the way of positives. The dialogue is so bad it seems
improvised—either that or it was just particularly poorly written.
It may very well be the latter, as the script provides no real story
arc. The only other commendable feature is that it closes on a pretty
adept drone shot. The reward for sitting through the credits is a
shot of another slasher, this one in a Shatner mask, picking up one
of Jason’s discarded weapons. This teases a crossover, which is
cool in and of itself, but the viewer is left hoping that Riley
Lorden et al. won’t be the ones to make it.
Nor should the guys who
made the other Fan Film. This flick is credited rather
obliquely to “The Cast,” and with good cause, as even the most
superlative ironist would not want their name associated with this
steaming pile. The cast is a thirty-and-over sausage fest; indeed, it
seems like the guys who put this together were having a party in
the midst of filming (or vice-versa). This film’s Jason is
dollar-store quality, with a street-hockey style mask that looks more
fitting for Lord Humongous than Jason Voorhees (now there’s a
worthwhile crossover, fan-filmmakers) and Halloween-decoration
plastic ribs that he wears like a necklace. Moreover, this Jason
proceeds almost daintily with his kills. I guess the guys who made
this were going for laughs. That said, they seemed to earnestly
sketch out the homosocial and outright homoerotic trajectories
between some of the characters, an element that would be more praiseworthy had
the film taken itself a little more seriously on the whole. If
nothing else, this Fan Film’s only redeeming quality might
be that it stands as the only really queer-friendly Friday the 13th fan film. It offers some strangely intimate moments between the
characters, as if the boys were working things out between one
another in real-life as the party was happening and as the movie was
being filmed. This is the only conceivable reason why it should be
watched. In fact, this so-bad-it’s-good aspect actually makes this
Fan Film better than Riley Lorden’s not-as-bad but still
unremarkably crappy fan film of the same name. If you find yourself
confused, I’d suggest watching neither film.
Watch the bad one here. Don't watch the terrible one anywhere.