Kiss Daddy Goodbye

Hilarious. The psychic children are what saves this movie. The kids playing these roles are so completely lifeless that their performances steal the show. Apparently they're the director's kids... which makes sense. That's the only way they would have ever been given the opportunity to act. They speak their lines with total indifference, with no expressions except for the same blank stare that they wear throughout the whole movie.

The makeup on their daddy is equally fantastic. It's so stupid you have to see it to believe it.

A classic. Watch and laugh...

Beth (Nell Regan) and Michael Nicholas (Patrick Regan III) are two country kids blessed with "the power", which would seem to be an extremely advanced form of telekinesis. Their father Guy (Will Rand) home-schools them, with periodic check-ins from a Board of Education employee, Nora Dennis ("Texas Chain Saw Massacre" Final Girl Marilyn Burns), because he doesn't want them taken away and subjected to experiments. But one day, a degenerate biker gang come onto the family property and soon kill Daddy. Left largely unchecked, there's nothing to stop the kids from resurrecting Guy and turning him into Zombie-Daddy, and using Zombie-Daddy to get revenge on anybody who rubs them the wrong way. Former singing star Fabian Forte ("Get Crazy") is on hand as the new local Deputy faced with the resulting baffling deaths.

This is not a "good" film in the slightest; badly written, badly directed (by the kids' father, Patrick Regan), and obviously done on the cheap, it's awkward as all-get-out. Still, it's enough of a curiosity to keep it watchable. There's absolutely no gore, but there is nudity (from co-star Gay French as the female biker), and there are some amusing moments of utter silliness. The hilarious ooga-booga electronic music score by David Spear is priceless accompaniment.

Fabian is utterly bland as the hero, but Burns offers some charm as the gal turned on by him, prompting her to utter come-ons like "I've got some evidence for you to examine". The kids are flat and charisma-free, unfortunately, although Patrick III comes off somewhat better than Nell. The supporting cast includes familiar faces such as Jon Cedar ("Day of the Animals"), Marvin Miller (voice of Robby the Robot), Jed Mills ("New Year's Evil"), and Robert Dryer (the villain in "Savage Streets").

Had this been made with more of a budget, and more talent behind the camera, this might have been something to savour. As it is, it's basically an offbeat, obscure little piece of work that may intrigue some devoted cult movie aficionados. The strangest thing about it is realizing that some of the people involved (James Ursini, Alain Silver, Elizabeth Ward) are better known as film noir experts!

Five out of 10.

This film was supposed to released by Film Venutres International under the title CAUTION:CHILDREN AT PLAY many years ago, but the president of the company disappeared after a lawsuit leaving this film in limbo and now public domain nightmare. Teen Idol Fabian plays a local cop who meet and falls for Burns (from TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE) is basically a subplot. The main plot is these little kids (a brother & a sister) who's father was murdered by Robert Dryer and his biker gang. But the kids have special powers to bring the dad back to life to get even with the bikers and even kill a drunken Jon Cedar in the process. The film is dull, boring, barely "R" rated, and has a terrible music score. Marvin Miller has a nothing cameo as a food mart store owner. Skip it!

Here's another gloriously absurd and grotesque horror movie concept that only could have sprung from the mind of delirious early 80's scriptwriters. Dig this: A father and his two psychically and telekinetic gifted children lives isolated atop of a mountain, because daddy is worried the government will come and kidnap the children for examination. One day, however, the happy family receives a visit from a gang of nasty biker thugs and they kill daddy right in front of the children. Rather than to use their powers to rescue him, Beth and Michael prefer to resurrect his corpse later on and employ it as a tool of vengeance against the bikers. Meanwhile a social worker (Marilyn Burns of "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre") and the new local deputy (Fabian Forte the singer) attempt to visit the family without finding it strange the father is never available. "Kiss Daddy Goodbye" is likely to be the only movie ever in which children toy around with one of their deceased parents and even instruct him to dig his own grave. However, this ultra morbid storyline aspect is probably the only reason to check out this otherwise boring, unexciting and amateurishly put together film. The death sequences are dull and bloodless, the pacing is intolerably slow and the acting performances of the entire cast rank among the worst I've ever seen in 80's horror; and that is saying quite a lot. Especially the child actors are terrible, but they are director Patrick Regan's offspring and they look exclusively modeled after the uncanny kids of "Village of the Damned". Apparently only cute-faced kids with white hair and pale skins are allowed to have telepathic powers. This rare and curious piece of 80's trash is probably not worth tracking down, but still I can't say I regret having seen it. There's a certain something about this movie which fellow cult fanatics will notice and appreciate as well.

I rented this only because Marilyn Burns was in it, and I am a huge fan of hers and of "Texas Chainsaw Massacre," where she played her most famous role of Sally, the terror-stricken heroine. I had seen her in "Eaten Alive," Tobe Hooper's follow-up to TCM, and she was great in that. And I wondered if she would keep that same style of acting in this. (If you've seen her in those two movies, you'll know exactly what I'm talking about.)

What a surprise, she played an extremely timid role, and it was interesting to see her acting in such a contemporary manner. She plays Nora Dennis, a social worker of some sorts who checks on these two children every month. The children are these two little psychic kids whose father was killed by roadhogs. They bring him back through "the Power" to exact revenge, and thus he does, in a very boring manner.

The other part of the movie is Nora meeting and becoming involved with this cop who is investigating some on what's going on in the movie. Burns plays the role well, but I've seen her do better, and she never actually gets to pull off that Sally-like performance that made her first two roles so memorable. In fact, this film in a whole is quite timid, and pretty boring. There is no blood whatsoever (not that I'm a gorehound, but some would be okay.) It's a weak movie, and I can't recommend it much. But fans of Burns might be interested in seeing her in this film.