When Mary Hyatt (Paula Prentiss) is bitten by the vampire, Waldemar (Jeffrey Tambor), she explains her condition by saying maybe she’s pregnant. Van Helsing (Severn Darden) responds by saying:
Remember Rosemary? She had a baby.
Unless you count its title, this is the closest Saturday the 14th (1981) comes to spoofing a specific horror movie. Instead, it’s a family (?) comedy with not necessarily an original story, but a story of its own. This is also the closest Saturday the 14th comes to being funny. I’ll admit, it made me smile, and I smiled at several other throwaway dad jokes. However, this shouldn’t lead you to believe that it’s a good movie.
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At only 75 minutes, it’s harmless, and its greatest success may be that it’s not offensive. Financed by Julie Corman (Roger’s wife) for New World Pictures, its least success is that it’s lifeless, with terrible performances by some usually reliable actors such as the aforementioned Prentiss and her husband, Richard Benjamin. They portray a fictional couple, Mr. & Mrs. John Hyatt, that inherits a spooky old house when his uncle dies.
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The children are even worse. Kevin Brando (Billy Hyatt) and Kari Michaelsen (Debbie Hyatt) each have a dozen or so screen credits, but their pictures aren’t even included in their profiles on IMDb. Billy opens the book for which Waldemar and Van Helsing are both searching, releasing (in horribly dated, but kind of charming special effects) the monsters it’s meant to imprison for eternity.
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The overall conceit, is that the positive energy of a big party on Saturday the 14th will force the monsters back into the book so they stop wreaking silly havoc in the kitchen. The problem is that the family members invited to the party are anything but positive forces, especially bitter old Aunt Lucille (Rosemary De Camp.) The family dynamics are rich with potential, but the action unfolds at such a swift pace, little humor is realized.
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We’ve got to blame first-time director Howard R. Cohen for the result. He directed only six movies for various incarnations of New World, but wrote four times as many. These include the video store “classics,” Space Raiders (1983), Time Trackers (1989), and two Deathstalker sequels, Deathstalker & the Warriors from Hell (1988) and Deathstalker IV: Match of Titans (1991.)
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Then again, perhaps we blame New World itself. Cohen shot the film in only three weeks, obviously with very little budget. Even though what appears on screen is weak, I’d like to have seen a few pennies thrown behind the camera at a composer that could have pumped simulated energy into Saturday the 14th. Parmer Fuller’s inconsistent music is more noticeable in its absence than in its presence.
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All this said, I actually didn’t mind Saturday the 14th. I’m a father and enjoy some throwaway dad jokes now and then. I’ve loved Paula Prentiss ever since The Stepford Wives. As lethargic as Jeffrey Tambor inexplicably is in it, he still entertains. The move is just so lackluster that I can’t get worked up about it one way or the other. It’s not good… it’s not bad… it just is. I can’t recommend it, but I won’t try to stop you from watching it.
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