Crystal Lake Memories: The Complete History of Friday the 13th
Crystal Lake Memories: The Complete History of Friday the 13th
NR | 13 September 2013 (USA)
Crystal Lake Memories: The Complete History of Friday the 13th Trailers

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.

Reviews
Karry

Best movie of this year hands down!

... View More
SnoReptilePlenty

Memorable, crazy movie

... View More
Glucedee

It's hard to see any effort in the film. There's no comedy to speak of, no real drama and, worst of all.

... View More
TrueHello

Fun premise, good actors, bad writing. This film seemed to have potential at the beginning but it quickly devolves into a trite action film. Ultimately it's very boring.

... View More
Michael_Elliott

Crystal Lake Memories: The Complete History of Friday the 13th (2013) **** (out of 4)Honestly, what can you say about a documentary that clocks in at six hours and forty-minutes? This look at the FRIDAY THE 13TH series is without question a dream come true for fans of the horror series since, for the longest time, Paramount really didn't do too much in regards to special features for the series.Although Paramount finally came around and delivered some extras, this here is basically all you F13 fans will need when it comes to details about the series. I eman, the first two hours are devoted to the first four films so that tells you how much detail is given to each one of them. What's so great about this series is the fact that it looked at all of the films and even the television series and thankfully most of the cast members and directors are here.I'm not going to list all of the actors and directors that were interviewed but lets just say that Steve Miner is the only one that really stands out as being missing. Oh yeah, Kevin Bacon too but did we really expect him to talk about the film? The interviews are rather priceless because you're hearing from a lot of the actors for the very first time unless you were able to catch them at a convention. All of them are obviously happy about getting to discuss the films, their work in them and what it means to be involved in the series.We get great stories about all aspects of the production. We learn about ideas that weren't used. We learn about the box office take as well as the various issues with MPAA. We learn about alternate endings as well as scenes that were shot but deleted or other scenes that were never shot. All of these stories are just what F13 fans have wanted and to have them in one film, all together is just wonderful.CRYSTAL LAKE MEMORIES is a very long documentary but the second time I watched it I watched it in on sitting and I must admit that I loved every second of it and wished it had been twice as long. If you're not a "fan" of the series then you might just want to watch this film-by-film. In all honesty, if you are a fan I really don't see what you'd complain about here.

... View More
Dalbert Pringle

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.

... View More
Zbigniew_Krycsiwiki

Bookended by sequences narrated by Corey Feldman, this incredibly lengthy, eleven hours long documentary about the making of the Friday the 13th film series, told, in chronological order, by the cast and crew of each film, is interesting even if you already know a lot of what is being discussed. Each film is given a fair amount of time for coverage, about 25 minutes or so, with interviews of the cast and crew of that specific film, as opposed to some random fan, like we ended up getting in His Name was Jason. Monica Keena's comments are amusing, but it also seems like she is perhaps taking Jason a bit too seriously. She seemed a bit too insulted by Jason later killing her character in comic book form. From his interviews, one gets the feeling that Derek Mears is genuinely a fan of the character and the series, and made the character frightening again, for the first time since part VII. Kane Hodder was a good Jason, he made the character his own by doing something unique with it, which had never been done before, but his Jason wasn't scary or frightening, more slow and methodical. Even the segment devoted to the (in my mind, underwhelming) in-name-only television series was well done.

... View More
thesar-2

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.

... View More