Part 2 Double Impalement: Original Or Stolen Kill?
This topic has been debated a long time, ever since the movie was released almost 30 years ago. The filmmakers claim that they never even heard of Twitch of the Death Nerve, let alone watched the movie. For those of you that do not know, a 1971 film titled Twitch of the Death Nerve featured a double impalement kill almost exact to the kill in Friday the 13th Part 2. It is so much alike that it could very well be a remake scene.
So, did Steve Miner and Ron Kurz “borrow” a scene or did they create it not knowing a very similar kill already existed? Watch the video below and you be the judge. A big thanks to Scabboy’s Youtube Channel for the video.
Never seen that one before. They’re just too similar for it to be a coincidence, right down to the shot of the spear before and the under the bed shot after. Seems funny to me.
yikes that is close.
It would seem that if you wanted to off two counselors in the same manner and only had the regular Jason killing implements at your disposal, that you could come up with that scene without having ever seen the original. So…I’m gonna say they prob didn’t see that one. Or if they did, probably figured thought no one else ever would
you know what, i have been watching Friday movies since Part 4 was released on VHS back in the mid 80s, and being from a small town in Canada, and not having cable growing up, and well, of course no internet back then, i always thought the Friday films had the best kills, original and imaginative.
so years go by, and i started going into a big 70/80s hard to find horror faze, and i came across TOTDN. i watched it and when i seen that scene, the first thing i thought of was Friday 2, and i sat up in my chair, pointed at the screen and said, Friday 2 stole that kill, wtf?
i call bullshit on them not knowing that they were stealing a kill scene. they took it from a low budget italian movie, that was made 10 years prior, and thought no one would notice in North America. while Mario Bava was a well known horror director, he was well known in Europe, and to the small cult following around the world at the time. his movies are probably more popular now then ever before, because of his original kills and the graphic nature of them.
i even go as far as saying that they might have gotten some ideas from Dario Argento’s movies. He is another great italian horror director. not exact kills per-say, but the style and even the look of a kill and how to set it up and get the right camera angle.
its hard not to steal some ideas from other movies, but it should be a homage and a tip of the hat to some classic directors. either way, my opinion, they stole that kill, its waaaaaaaaay to obvious.
good topic, i often wondered other peoples thoughts on this subject.
IMO it doesn’t really matter to me if they ripped it off or not. Still classic.
That is close. Ft13th was inspired by many movies like Psycho. But I believe it was director Adam Marcus (Jason Goes To Hell) who first compared the FT13th movies to Twitch Of The Death Nerve on The Many Lives Of Jason Voorhees featured on the Jason X DVD. In another article Sean Cunningham swears He never saw nor heard of the film until years later. I remember watching twitch many years ago. It was not only the inspiration for FT13th, but many slashers to come. Mario Bava is a genius. I know Victor Miller (writer of FT13th part 1) said they were ripping off Halloween (1978). But FT13th kicks Halloweens ass. I think it was easier to steal from twitch of the death nerve because it was not well known at the time. And in closing Id like to say, thats how the death scene shouldve looked in FT13th pt 2. All bloody and gory.
iMDB says that two scenes in Friday 2 were “stolen” from that movie. Is the other one the machete in the face scene? I found this looking in “alternate versions”: Nearly the entire scene (21 sec) is cut from the boy’s death with a machete embedded in his face.
Anyone got clips?
This is clearly not a stolen scene, in Friday II the guy is on top, and in Twitch its the girl. All claims should be thrown out the window!!! LoL
On another note, A+ to Twitch for the nice side boob
Is there also a chance that this kill was inspired by Twitch of the Death Nerve,or could it also be a coincedence that part 2 also had this kill?
Nice catch Gabe.
Who knows? I mean are we really gonna disect the scene, when Platinum Dunes steals movies, and not just a scene, big deal! They still pulled it off nicely…..Classic vintage Jason! I wish the modern movies would only show Jason\’s feet, or his back from behind, instead of showing him walking right up to them & killing them with no suspense what so ever.
I don’t think we have to really disect the scene, but it is interesting to watch two exact same kills side by side. Each scene is complete with the same instrument of destruction and both victims in the same, um, postion. The fact that Twitch was released 10 years earlier at a time when these kind of movie were not even a thought in Hollywood is truly amazing!
Also, Halloween 2, which was also released in 1981, had a similar kill as another italian horror movie. The scene is where Michael Myers drowns the nurse in the hot tub after he turned the heat way up.
I think that they probably stole it, But who cares. I would be very angry if I was a filmaker though and someone stole my same death scene. That\’s not right. However I love Friday The 13th and I\’m standing by them whether they did it or not on purpose. Haha. I never seen Twitch of the death never before. I\’ve only heard of it. Strangely enough it was on the Jason X dvd documentary.
Mario Bava’s Bay of Blood (which was released in America as Twitch of the Death Nerve)was released in the US by Hallmark Releasing Corp in 1972. Hallmark financed and released Sean S. Cunningham’s Together, as well as the Craven/Cunningham collaboration Last House on the Left (also 1972, btw). It stretches credibility to think that the scene wasn’t lifted. That said, Bay of Blood is a decidedly lesser Bava film, though it’s gore quota has elevated its reputation unjustifiably over the years, with a family inheritance plot better suited to an episode of The 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo than a serious horror vehicle. Friday the 13th Part II, on the other hand, is a credible entry in the series and worthwhile for anyone interested in horror cinema.
Thanks Lorne, I wondered if anyone was going to bring up Hallmark Releasing, it was starting to bother me that nobody brought that up.
jasonsfury, you’re thinking of Dario Argento’s 1975 “Deep Red” with the hot tub scene in Halloween 2. Even though in Deep Red, it was just a simple bathtub in a woman’s house.
Oh, a male character in “Twitch of the Death Nerve” also feature a man wearing a sweater that look a lot like what Pamela Voorhees wear!!
Yeah I saw this debate brought up many years ago. It’s also brought up in a couple of shasher film documentaries if my mind serves me right.
It’s totally a rip and I sort of remember Cunningham saying some where that he used that scene in Twitch for inspiration for his concept or something along those lines. (but I’d have to go back and research that comment)
Plus if you have read the behind the scenes of that shot that the original cut also shows them squirming on the bed trying to get off the spear in Friday 2 but it got cut down. So if you could see the uncut version it would be identical.
But I like the Friday 2 version better.
Steve
mwd
Friday 2 also blatantly stole the campfire story scene from a 1981 movie, “The Burning,” which featured a young Jason Alexander. In fact, this story of Cropsy, a disfigured camp worker seeking his revenge with a pair of gardening shears seems to have set up the whole future of the Friday franchise. There is no coincidence that Steve Miner “accidentally” recreated all these iconic scenes.
I doubt Friday 2 ripped off The Burning, seeing as how they were released the same year…and the Cropsy folklore was around way before either of the movies came about.
Ah ha. Thanks NW. Now that sounds like the correct movie. Memories!
It’s funny that “Twitch” was also know as “Last House on the Left Part II” and had nothing to do with the first Last House.
There are a few kills in Twitch that are really similar to the first 2 Friday the 13th films.
If this went to court, I am sure the judge would rule that the italian movie influenced the Friday the 13th kill. George Harrison (beatles fame) was sued for that My Sweet Lord song he had. The court ruled that he subconsciously took a guitar riff from another song and added it to his. He lost a lot of money. In the very least, you can say that happened here. Though, it seems like maybe a bit more.
Today, its no big deal to borrow scenes from other movies. Happens all the time.
Yeah, it’s definitely a rip. I think Cunningham and Miner would have gotten less flack about it if they’d just said “this scene is our homage to Twitch of the Death Nerve”, rather than trying to pretend they had never seen the film. Giving a nod to a favorite film is done by directors all the time in Hollywood. If Miner had just said “yeah, I love Bava and wanted to tip my hat to him in this scene”, then I think most fans would have respected that. It’s a damned cool scene, in both flicks!
The only thing I can say is that our happy couple didn’t keep going in the middle of the “spearing!”
That aside, yeah, they are similar, but a lot of times, scenes like this are similar in some way, shape, or form.
Very similar indeed. However, when two things are being compared that are very similar if not the same, I am reminded of a quote by Boy George when asked what he thought about Pete Burns, the lead singer of “Dead or Alive,” complaining about how Boy George had ripped off his use of cross-dressing/androgyny and that Pete had done it first. The quote is this: “It’s not who did it first. It’s who did it better.” And, obviously, “Friday:2,” did it better.
they aren’t just similar, they are the EXACT same scene…it’s taken for sure…no way it’s original
Who cares if it’s ripped off or not…it wouldn’t be remembered very well if it weren’t for part 2…in fact would anybody remember TOTDN otherwise?
I would have to see the complete uncut scene to judge. According to many published accounts, the original Friday the 13th kill scene was longer and much more graphic…so much so that it had to be cut for the movie to get an ‘R’ rating. The way the scene is now, it is very similar, but the one in TOTDN is actually bloodier and the false back is fake looking. Copied or not, FT13TH2 did a better job.
Friday 2 took that scene from Twitch. There is nothing wrong with that. The horror genre takes from each other all the time.