Friday the 13th Part III (1982) | 31 Days of Horror: Oct 13

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See severed heads that almost fall right in your lap. See that bloody hatchet coming right at you.

It’s Friday the 13th, so I always like to celebrate here at 31 Days of Horror. This year it’s the third part of the Jason Vorhees saga, which was originally released in 3D. Make sure the back door is locked, and then turn down the lights for Friday the 13th Part III.

Before Viewing

The trailer for the third part of this franchise (which apparently opened on Friday, August 13th) reminds the viewer that 13 is an unlucky number. But also that one through twelve are also unlucky, as these woods belong to Jason. The film is also presented in 3D so a number of shots showcase some of the things audiences have to look forward to, like a machete, hot poker, or spear gun coming right at you! Even though Friday the 13th Part III looks like more of the same, it adds a new dimension to the horror.

Presented below is the trailer for the film.

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After Viewing

The film opens where the previous installment ends, showing Ginny (Amy Steel) narrowly avoiding serial killer Jason by pretending to be his mother, Pamela Voorhees. The action picks up later the next evening as Jason (Richard Brooker) kills Harold (Steve Susskind) and Edna (Cheri Maugans), the proprietors of the Crystal Lake cafe and store. Elsewhere, Chris Higgins (Dana Kimmell) picks up her friend Vera (Catherine Parks) as they and five other friends head up to her cabin, Higgins Haven, near Crystal Lake. They pass by a police presence at the nearby store, and wonder what has happened.

Entering the property, Chris almost drives the van over a man (David Wiley) sleeping in the middle of the road. He holds up an eyeball, claiming it’s an omen and warns them to go back where they came from. At Chris’ cabin/house, they all meet Rick (Paul Kratka), Chris’s boyfriend who she hasn’t seen in a while. Shelly (Larry Zerner), a nerdy and socially awkward friend, plays a prank on the group pretending to have an ax buried in his scalp. Nobody appreciates the humor, least of all Chris, who runs out of the room.

Vera takes Shelly to the local store (a different store than the beginning of the film) in Rick’s VW Beetle to get some supplies. They irritate a trio of bikes, Ali (Nick Savage), Loco (Kevin O’Brien), and Fox (Gloria Charles), when Shelly accidentally backs into their motorcycles. When they return to the cabin with a broken windshield, Rick and Chris take off, leaving Andy (Jeffrey Rogers) and his pregnant girlfriend Debbie (Tracie Savage) to go for a swim. Meanwhile, Jason sneaks into the barn. The bikers show up at the cabin for payback, by siphoning gas from the van. Fox and Loco investigate the barn and both get stabbed by Jason with pitchforks. When Ali goes looking for them, he gets clubbed by Jason numerous times.

Andy and Debbie return to the cabin and retire to the hammock in their room. Elsewhere on the property, Chris explains to Rick why she’s been so distant from him, sexually. Two years ago, Chris was assaulted by a grotesque looking man with a knife in the woods near the cabin. She passed out and awoke in her room. Neither of her parents ever mentioned a thing, and she’s been nursing the trauma ever since. Chuck (David Katims) and Chili (Rachel Howard), two stoner friends, attempt to get payback and scare Shelly in the barn, but he’s not there.

Instead, Shelly is scaring Vera again, reaching up from the pond to grab her foot on the dock. She rebuffs him, saying she likes him (not in that way), but not when he acts like a jerk. Dressed in his wetsuit with a hockey mask, and speargun, he heads to the barn. A figure with a hockey mask (who could it be?) returns and fires the spear directly into Vera’s eye, killing her. At the cabin, Debbie showers after sex while Andy gets slaughtered by Jason. When Debbie goes to investigate she is killed as well.

The power goes out at the cabin, so Chuck heads into the basement to check the fuse box. Jason shoves him into the electrical box, causing the lights to flicker. At the front door, Shelly shows up with a slit throat, gasping. Chili believes it to be a prank and ignores him, until Jason stabs her with a red hot poker. Chris and Rick return, having to walk back, and find no one. Rick is killed when Jason crushes his head with his bare hands. Chris flees from the cabin out a second story window. She takes the van, which runs out of gas on the bridge.

Jason chases her into the barn, but Chris manages to get the drop on him. She gets a rope around his neck, and pushes him out the top door, hanging him. As she exits the front, he comes back to life pulling himself out of the noose. She notices his face under the mask is the same as the person who attacked her two years ago. Ali, who’s not fully dead, pops up to attack Jason before getting fully killed. Chris puts an ax into Jason’s head before hopping in a canoe and drifting on the lake. The next morning she hallucinates that Jason is coming for her, and that Mrs. Voorhees pops out of the lake to drag her under. The sheriff takes her away for medical attention as the camera drifts into the bar, showing Jason is still dead.

“Nothing’s gonna happen to you when we’re all here together.” – Debbie

Friday the 13th Part III sometimes referred to as part 3D was a new dimension in terror for the franchise, literally. It was at the forefront of the 3D resurgence in the early 80s. Films such as the original House of Wax (1953) or The Creature from the Black Lagoon (1954) used a cyan and red offset technique, created by using a special camera setup, that created a faux stereoscopic image. Viewers had cardboard glasses with cyan and magenta lenses that made it appear that objects were coming off the screen. Originally a popular gimmick in 1953 (with over 40 films released in 3D), the technology quickly dwindled, producing only 15 films for all of the 60s and 70s. 1982 marked the return of the technique, which featured several films, including this one, before petering out (again) the following year with other threequels Jaws 3-D and Amityville 3-D debuting, as well as a couple of sci-fi films Metalstorm: The Destruction of Jared-Syn and Spacehunter: Adventures in the Forbidden Zone.

The techniques of 3D lends itself to horror films more than other genres, and is used as an additional tool to scare and shock audiences. The Friday the 13th franchise does not really need additions like this, but obviously producers are always searching for something to make a sequel stand out, rather than be a repetitive version of a familiar story. Unfortunately it seems as if the process of filming in three dimensions, with the bulky cameras and lengthy setups, might have detracted from the overall elements that make a Friday the 13th film so memorable. Watching the film in 2D really showcases the number of times that something was meant to poke out at the audience. Harold moving the pole for the clothes line or Andy yo-yoing towards the camera are two ho-hum examples. There are also jump scares with knives, harpoons, blood, and snakes jumping out at audiences as well, yet the “formula” for the film seems off.

Maybe Friday the 13th Part III seems off due to the fact that producers had decided that this would be the last film in a planned trilogy (imagine that). The end had Jason dying, and staying dead. But many of the tropes seemed to be watered down or take a back seat to the 3D process. For example, both Friday the 13th and Friday the 13th Part 2 had multiple sex scenes, multiple characters making out, and nudity as part of their runtime. While Part III had at least the same number of couples, only one is sexually active, with Debbie having one minor nude scene. And what is with the characters mentioning that Debbie is pregnant? It’s not like she’s showing yet, being very early in her pregnancy. Perhaps it was a way to build sympathy for her character, or show that she’s at least in a committed relationship. The remaining characters don’t seem to work well together. Chuck and Chili seems to be a minor addition, as a pair of stoners–with Chuck easily aping a Tommy Chong look. Shelly has Vera as a blind date, but she is just not that into him. Only Chris and Rick have some additional chemistry, but she–as many final girls often do, isn’t putting out.

For this film, the main character not being involved in any sexual situations is not because Chris is a prude or is saving herself for marriage. She has a trauma in her life, stemming from an attack two years ago by Jason himself. A strange piece of backstory that fans of the series feel like they might have missed elsewhere. Her abstaining, even amongst Rick’s gentle and sometimes more overt come-on’s, may be one of the most realistic elements of the Friday the 13th franchise. While not a strictly sexual trauma, her attack by the knife wielding maniac coupled with the fact that her mother slapped her for staying out too late (the first time her parents had ever hit her), puts the character in a head space to question any intimate encounter with another person. Rick continues to pressure her, but she continues to rebuff him, even feeling guilt from those moments and realizing she needs to explain why this is happening.

The one thing that doesn’t seem to suffer in this threequel is the creativity of the deaths. There are 12 in all, making this the bloodiest Friday the 13th yet. Adding in the 3D process allowed the filmmakers to create even more interesting ways to kill the characters. Pitchforks make easy work of two of the biker gang, while Vera getting shot in the eye by a harpoon coming straight for the audience is a true crowd pleaser. Andy and Debbie’s deaths also provide a new avenue. He was slit down the middle while doing a handstand, then stacked like a cord of wood above the bed dripping blood onto Debbie, who is stabbed through the back and out her throat much like Kevin Bacon was in the first film. Chuck and Chili’s deaths were less than stellar probably due to their lack of screen time in general. However, Jason being killed, not once but twice, by Chris is possibly the best element. She hangs the killer, who manages to come back and literally pull himself off the noose, just before she puts an ax into his head (echoing Shelly’s gag earlier in the film). And the fact that he stays dead also adds another level of surprise.

The biggest element to this film has to be the introduction of Jason’s iconic hockey mask. This is the one feature that seems to define the character in pop culture, popping up as his most notable article, even though it wasn’t introduced until halfway through the third film. Steve Miner returned to direct this film, his second film ever, and the last Friday the 13th film he would direct. However it was not the last horror film he’d make. He’d return soon with House, a great haunted house film with William Katt and George Wendt, as well as the franchise starter Warlock, the franchise reviver Halloween H2O, and the classic giant alligator film Lake Placid. Obviously this was not the last Friday the 13th film. In total the series continued for 10 films, one crossover with A Nightmare on Elm Street’s Freddy, and a reboot in 2009. This film for all its weirdness and quirks is still fun. Maybe it’s because this was the first Friday the 13th film I ever saw, but there are some classic moments, however goofy some of them might be.

Assorted Musings

• The rotting corpse of Mrs Voorhees jumping out of the lake in Chris’s dream is similar to the end of Part 1 where a rotting Jason attacks Alice in the canoe.
• Each film has had a doomsayer in them. Crazy Ralph was in the first two parts, while creepy Abel shows up here with a random eyeball.
• Debbie grabs a Fangoria magazine, a great shout out to the horror fans, which has an article on makeup effects artist Tom Savini, just before she is killed. Savini worked on the first and fourth films in this series, but sadly not this one.