MovieChat Forums > Friday the 13th (1980) Discussion > How did Alice fall into the lake?

How did Alice fall into the lake?


The ending to that movie still bothers me:

If the scene with Jason is supposed to be a dream, why did the police still pull Alice out of the lake? How did she end up there?

They probably didn't mean that they just pulled her boat out of the lake. Otherwise, she would have woken up when they did. And this way, there would have been no need to explain the situation to her in the hospital. Because in that case, she would have remembered that she was brought to the hospital. Also, in this situation she wouldn't think the dream was real because she would realize that her dream happened some seconds ago while the police picked her up some hours ago, brought her to the hospital and then she fell asleep there.

Since Alice thinks Jason is still in the lake and believes the dream was real, this means she wasn't awake when the police brought her to the hospital and that the scene in the hospital is the first time she's awake since last night.

So, how did Alice end up in the lake? Also, why didn't she immediately wake up when she hit the water?

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"You're overthinking it"

It was the Loch Ness monster.

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Yeah. How could I ever ask a plot-related question about "Friday the 13th" on a "Friday the 13th" board? What a stipid idea. :rolleyes:

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It's probably supposed to be that when she has the nightmare, she startles herself awake and tips the boat over.

Also, maybe it was meant to be up to the viewer if it was a dream or not.

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It's probably supposed to be that when she has the nightmare, she startles herself awake and tips the boat over.

But she has the nightmare when she's in the hospital: She dreams of Jason and immediately wakes up, terrified.
If she has the nightmare in the boat, she would have been unconscious for many hours, having been awake for a moment between having the nightmare and becoming unconscious.

Also, why would she be unconscious anyway? If she has the nightmare in the boat and tips it over, she would immediately wake up and try to get into the boat again. Why should we assume that accidentally tipping the boat has exactly the same effect (drowning) as if somebody actually pulled her underwater?

Also, maybe it was meant to be up to the viewer if it was a dream or not.

This works only if both versions make sense in their own right. But if one of the versions leaves some major plot holes, it's not a good way to make an ambigious ending.

I still don't understand it: There's really no way why she should drown in the first place.

Firstly, tipping over the boat all by herself is a stupid plot device anyway. That's like some action hero defeating the bad guy and then slipping over a banana peel and breaking his neck.

And secondly, it makes sense to pull Alice out of the lake if Jason pulls her underwater. But if she just dreamed this and merely fell into the water all by herself, she would wake up and fight her way back into (or onto) the boat. But they make it seem like the effect of getting actively pulled underwater is the same as drowning after falling into the water.

If there was never a Jason to begin with, why did she drown at all?

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The fact alone that you need to prepare that Jason costume, get a child actor to play him and prepare the whole setup in the water pretty much shows that it was not a last minute addition, as if they spontaneously decided to do this ending and shot it within an hour at the last day of filming. There had to be done some elaborate preparation which would have given them enough time to think it through. So, this is really no excuse.

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Still, it cannot have been some spontaneous idea that they just did within some minutes and then it stuck.
Filming the scene in the water and the scene in the hospital takes enough time so that it cannot be considered a "last minute" addition.
Which means someone must have written down the scene before. Which means this person must have thought about it.
It's impossible that someone came up with it spontaneously and five minutes later they were filming it without really thinking about the scene and then another 10 minutes later the scene was finished.

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The scene was added because they wanted a last minute jump scare, ala the ending of Carrie.

They didn't want us to know it was a dream, so they could scare us first. Once that's accomplished and we think Alice is pulled under the water, we're shown she's still alive and safe (for the moment...).

I think the dream in the hospital is a repeat of what she dreamed in the boat, and I believe she fell into the water from waking up in hysterics after the dream, causing her to tip the boat and fall out.

You should get the book Crystal Lake Memories, it will describe how they did the scene. I have the book but don't remember exactly what it said, but I do remember it said they wanted that last minute scare and that's why that scene was filmed.

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The scene was added because they wanted a last minute jump scare, ala the ending of Carrie.

Yeah, I know the intention. But I'm interested in it from a plot point of view.
"Carrie"'s ending made sense: When the girl woke up, they didn't present it in a way that she still thought she had actually been at Carrie's grave. It's clear that it was just a nightmare and that she has been in bed the whole time.

If they wanted a jump scare in "Friday the 13th", they could just as well have shown that scene with Jason and then switched over to a scene where Alice wakes up, still lying in the boat.

The fact that the policemen tell her they had to pull her out of the lake, that's the thing that makes it illogical:
If it was just a dream, why did she end up in the water in the real world as well?
If she tipped the boat, why doesn't she remember that? Why didn't she try to climb back in the boat? In the dream, she was pulled underwater, sure. But in the real world, there was nothing from preventing her to get back into the boat.


You should get the book Crystal Lake Memories, it will describe how they did the scene.

This book will probably only explain how the scene was done from the filmmakers' point of view. But I'm interested in a plot-related explanation: From the point of view of the characters from within the story, what exactly happened?

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I think they left it open ended on purpose. It makes it scarier that way. Was it a dream or was it real? The last line of the film, "then he's still there", and Alice seeming to believe it really happened. And who knows, maybe they were leaving it open for continuation.

I looked in the book and can't really find anything that explains it the way you're asking about it. It just says they didn't want to leave it with the last scene being Jason coming out of the water. They wanted the hospital scene for an epilogue, it says.

In the novelization, Alice thinks it really happened. This was written in 1987 I think, so maybe it's written that way in light of the sequels.

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I still don't agree it isn't canon. Obviously it has to be approved by somebody officially connected to the film because otherwise they couldn't print it.

And the sequels are part of the canon.

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I do count the sequels when I watch this because they are connected to it. I don't like the Jason family backstory in 9, but I feel like I have to count it.

Well the novel didn't have anything bizarre in it, so I don't see a reason why it shouldn't be canon. Have you ever read it?

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[deleted]

She's dreaming

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Wow! Thank you so much. So, so much.

I was asking a question and made some elaborate explanations on what I think about the scenario and why I have problems with it. There were some back and forth discussions about the various aspects with different users. And in the end we came to the conclusion that continuity is not one of "Friday the 13th"'s strongest aspects.

And now you come here, ignore everything that was said before, and, without any further explanation, simply write: "She's dreaming".

Now, that has convinced me. Thank you so much for this very helpful post.

Of course. How could I have not realized this? She's dreaming.

Those few words explain absolutely everything. Really. They explain everything. Including the objections that I have with the theory that she's dreaming. You know, the objections that I mentioned in the first post and which were the issue of all the discussions going on in this thread. You explained them away with your short statement that she's dreaming.

Thanks again, man. You really settled the discussion once and for all. Your post was so insightful. Thanks.

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Lol a lot of people make short posts that don't really try to solve anything, I see that quite a bit.

Adrienne King has a website, maybe you could contact her through her site with your question.

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Adrienne King is just the actress. Their opinions don't have any more weight than any fan opinion.

Otherwise, the first "A Nightmare on Elm Street" would be some kind of time loop/prophetic dream/premonition because Robert Englund came up with that totally retarded theory.
You know, the guy who played Freddy in all movies (and who should therefore know that the movies are not supposed to be "all just a dream" and that Freddy is very real inside the movie's universe) thinks that specifically the first movie never actually happened "for real" and is instead all just a premonition dream.

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Well I don't know about Robert Englund's theory, where he got the idea he did, but I would think most of the time the actors would know what they are supposed to be playing. So Adrienne would possibly know what made Alice fall out of the boat.

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O.k., maybe I'll try it out.

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Cool. It's an interesting website anyway. :)

I rewatched the scene yesterday and I was thinking this. Maybe Alice fell out of the boat when the police called out to her, maybe it startled her, then falling into the water shocked her and in addition to the traumas with Mrs. Voorhees, she dreamed the scene with Jason in the hospital, and just thought that was how she fell out of the boat.

Or she tipped it over in her sleep, got rescued by the cops, and then in the hospital had the dream about Jason, and as I said with the first scenario, forgot how she really fell out.

And another thing to consider is that as Alice sees it, the cops came, called to her, then Jason pulls her under. But since the cops never saw Jason, obviously he didn't really pull her under. Unless one thinks he already had, the she just dreamed it that the cops were there when he came out.

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I had a look at her website. But it doesn't look like you would actually get in contact with her personally:
www.adrienneking.com/Contact.html

Webmaster, booking etc. No e-mail address to writer her in person.

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Ah. She does have a twitter page, if you have twitter you could ask there.

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Eh, I don't think she will give me an elaborate answer on a medium that allows 140 characters.

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You're overthinking it. Victor Miller THE WRITER said Jason is dead and that the DREAM sequence was a final scare. The continuity in the sequel is another story as that was done by other people because of capitalism. Excuse me for not typing a long pointless post of trivia that the majority of fans already know.

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Victor Miller THE WRITER said Jason is dead and that the DREAM sequence was a final scare. Excuse me for not typing a long pointless post of trivia that the majority of fans already know.

Yes, I KNOW. I even said so in the first post. My original question was: How does this work on a PLOT LEVEL?
I.e. if she dreamed it, why didn't she remember that she got to the hospital and only had the dream later, i.e. why did she think Jason is still out there?

There was really no need just to repeat the simple statement that she was dreaming. Your post was pointless since it didn't explain anything.

I didn't expect you to repeat a trivia entry. What I wanted to know: How can this trivia detail be incorporated into the movie's plot, so that the plot makes sense?

Because it is strange, even if we ignore the sequels: Alice ending up in the hospital, not knowing how she got there and thinking her dream was real, that just makes no sense. She wasn't beaten senseless by Mrs. Voorhees, so why did the police have to pull her out of the lake? And if pulling out of the lake means that they retrieved her boat, why doesn't she remember waking up and being brought to the hospital?

Alice was exhausted, but overall not injured. The last thing we see of her is getting into the boat. So, it just makes no sense they they had to pull her unconscious body out of the water.

And I was asking for ways how this plot detail makes sense.

THAT was my question. And some people came up with theories and explanations. You didn't. Regarding this question, you simply said: "She's dreaming." Wow, what a great new piece of information! I totally didn't think of this in my original post.

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I'm not interested in explaining away bad writing. It is what it is, you've already had your question answered and it came from the horse's mouth. Perhaps the answer to you is a bit ridiculous but it is at the end of a day a movie. It is perhaps ridiculous but nothing these films aren't known for already.

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I'm not interested in explaining away bad writing.

But the whole thread is about explaining away bad writing. It has been like that from the beginning. If you're not interested in something like that, why do you even answer in the first place? In any case, your simple repetition of a fact that I already mentioned in the first post helped me exactly 0 %. It was just as good as not writing anything at all.

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Nope, you just don't like that I'm telling you that you're overthinking it which you are.

The dream sequence is quite ridiculous regarding logic but I think it's pointless explaining it when it's just poor writing from people that wanted to capitalise on the success of Halloween and couldn't have given a toss about said logic. I'm not denying your right to speculate but I do find it quite futile.

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But the whole thread is about explaining away bad writing


Are you talking about your OP? It's full of bad writing, most especially since it's based on the false premise that you made up, namely, that Jason didn't pull Alice into the lake even though in fact he very obviously did. Your subsequent posts in this thread follow suit too.

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It was a very convincing dream.

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'Victor Miller THE WRITER said Jason is dead'
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He was? He's not so dead after part 1

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i think Jason pulled her in, she was unconscious from almost drowning until she awoke in the hospital

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Then how would you explain the cops that were looking directly at her and shouting to her, don't see Jason pop up and pull her under.

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i've always thought about that and just pretend they looked away for a split second

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[deleted]

I think the poster was joking about turning there head,lol. But you can basically say what you want as there really is and never will be a logical answer, esspecially in Friday the 13th movies.

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yes that is true







Recently watched - BvS Ultimate Edition 10/10 Suicide Squad 9/10 Terminator Genisys 9/10

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there really is and never will be a logical answer, esspecially in Friday the 13th movies.


Bull crap. There is a logical answer and film makes it extremely obvious. The logical answer is that after Jason drowned, he became an undead ghoul who lives in Crystal Lake and attacks people who come to his home.

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I assume you are just being cheeky and laugh at your response. Right?

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I assume you are just being cheeky and laugh at your response. Right?


Of course not. That's 100% what this film represents as happening. As I said, the film makes these things blatantly obvious. I'm not sure why this film's simple story is apparently "rocket science" and way too complex to understand for most/all the other posters in this thread. This is by far the stupidest thread I've seen in a while.

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yeah it could work like that

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how would you explain the cops that were looking directly at her and shouting to her, don't see Jason pop up and pull her under


The film makes this extremely obvious too. As Jason popped out of the water, Alice tipped the canoe sideways, which blocked Jason from the cops's line of sight.

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That only occurred after he pops up reaches out and around her and she screams .Once he reaches around her she and she grips the side of the boat as he pulls her dow. Also, since you aren't joking,you will address me in more respectful tone. The reason it is argued is because people are trying to reconcile the ending of this film to the sequels that follow. Believe me, you haven't solved anything and the will forever be debated.

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She falls out and the cops had to get her. It's referenced in Part 2 when Ted remarks that "5 years ago, some girl panics and falls out of a canoe."

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I always thought that we were supposed to feel like Paul's rendition of the event was was other he had through word of mouth and people doubted Alice's versionas. However, we were supposed to take the ending of first as being true.

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How about the cops calling or approaching her from the shore started waking her up and she woke up in a state of shock/trauma (of course, after what she'd been through) and fell out of the boat. The cops fished her out and she was still in shock/passed out.

(Obviously we see none of this; we see her dream, where she wakes up calmly).

Then later, after she was sedated/asleep and woke up, she is questioned by the cops, still believing her dream of Jason was real.

Explaining the ending of part 2...now THERE'S a tough one...

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It could be that little Jason did indeed pull her out of the board, but she wasn't killed and got away-- and why he killed her in part 2. But then, it doesn't make sense that he would had grown to adult-size in the meantime

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I just watched this after not seeing it since the 90's, in my teens... It really doesn't seem like a dream, it seems like she is pulled from the canoe and then unconscious until she wakes in the hospital. The cops not seeing Jason pull her out is understandable since it was a quick grab and far off in the lake. The cop says they 'pulled her out of the lake' so clearly she fell out of the canoe somehow.

I know the screenwriter says it was just a dream so who am I to argue with him, but that makes less sense than it just being real, plus it adds the creepy factor.

I guess people hail this movie as a classic but it was really poorly made, it just felt clumsy, even with the psycho mom (the high point) I can't give this more than 5/10. I didn't care about any character so when they got slashed it had no effect. Comedy was non existent, the kills were pretty uninspired, the layout of the camp was never really emphasized so when someone leaves one building to go to another I didn't get the sense of place that adds a huge dimension to these kinds of movies.

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I wish the movie had just ended with her getting dragged under by Jason. I don't like them insisting that awesome scene was just a dream. We also wouldn't have had to have Alice come back briefly in the 2nd one just to get killed off right away by Jason. But it is what it is.

Green Goblin is great! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t1L4ZuaVvaw

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