Crystal Lake Cruiser

About Friday the 13th (1980)

Sean S. Cunningham’s Friday the 13th (1980) was conceived purely as a commercial venture after the success of Halloween, with Cunningham taking out a full-page ad in Variety announcing the title before a script even existed. The film’s legendary twist ending—revealing that the killer was Jason’s mother Pamela Voorhees, not Jason himself—was kept secret from most of the cast until filming. Tom Savini’s groundbreaking practical effects, particularly Kevin Bacon’s arrow-through-the-throat death, set a new standard for slasher movie kills and helped launch Savini’s career as the horror genre’s premier makeup effects artist. Made for just $550,000, the film earned $59 million and spawned one of the longest-running horror franchises in history, even though its most famous character, hockey-masked Jason, wouldn’t appear in his iconic form until the third installment.