Watched this one as a semi-commitment to "watch every single _Friday the 13th_ movie" and yes, it's taken awhile... There are only so many of these that a normal human being can stomach in a short span of time, so yes, it's been a bit since I watched _Jason X_ but I can now mark this one off my list. As far as films go, I have mixed feelings about this one...VERY mixed feelings. Parts of it were gruesomely good; the kills were excellent and beautifully gory so I was impressed with that part. The flip side, however, is that _Freddy vs. Jason_ was exactly like every other 1980's teen horror/slasher flick: full of stupid teen drama (and acting) that was bad enough to make you wonder if it was really worth it. (Hint: It wasn't.) The teen drama, the utterly horrible acting (and I don't mean "melodramatic" as you see in some teen films, but just the complete lack of talent), the script/dialogue in so many scenes...just YUCK. I love a good horror film but man these 1980's teen scream movies were just putrid. And that hasn't changed. (FWIW, I was a high school senior in the 1980's so I can appreciate the "teen" aspect of these films. They still suck, though. They just didn't suck as bad back then.) There were parts of the film that were actually humorous, and some that tried too hard; the whole "Jason in a pinball machine" was so ridiculous...I mean, there's "cheesy" and then there's infantile ridiculous; this was the latter. But there _were_ some bits that were actually humorous and had me chuckling. So overall, it was just a mixed bag of stupid and violence. There's the bottom line. Choose wisely whether you want to sit through this one; although it's not as awful as some of the _Friday the 13th_ films (by a long shot), it's certainly not the best and it's not really a very good film at all. The storyline is so goofy that you simply have to disengage your brain for an hour and a half (the last seven minutes are credits and there's no "after-the-credits-surprise" to waste your time waiting on) and choose to sit through this mess. This isn't one of those _"Man I wish I could get that 97 minutes of my life back"_ but it IS a _"That's definitely an hour and a half I won't ever give up again."_ It was fun, gory, and teen-hormone-drama-stupid thrown into a blender and the smelly mess is what you wind up with.

>*"Who cares about some fucking dream guy, okay? That psycho in a hockey mask was real."*

If you like both franchises, this is pure fanservice. This one's a teen slasher, totally camp and lots of dumb fun once again. Not much of a story but it's everything you're here for; pure entertainment throughout, lots of fun bloody kills and the right amount of Freddy and Jason presence.

The teen characters are empty shells but they're at least comical and entertaining. Very bad acting, dialogue and horrible special effects at times though. Except for that the movie looks freakin good in general. Great dream sequences and kills visuals.

Freddy's face makeup/mask looks like one of those strawberry grid pastries and the parts where he's talking to himself were really cringey. Jason got the best kills overall and the best moments, he was litterally on fire! Those fire scenes with Jason were my favorite parts of the movie until the absolutely epic Freddy vs. Jason *X-Men* fight(s). It was everything I hoped for and more. So much fun and laughs! And they somehow managed to incorporate the humans without them getting in the way. Awesome ending.

I've only seen the first *Friday the 13th* very long ago so I can't really compare the franchise with this movie but after binging the whole *A Nightmare on Elm Street* franchise... i'm sorry but ***Freddy vs. Jason*** is superior to every one of those movies!

As expected, a pretty bad movie. Right from the start I’ve noticed something weird about this film, it feels like it’s been running on 2x speed. Super accelerated, yet nothing really happens.

Terrible soundtrack choice. That heavy metal score doesn’t fit at all with the movie we’re seeing.

Bad acting and bad characters. I was hoping so hard that everyone would be butchered by both Jason and Freddy, if possible. Lori, just die, please. She just reminds me of the good Laurie, Jamie Lee Curtis.

I did not really understand where the hell Lori got the conclusion that Freddy’s weakness is fire and Jason’s is water. So random. Doesn’t even make sense, although Jason has drowned in his films countless times before this one he never showed any sign that he’s afraid of the water. Besides, Jason wasn’t really sleeping, he was sedated. You don’t dream while sedated, you just black out. At least I think so.

The moment where Jason is on fire while killing people in a party in a cornfield is cool.

I suppose the final act where we finally get Freddy vs Jason fight is decent, kind of.

The movie is terrible. It’s only worth watching this so you can see these two iconic horror characters in the same plot.

At this point, who really cares about continuity, I guess. Jason's survived being blown to bits by a SWAT team, boiled in toxic waste, drug to hell by demons and disintegrated in the atmosphere. Freddy's been crushed, impaled, pipe bombed, stripped of his powers and forgotten. It isn't the first time we've set aside preceding stories for the sake of the next one, and in this case it's given a pass for the sake of a titular clash of legends. Only they don't actually clash until the final twenty minutes, and even then it's a bit underwhelming. Their heavyweight brawls deliver a few brief moments of awesome, but there's always something restraining these monsters, holding them back from really cutting loose, and the big climax is predictably open-ended.

In keeping with both franchises, most of our story revolves around a tribe of empty-minded teens. Slowly, prophetically unraveling the plot, their numbers are whittled down until a pair of strong-willed survivors finally decide to fight back. The greater saga is a bit over-reaching, introducing and abandoning several pointless subplots, but it does a fair enough job of intertwining two distinct franchises and granting legitimate reasons for Freddy and Jason to cooperate and, later, clash.

It's trashy fun, loaded up with fan service and gruesome killings. Big and dumb and cringe-worthy, spiritually compatible with both legacies, and basically all it needed to be. I've seen much worse.

***Worthy new millennium entry in the Friday & Nightmare franchises, until they clash, that is***

To be expected, 2003's "Freddy vs. Jason" mixes together elements of the "Nightmare" and "Friday" franchises. Both franchises had essentially ran out of gas in the early 90s -- the last conventional "Friday" movie, before 2001's "Jason X," came out a decade earlier and the last "Nightmare" movie almost as long. So mixing up the formats was a great way to introduce these modern monsters to a new generation as well as re-introduce them to the old.

THE PLOT: Freddy Krueger, the wicked spirit of a child molester/serial killer, is trapped in hell and unable to wreak havoc on the youths of Springwood, Ohio, because they have forgotten him and therefore no longer believe. Krueger's diabolical plan is to lure Jason from Crystal Lake, NJ, to Springwood and inspire him to go on a killing spree, which would naturally be blamed on Kruger, thus giving him the power to return.

Some say "Freddy vs. Jason" is more of a "Nightmare" film than a "Friday" film, and I can see why, but it's really an equal parts crossover. Once Jason is led to Springwood it essentially becomes a "Nightmare" movie with Jason as the antagonist until Freddy gains enough power; by that time the story switches to Crystal Lake for the finale and even provides an insightful flashback (via a dream sequence) of Jason's youth and abuse.

One of the highlights takes place early in the second act: Jason's flaming attack at a teen party in a cornfield; it's a dynamic sequence and features great opticals.

As with all the Friday films, "FvJ" features a nice assortment of women, beginning with the cameo of Heather (Odessa Munroe) in the opening reel. She's pretty much on par with the cameo of Agent Marcus (Julie Michaels) at the beginning of "Jason Goes to Hell." From there we have cutie Katharine Isabelle as a secondary protagonist and Monica Keena as the heroine. It took me about half the movie to warm up to Monica but she ultimately won me over.

"Freddy vs. Jason" is a noticeably more technically sophisticated than the first nine "Friday" movies. Don't get me wrong, it's very cartoony and hardly scary (except for jump scares and gore), but it LOOKS so much better and has more oomph. The story’s also way more involved than the first eight entries and “Jason X,” which makes the film play better on repeat viewings.

The fight between the two monsters in the closing act is a cinematic tradition going back earlier than 1945's "The Wolf Man vs. Dracula" (aka "House of Dracula"), but it's the weak point of the movie for me because it's just too cartoony. The film works as horror with either Jason or Freddy attacking the youths, but when they finally clash in the action-packed climax it's just too comic booky.

The film runs 97 minutes and was shot mostly in British Columbia, Canada (e.g. Buntzen Lake, Anmore), but also Toronto.

GRADE: B