Friday the 13th: A New Beginning, the fifth film in the Friday the 13th franchise, is celebrating its 40th anniversary this year – and JoBlo’s own Ryan Cultrera was recently able to catch up with Melanie Kinnaman, who played the film’s heroine, at the Ve Neill’s Vampire Weekend convention in California! Ryan talked with Kinnaman about her experience working on the classic slasher, and you can watch the interview in the video embedded above.
Directed by Danny Steinmann, who also crafted the screenplay with Martin Kitrosser and David Cohen, Friday the 13th: A New Beginning has the following synopsis: Years after Tommy Jarvis murdered hockey-masked serial killer Jason Voorhees, he resides in a mental hospital and struggles with the trauma of the experience. When Tommy moves to an isolated halfway house, he has nightmares about Jason’s return, and soon one of the patients is killed. As the body count grows, Tommy begins to question his sanity and wonder if Jason has risen from the dead. But, to determine the killer’s identity, Tommy will need to survive.
Kinnaman was joined in the cast by John Shepherd, Shavar Ross, Richard Young, Dick Wieand, Marco St. John, Tiffany Helm, Juliette Cummins, Jerry Pavlon, Vernon Washington, Debi Sue Voorhees, John Robert Dixon, William Caskey Swaim, Richard Lineback, Miguel A. Núñez Jr., Jere Fields, Bob DeSimone, Rebecca Wood, Corey Parker, Anthony Barrile, Todd Bryant, Curtis Conaway, Sonny Shields, Dominick Brascia, Mark Venturini, Carol Locatell, Ron Sloan, Ric Mancini, Suzanne Bateman, Eddie Matthews, Chuck Wells, Tom Morga, and Johnny Hock, with a cameo appearance by Corey Feldman.
When the sequel was first released, a lot of fans were disappointed by it, largely because Jason Voorhees is only present through nightmares and hallucinations (the actual killer is a copycat). Many of those fans have since embraced it for being the sleazy, fun slasher movie that it is.
Are you a fan of Friday the 13th: A New Beginning? Take a look at our Melanie Kinnaman interview, then let us know by leaving a comment below.
