STAY TUNED. Directed by Peter Hyams; written by Tom S. Parker and Jim Jennewein; produced by James G. Robinson for Morgan Creek Starring John Ritter, Pam Dawber and Jeffrey Jones. Rated PG.
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In spite of its clever premise and original special effects, it's hard to stay tuned to Stay Tuned.
With its further-than-way-out storyline, it needs to move at "Laugh In" pace, or even faster. Unfortunately, it doesn't. Give the audience too long to think in between punch lines, and the silliness of the whole enterprise begins to outweigh its amusement value.
Roy Knable (Ritter) is the ultimate couch potato, who will watch any TV show on any channel at any hour. TV is more interesting than his boring job and less trouble than dealing with his pretty wife Helen (Dawber) who is much more successful in her job than he is.
When spooky salesman named Spike (Jones) offers him a deal on a satellite dish with 666 channels, Roy jumps at the deal. And soon thereafter both he and Helen are jumping between channels on the inside of the diabolical programming at HVTV (for Hell Vision).
Spike is, of course, an agent of Satan's, and if he can kill off the Knables in 24 hours, their souls will be his. If they can survive that long, they get to go back to reality.
The framing story is somewhat cumbersome, to say the least. But the satires of various TV shows, commercials and movies that the Knables get dropped into are mostly quite amusing. A few, however, are a little too violent or sadistic to be funny.
Ritter's flair for physical comedy is well-used here. Dawber shows that she hasn't lost the knack of playing second banana to a funnier co-star (although Ritter is no Mork). And Jones is one of the few actors who can be entertaining even when overacting, as he does here. I like him better in roles that don't call for such melodramatics, though.
If your kids aren't familiar with "Three's Company" or Rosemary's Baby, or other old video fare, they won't get some of the jokes. But they will probably enjoy most of Stay Tuned anyway. And except for the few questionable satires like "Driving Over Miss Daisy" and "Sadistic Hidden Videos" it is an acceptable, if not outstanding, movie for them to see.
September 16, 1992