Student Bodies / Jekyll & Hyde Together Again Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		2.5
Video		3.0
Audio		3.0
Extras		0.0
Overall		2.5

Student Bodies / Jekyll & Hyde Together Again Blu-ray Movie Review

You'll laugh, you'll cry. Well, you'll cry, anyway.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman May 6, 2011

Note: The scores above are averages for the two films in this set combined. For more detailed scores, please see the individual scores listed below.

If you’re the sort of person who pays attention to those ultra-squeezed credits that seem to be the norm on reruns—er, rebroadcasts—these days, you may recognize the name Jerry Belson. Belson had a long and at least fitfully distinguished writing, directing and producing career in episodic television, contributing to a number of well remembered series including The Dick Van Dyke Show and The Odd Couple. Belson’s film oeuvre is considerably more spotty, including his having written one of the lesser appreciated Spielberg opuses (Always) and one of the funnier Burt Reynolds films (The End). This new Legend two-pack of pretty sad comedy-horror films find Belson in an Executive Producer capacity (for Student Bodies) and a trifecta of writing, producing and directing (for Jekyll and Hyde. . .Together Again). Student Bodies hails from 1981 and Jekyll and Hyde from 1982, both perhaps trying to cash in on the penchant for madcap, skit-like humor that shot to popularity with 1980’s Airplane!. Unfortunately, neither of these films even comes close to the Zucker Brothers’ brilliant combination of one liners and visual non sequiturs, and in fact both of these films, while possessing moments or two of fun along the way, seem like ancient relics made up mostly of big hair and way too much polyester.

Student Bodies
Film: 2.5
Video: 2.5
Audio: 3.0

They say that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, but is there imitation mixed with 20/20 hindsight? Over the past year or so, I’ve received a rather large amount of films and press sheets which tout individual films as being the “inspiration” for the Scream and/or Scary Movie franchises. Joining this stack of self-proclaimed progenitors is the 1981 opus Student Bodies, one of the few films where I’ve seen an Allen Smithee producing (as opposed to directing) credit (the film’s actual producer was none other than Michael Ritchie, who evidently didn’t want his name associated with such a lo-fi enterprise). Never as out and out smart and self-reflexive as Kevin Williamson’s Scream outings (at least the first two, anyway), Student Bodies is closer in tone to the Scary Movie enterprises, with an overall silly ambience that manages to eke out several middling to hearty laughs in between a number of bits that really don’t land very well and which unfortunately are repeated ad infinitum, as if repetition in and of itself is going to lead to hilarity. (It doesn’t).

Student Bodies has several appealing elements to it, including some very funny and completely off the wall character bits along the way, but its overall amateurish feel and haphazard filming and editing style undercut it at virtually every turn. The film deals with a stalker code named The Breather due to his (or her) penchant for, well, heavy breathing. (In a trivia footnote, several sites report that The Breather, credited onscreen to one Richard Brando, is actually comedian Richard Belzer, though IMDb lists the performance as belonging to Belson himself). The Breather apparently likes to kill young teens who have just engaged in sex, a la a slew of horror films which Scream made such delicious fun of.

This film has some undeniably funny elements to it, including one or two laugh out loud lines as clueless heroine Toby (Kristen Riter) makes her way through an almost Felliniesque assortment of school employees, any of whom could be The Breather. We have the lecherous Principal (Joe Talarowski), the man hating science teacher (Peggy Cooper), and the extremely limber school custodian (The Stick—yes, The Stick), each of whom contributes at least a glancing comedic blow or two. The film starts out with the promising prelude "This motion picture is based on an actual incident. Last year, 26 horror films were released...none of them lost money," but fails to really capitalize on that kind of smart humor. There is one fantastically out there moment about halfway through the film involving an R rating that is almost like a moment out of a lost Monty Python episode.

But overall this film is too slipshod and rushed feeling for its own good. It seems more like a home movie knocked off by some clever high school kids, and indeed most of this no-name cast seems never to have worked professionally again. Student Bodies has evidently gained a cult following of people who saw it as kids in the nascent days of cable, and for them this Blu-ray release may hold some nostalgia value, although one is tempted to remind these people that you can’t go home again.

Jekyll and Hyde. . .Together Again
Film: 2.0
Video: 3.5
Audio: 3.0

The 1980s was the era of the “cocaine achiever,” to borrow a phrase from fine coffee bean producers, and that white powdery substance is alluded to over and over again in the spectacularly boneheaded (or, considering this film’s salacious content, boner-headed) Jekyll and Hyde. . .Together Again. Mark Blankfield portrays Dr. Daniel Jekyll, a world class surgeon who wants to hang up his scalpel in order to research man’s “animal instinct,” which he feels certain will lead to new healing opportunities. Jekyll has discovered a magical white substance that when snorted transforms him into an ogling sex maniac who’s somewhat akin to The Simpsons’ Disco Stu or an updated version of Jerry Lewis’ iconic Buddy Love character.

Whether it’s the pedestrian writing of Belson on this outing, certainly not up to his usual standards, or the hyper-kinetic performance of Blankfield which is to blame for this film’s unpleasant and kind of smarmy demeanor is anyone’s guess. How Bess Armstrong, once the “it” girl of television sitcoms, ever got mixed up in this mess is another enduring mystery. This is not to say the film isn’t without humor, because it does provide a laugh or two, especially with some of Blankfield’s physical comedy bits during his transformation into the gold-chained and pinky-ringed Mr. Hyde, but the overall laugh quotient is pretty paltry.

But the film at least gets one thing dead (pun intended) right: Robert Louis Stevenson is shown spinning in his grave at this adaptation of one of his most iconic works, and at the very least, your eyes and/or head may be spinning, too, if you deign to watch this largely lamentable “comedy.”

Student Bodies / Jekyll & Hyde Together Again Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

As with the other Legend two-packs of Paramount titles we've seen over the past week or so, neither Student Bodies nor Jekyll and Hyde. . .Together Again have undergone one whit of restoration. Both of these films are delivered via AVC codecs in 1080p and 1.78:1. Student Bodies is much the worse for wear, with an overly grainy and often quite dirty and blemished print that devolves into digital noise territory on more than one occasion. There's an ample amount of telecine wobble in the film's opening opticals, but that calms down after the credits are over. Colors are not especially robust or well saturated throughout the film and the image often is very soft. That said, this film was obviously shot on a miniscule budget and the source elements were probably never gorgeous to begin with. Jekyll and Hyde. . .Together Again is a considerably higher budgeted affair, and its image quality, while not spectacular by any stretch, is quite a bit better. The image is a good deal sharper, colors are generally more robust, and there is noticeably less damage to the print utilized for this film. Neither of these transfers is probably going to set anyone's heart on fire, but Jekyll and Hyde at least looks pretty good, and the lack of digital tweaking will probably please those who want their catalog titles served up noise reduction free.

Student Bodies / Jekyll & Hyde Together Again Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Both of these films are presented with standard Dolby Digital 2.0 tracks which, while not spectacular, suffice for the modest ambitions of these outings. Neither of these films is hobbled by the damage that was present in the two other Legend two-packs I've reviewed this past week, Houdini/Those Daring Young Men in Their Jaunty Jalopies and The Skull/The Man Who Could Cheat Death. While there's no "wow" factor on the extreme ranges of either of these tracks which would have been more in evidence had we been granted lossless audio, both of these trundle along pleasantly enough. The underscore for both films is well presented, as cheesy as it is in both films (it's hard to believe Barry DeVorzon scored Jekyll and Hyde. . .Together Again, but that's what the credits claim). Dialogue is clear and understandable at all time, save for Mr. Hyde's animalistic grunts. Jekyll actually has some nice source cues sprinkled throughout it which sound okay if not overwhelmingly brilliant.

Student Bodies / Jekyll & Hyde Together Again Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

Once again Legend has not provided any supplements for this release, not even the occasional trailer which adorned previous DVD releases of some of these titles.

Student Bodies / Jekyll & Hyde Together Again Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

This is the first out and out pairing of two duds that Legend has released on Blu-ray. The previous two-packs had at least one film which merited attention, but aside from people who may have seen one or the other of this particular pairing at an impressionable age, I can't imagine anyone really clamboring for this release. While Student Bodies is ostensibly the better of the two films, that's damning with faint praise. Belson was a gifted writer, as his many television credits prove, but he really missed the mark with his adaptation of Jekyll and Hyde. If you are a fan of either of these films, especially Jekyll which looks manifestly better than Bodies, you'll probably be satisfied if not impressed with these Blu-ray releases.