Clayton George Wickham - final thesis

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Robin’s death sequence contains a form of surrogate visual penetration which
immediately precedes her own bodily penetration, and further solidifying the
viewer’s cognitive visual conception of the incident. In terms of perspective, the
film aligns with Robin through the use of close ups on her and the erratic editing
pace of shots of varied lengths. Significantly, the shot preceding the death blow is a
medium shot of underneath her mattress. She is lying on the top of a set of bunk
beds, and a hand moving from the left of the frame, holding a machete upright,
places the tip of the machete against the bottom of the mattress. The hand then
pushes up as the machete cuts through the fabric accompanied by the sound of cloth
ripping and the singing of the metal grating against something solid. This is
followed by a cut to a medium shot of Robin, laying on her back, her head at the left
of the frame, her midriff at the right, and a wet slicing sound is heard as she screams,
before the machete eventually emerges from her chest. Although the source of the
wet slice is seen through the exit wound, the point of entry remains unseen.
However, the previous shot of the machete tearing through the mattress enhances the
implied visual that is completed through the exit wound that is created, the mattress
acting as surrogate for her back being penetrated by the weapon. This uniquely
differs from the death of Jack in Friday the 13 th , as the emergence of the arrow from
his throat is a surprise to the viewer as the entry point is neither seen nor implied
beforehand, and the double pinioning of Jeff and Sandra, which shows the spear
emerging from the mattress, without showing their bodies upon entry or exit of the
weapon.
Jason Lives! retains A New Beginning’s tendency to favour the depiction of
death sequences through unverified diegetic sound and editing, and is shot with
eye/camera and off-model eye/camera shots. This occurs in Lizabeth’s death