Halloween Director Trashes Friday the 13th

You'll wish it were only a nightmare...the night he came home.

By Lucy O'Brien

Halloween director and horror legend John Carpenter doesn't think much of the Friday the 13th franchise.

Speaking on Bret Easton Ellis's podcast (as reported by Vulture), Carpenter revealed he wasn't a fan of some of the cash-grab movies that followed his seminal 1978 slasher flick. "One sprints from an organic idea and has a truly artist's eye working," Carpenter said. "And Friday the 13th...affects me as very cynical. It's very cynical moviemaking. It just doesn't rise above its cheapness."

Carpenter blames the slasher fatigue of the '80s on directors trying to appeal too hard to young people ( "that's what the teenagers want to see") and cheap budgets.

"I think the reason that all these slasher movies came in the ’80s was a lot of folks said, 'Look at that Halloween movie,'" said Carpenter. "It was made for peanuts, and look at the money it's made! We can make money like that."

Carpenter will soon be returning to his iconic Halloween franchise as executive producer for a new installment in the works at Blumhouse, set to be written by Prisoners scribe Aaron Guzikowski. As for Friday the 13th, we'll be seeing Jason Vorhees in a new video game this Fall.

Lucy O'Brien is an editor at IGN’s Sydney office. Follow her ramblings on Twitter.

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