Crystal Lake Memories: The Complete History of Friday the 13th
Taking inspiration from Peter M. Bracke's definitive book of the same name, this seven-hour documentary dives into the making of all twelve Friday the 13th films, with all-new interviews from the cast and the crew.
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- Cast:
- Emma Jacobs , Jennifer Banko , Kristi Angus , Corey Feldman , Diane Almeida , Erich Anderson , Judie Aronson
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Reviews
Too much of everything
Don't listen to the negative reviews
This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.
Great story, amazing characters, superb action, enthralling cinematography. Yes, this is something I am glad I spent money on.
When studios make DVD extras they hire people who most of the time are not "Fans of the Film" that they are working on. The First Release "Twin Peaks Fire Walk With Me" is an example of a passionless produced product. That is not the case here. "Crystal Lake Memories" is a professionally produced product that happened to be made by people who love the films and that comes across hear "LOUD AND CLEAR".Each film is covered here. There is interviews of the cast as well returning to certain locations. I found the most entertaining segments were the ones devoted to "Friday the 13th Part IV" and "Friday the 13th Part VII" I have no complaints about this documentary. I just wish that the fans could raise the funds and restore the gore that was edited out of each film. You don't need the actors to come back. Body doubles and insert shots is all we need.
In my opinion - For anyone (in their right mind) to actually sit through nearly 7 hours of watching this ridiculously redundant and preposterously repetitive "Friday The 13th" documentary would certainly have to be a bona-fide masochist of the highest order. I mean, 7 hours!!?? Like, talk about milking a subject to absolute death.If you ask me - I think this "Crystal Lake Memories" documentary could've easily been reduced to a running time of, maybe, 2.5 hours, at best. It seemed to me like just about everyone and their dog appeared in this documentary gushing and paying glowing lip-service to a horror movie franchise that, since 1980, has spawned 12 mind-numbingly predictable sequels in all. And, unfortunately, at this point, there seems to be no end in sight for more of this nonsense.Yes. I will admit that I watched most of this documentary in fast-forward mode. But, hey, with that said, when I did stop the rush of images to hear what anyone was babbling about, it was just the same old, tired bull from start to finish. And I knew I hadn't missed anything worthwhile at all.Let's face it - This documentary is strictly for hard-core fans only!P.S. - I thought it was really hilarious that actress Betsy Palmer, who played Jason's murderous mother in the original Friday The 13th, was the only one in this documentary who had the guts to come forward and say that she couldn't understand this horror film's lasting appeal. She was the only one and I applaud her for that.
Admittedly, I was a huger fan of the Nightmare on Elm Street films, but when I purchased the box-set of the 12-film Friday the 13th series, I truly fell more in love with these movies.Once I finally recapped the entire series, taking more notes during this screening than I have ever during any movie, I turned to Crystal Lake Memories: The Complete History of Friday the 13th, a filmed documentary in the same style as the Never Sleep Again: The Elm Street Legacy documentary.The Freddy one was a mere 240 minutes, whereas the Jason chronicles is an astounding 400 minutes! (660 minutes if you include the unfinished 4-hour extra scenes that were cut from the original documentary on a separate disc.) Granted, there's more Friday the 13th films than the Nightmare series, but 11 hours is really pushing it. Not to mention, there's audio commentary on top of the original 7 hours!Forgetting about the length, I watched the whole (initial seven hours) thing through. I am a fan, after all. I learned some interesting things, and had a nice recap of how audiences took to the individual films as well as the box office. But the question is, as a true fan, did I learn really all that much with spending 7 (or 11 with the extra disc) hours on this documentary? Not really.Sure, there were a few things that I was shocked at, or took from this documentary, but NOT enough to spend this much time with these interviews.That all said, if you're a Friday the 13th fan yeah, I would recommend this very long documentary on the series. But, just once. You won't gain too much knowledge than you already had.Going back to Freddy That was a 100% AMAZING documentary and had a much more interesting host in the form of Heather Langenkamp over this documentary's Corey Feldman. Not that he wasn't great, he was just okay, whereas Heather was thoroughly interesting and absolutely invested in the series. Corey was merely reporting, especially since he only appeared in one and a tenth of the series.Is it worth getting all 11 hours of the documentary? No. The seven initial hours were just fine. The additional four, well, let's just say, I turned off an hour and a half through since they were so rough and unfinished. Watch the seven-hour one but only once.
I just saw the whole thing last night and here are my thoughts.This is a must have F13 DOC for all the die hard fans.2 DVD's and 2 blu rays in which we get the whole story of the franchise splited in 14 chapters running from 20 to 40 minutes each chapter.As u can imagine we begin with part 1 (long night at camp blood) and we end with the remake film.in more detailDVD 1 and BLU RAY 1 have 7 chapters full of cast interviews and thoughts of the movies plus a lot of scenes from the movies some of them presented in their deleted // extended form.1) LONG NIGHT AT CAMP BLOOD2) PART 23) PART 34) FINAL CHAPTER5) A NEW BEGINNING6) JASON LIVES7) F13 THE TV SERIESDVD 2 and BLU RAY 2 have the rest chapters from part 7 to part 12 plus a bonus chapter containing more interviews from the cast members....IN more detail8) THE NEW BLOOD9) JASON TAKES MANHATTAN 10) JASON GOES TO HELL 11) JASON X 12) FREDDY vs JASON 13) THE REMAKE 14) REFLECTIONS ON WATERAlso we have an intro narrative by corey feldman who also appears at the very end of the project closing in a great way that project.As i said this effort is great but not complete.Unfortunately the alice cooper's videos from part 6 are absent from one more official F13 DVD release and what is strange is that we also don't get the 12 F13 trailer park which they should have been included in this specific release (although they are separate available).Apart from that this is a must have for all die hard f13 fans as we all get to see for the first time all 9 actors (and their stundmen) who played JASON all over the years plus we get to see most of the cast from the movies including scenes of those who could not make it to appear alive in this DOC.good work guys and now it's time for a HELLRAISER and a CHILD'S PLAY complete doc after those we had of JASON, FREDDY and MYERS.