Wednesday, February 27, 2013

Dana Kimmell in Rivals (a.k.a. Stranger at Jefferson High (1982))


Looks like we know where Chris Higgins got her van in Friday the 13th: Part III! This is from the film Rivals, also known as Stranger at Jefferson High-- a very good film.

12 comments:

  1. Aww very cool find my good man! I have saved videos of her early '80s television apperances on YouTube and of course being a HUGE Part 3-D mark that me & you are, I own two copies of both Friday Part 3 and also her Susan Strussberg thriller Sweet Sixteen. Donald Shanks, whom was The Shape in the mostly super-shitty lookin' back Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers had a minor supporting in Sweet Sixteen, by the way.

    Don't quote me on it but I belive my DVD of it is already out-of-print on goes for a decentsolid aount online, but I forgot.

    Very cool find here. I've never seen Rivals (aka: Stranger at Jefferson High). I'll have to track it down now as I always found her quite the little southern firecracker back in the day. :D MEOW! :)

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  2. Man oh man, I love me some Dana. She's my fave F13 final girl and probably the best there's ever been. Part 3 is also my fave series entry overall. The third act alone is probably the reason I feel that way. Her confrontation with Jason remains the very best in the series, and she delivered his first and most prominent signature wound IMO. I also love the ambiguity of their first encounter. Did Jason do more to her while she was unconscious? Who knows. The implications are certainly there, and his infatuation with her is evident once he realizes who she is later on. So many people love to shit on Part 3, but it's by far the defining entry in my eyes. Even the highly-praised fan favorite of The Final Chapter just amped up the same formula with some new additions. And Chris comes off as far more impressive to me since she faces Jason alone with no help whatsoever. Now that's my kind of woman. lol

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    1. Her hair in Part III did it for me.

      I also love the fact that we left wanting to see more of her and she didn't even show a shoulder!

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    2. I think that Jason may have done something, but I also feel that perhaps her parents found her and ran Jason off. One discussion on the olf F13 board was that the reason her family moved away from Higgins was because of the attack and the fact that Jason was there. Plausible. But I do think the direction of Jason was that he knew her and wanted her to know. From the original script, Jason knew Higgins Haven and knew it well. However, that doesn't mesh with his shack in part II, but still.

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  3. Indeed: While many shit on the overly entertaining Part 3-D these dys, it features a GREAT ensamble case that oddly enough work together, fantastic slasher formula eaths that are pretty much left intact, as well as great jarring Manfredinni score and indeed, perhaps the best rug-pulling finale of the early franchise. Even the BIG TIME overrated as all fuck Part VII (TNB) doesn't have as great of a finale with it trying far too hard with its budget, in my eyes.

    And indeed: Chris had to, like Alice from the original 1980 film, had to do things on her ow once the male lead was vanquished pretty early on in te last two reels of footage. That is a problem that I fee later movies had. Even Rob Dier, the Jason hunnter, suffered an anti-climatic showdown with Jason but died as he should. Starting with the annoying kid in part V, the film makers would ALWAYS include both a strong-willed heroine & a hero, such as the final Tommy Jarvis one of VI, and Tina & Nick in Part VII which I always found overrated as all fuck anyhow and of course Rene & Sean in part VIII, ect.

    Also in part 2 a fine superior sequel, we had the greatly written Giny character whom had to tackle Jason alone after Paul was knocked out for a large chunk of the final reel time so the stakes were amped up. Indeed starting with Part V, because too many people are left alive by the final reels, it always sort of bothered me even with all of the onscreen killin'. The film makers could have just had a srong-willed heroine & showed some exaples of her fighting back against aversity & not have an ending insulting our intelligence too much an viola, it is a fine slasher entry for what it is. :)

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  4. (con't) A just to move on with more overly long, alost ridiculous in length for a non-message board modern day posting:

    I still think that the fine Kimberly Beck did a fine job,acting flaws & all, in The Final Chapter. I feel that was the ast overly good form a technical stand point made Eploitation-style Sasher entry of the series. Rob had perished in his brief battle with Jason and Jason had lunged for Tommy her lil' bro not once but twice, and of course he could have successfully killed him. He was still al ittle boy then but thankfully, he had knowledge of horror films & used psychology on Jason, reused from the fine part 2 (1981) capper at the end.

    But yeah Chris is still still my favorite of the early Friday franchise heroines with a nearby close tie of Amy Steel's Giny character (even though I didnt like a lot of her older conservative clthing that they gave her to wear in that film & I also feel she aged MUCH better as the '80s went on--she's honestly even hotter in April Fool's Day in '86) and Kimberly Beck beats Alice oddly enough because I'm a huge TFC mark after Part 3.

    Also there is some meat to what you speak of. Indeed: When Chris was unconscious, Romanian-born writer Petro Popescue was originally asked to write something sexually ambuquigal in order to give the Jason character some sexuality, but in the final edit it isn't there. I believe that they either went against it in the writing process or Dana Kimmel, because of her strict Mormon beliefs, asked not to realy have too much of it left in the final edit of the film, which is why isn't even discussed that Rick (originally Dereck in the screenplay before his name was changed to be more "Scream-able" for the actress) popped her cherry & took her virginity that night that she had a spat with her folks for comin' in so late before she ran off to teach'em a lesson.

    Also there is a sidebar poll about rather anyone believes if Jason did it or not, and I've already voted twice like I have in this months poll. I believe you a can guess my judgement on it. :)

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  5. LOL Jack my good man I love how you wrote stuff like "Her hair did it for me too, and I loved the fact that we were left wanting more & we didn't even get shoulder".

    Heh heh. Reminds me of the mostly super-shit Halloween 5 wherein I for a brief period had a thing for H4 & 5's Elle Cornell ("Rachel" in both films), and I'm pretty sure that was a mostly clothed (as in wearing a trasparent bikini for film & television) in her all too brief shower sequence.

    Sadly as far as I've studied she's never shown any skin in flicks on film. I own Friday 3, Sweet Sixteen and also the newer Blu Ry of Lone Wolf & Cub myself but I still need to track this down. Hot damn Jack, you've seen so much cooler shit then even me. :)

    And that is intereting about the Part 3-D script. I personally prefer my Slasher villians/anti-heros as Asexual or without a se drive, really, which is why I always found the producer's cut with the incestrial rape of Jamie Llyod in H6 so lame. MM has no sex drive, in my mind. And I'm also glad that screen writer Barney Cohen's Part IV ideas of accidentally brushing Trish's side tit or something and then having Tommy stick the at-one-point microwave ray gun thing-y that Savini wanted to make inide of his head was abandoned. I dunno--it just would have totally been out of left field & would not have"geled right" with the rest of the mostly routine but good slasher flick that came before it in my eyes.

    Maybe we can say that Jason might've quickly looked at Chris' naked nude body while she was unconscious but I doubt he would have penetrated her. Or else Chris would haeve spoken about being raped. It just wouldn't add up, ya know? Ah well.

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  6. Dana just wanted to be vague about having sex with Rick, the writer decided to be vauge about the attack so as not to take the audience someplace else.... there's also possibly something implied in Part 2, where we see Terri scream and then later dead at Jason's shack.
    Back to part 3, the chase scene at the end of 3 is the first Friday the 13th thing I had ever seen, and to this day I've never seen a chase scene quite like it. It's perfect. The film is an hour of goofy 3D and then that amazing chase scene! Dana Kimmell is perfect!

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  7. Okay minor spoiler about my next attachments as e-mail: I recently found through various web searches & name searches a lot of older & obscure Dana Kimmell photos as well as modern oones, and I'll be sharing them with ya oon enough, once I attach them all and only have the nicer & better quality ones. :)

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  8. To Deuce:

    Yeah that was a unique forits time nice edit with the suppsoedly off-screen Teri kill. And she only appeared to be not bloodied,only unconscious in the Jason shack in the end, so yeah--there might've been somethin'to that way of thinking (or maybe not; also did anyone read the CLMs section with Part 2's screen writer of Ron Kurtz? Whoa, what a self-important prick--good writer, though).

    And yes that Part 3 chase sequence is damn near perfect. Part 2's I feel as well too, despite that whole goofy "Giny pissing her pants at the sight of a damn rat" sequence. Steve Miner SURE could direct fine retro slasher set pieces in his hayay of workman-lke directing if little to nothin' else, couldn't he? :D

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  9. Dana did not want the sex to be blatant. She admitted that and before Dana came out a lot of fans shit on that notion. But it helped the story a lot I think. Back in 2001 we barely knew any actor's opinions because not many ever spoke about the roles and we all assumed alot.

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  10. Indeed. Mostly all I ever had was from her point of perspective was an old Fangoria "Women of Crystal Lake" two-parter article spread out over two isues from notable fangoria writer Marc Shipiro. And yeah I agree, it helped the sotry a lot as you didn't need the sex anyhow. The over-sexed couple as well as the entions of it were just goo enough and it is the same flm. Agree'd. :)

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