Film scholar Williams views "Friday the 13th" as "symptomatic of its era," particularly Reagan-era America, and part of a trajectory of films such as "The Texas Chain Saw Massacre" (1974) and "Race with the Devil" (1975), which "exemplify a particular apocalyptic vision moving from disclosing family contradictions to self-indulgent nihilism." The film's recurring use of point-of-view shots from the killer's perspective have been noted by scholars such as Philip Dimare as "inherently voyeuristic." Dimare regards the film as a "cautionary tale that succeeds in warning against the sexual impropriety even as it fetishizes violent transgression."