Friday the 13th Part 3

Friday the 13th Part 3 title

Tag Line : Camp Crystal's Bloody Legacy

Friday the 13th Part 3 Set on the same weekend as the events of part 2, a group of teenagers decide to visit their families old holiday home, "Higgins Haven", which is located a bit further on around Crystal lake.

Unfortunately for them, Jason (played this time by Richard Brooker) is still prowling round the area and after acquiring an Ice Hockey Mask from one of his victims, he goes on another bloody rampage and proceeds to do away with the holidaying teens in the same manner as before.

Heads are crushed, knives and machete's are wielded, people are stabbed with red hot pokers, impaled on pitchforks and shot with harpoon guns in this entertaining and in some places, quite amusing third entry into the series.

The film was originally filmed for the 3D market, which makes some of the scene's look rather peculiar now the 3D effects have been removed, although the eye popping scene and the shot with the harpoon gun are quite interesting.

I rather get the impression that this film was only made to cash in on the short lived craze of 3D movies that appeared in the early-mid 80's. (one remembers Jaws 3D and the appalling Amityville 3D ). This is not the best in the series but is still quite good in places.

Mind the axe though!

Overall marks : 6/10.

Other Information.

Steve Miner returned to direct, with Frank Mancuso Jr. handling the production, who also went on to produce some of the following sequels. The music was once again by Harry Manfredini.
Jason acquired his trademark Ice Hockey mask in this episode, this was done to mimic Michael Myers Halloween mask from the "Halloween" series of films.
A lot of gore was trimmed from the US version in order to gain an R-rating. These shortened all the death scenes, which were originally longer, bloodier and more drawn out.
Richard Brooker got the job as Jason after answering a casting ad in a trade magazine. Steve Miner chose him for the sole reason he wanted a large guy to play Jason. Brooker had one further acting role, the part of Ogris in the movie "Deathstalker", before turning his had to TV production and direction. He still works in the TV industry, predominantly producing sports and daytime shows for the US TV networks.
The TV newscaster was played by director Steve Miner.
The US "R" rated version was submitted to the BBFC, only to suffer another short cut in order to gain a UK 18 certificate. This initially removed the scene of one of the girls looking up to see her boyfriends dead body up in the ceiling joists dripping blood, just before being knifed by Jason who's hiding underneath her hammock. However, this scene was re-instated for the UK DVD. The current VHS version is still of the old cut version though.
There was a differant ending originally filmed in which the surviving girl is actually killed during at the end of the movie. This version omitted the dream sequence of Mrs Voorhees bursting out of the lake, and instead shows the surviving girl geting out of the canoe the following morning and going back to the cabin, only to find jason stood in the doorway who cuts off her head with an axe.
Larry Zerner, who plays Shelley, was offered the job after one of the producers spotted him handing out flyers to a horror film and asked him if he'd like to appear in one.
The old Norwegian video-version is apparently fully uncut (unconfirmed).
The film was banned outright on video in Germany, but passed uncut for a DVD release in 2001.
If you fancy seeing the original 3-D version, you'll have to travel to Toronto Canada and visit "The Royal" cinema. They own one of the original 3D prints still in existence and screen it once a year!