It's never good when a television network tries to make shows out of movies (with some exceptions)
It's worse when they try to continue movie franchises, as NBC did when it made a sequel to the Amityville Horror in 1989.
It thought it had a winner when Patty Duke and a small army of priests battle an evil lamp.
AN. EVIL. LAMP.
They shouldn't be fooled by what it looks like. It's ready to pounce, even at the mom from Father Knows Best.
The Rifftrax crew of Mike Nelson, Bill Corbett (who was dressed as a skeleton) and Kevin Murphy provided a lot of solid riffs against this movie when they appeared a few days before Halloween in Nashville.
The movie's about an evil lamp from Amityville, NY (natch) who's defeated by an army of priests. It's bought by someone in a garage sale, who sends it to her sister (Jane Wyatt) in Southern California as a "gag".
She lives in a big house, and is joined by a widow (Patty Duke) and her three kids.
Naturally, evil things happen thanks to the lamp. It possesses the youngest daughter by tricking her into thinking it's really her dead daddy, and also kills the housekeeper with its cord. It also causes the house to kill a plumber.
One of the Amityville priests eventually arrives at the evil house, and the final battle is pretty dumb due to bad writing and Dollar Store special effects. Let's just say the possessed child does a decent impression of the main villain from a recent sci-fi movie.
The riffs come fast and hard, and they center on the lamp and past roles from the main stars. They comment on how Duke's character dreams of a twin cousin, and also cheesesteaks. Wyatt accuses one of her grandkids of lying, since she was also Spock's mom (really). We also had these gems:
You finally got out of that well
The young priest tries to call the family about the lamp, then the lamp calls back and melts the phone receiver.
That's what happens when you have too many jalapeno poppers
The water suddenly turns black
We're in Flint, Michigan
The lamp kills the maid
This could happen once we all get smart homes
Jessica explains why she thinks her lamp is dad
He has more charisma and a better physique.
There's also riffs on Dennis Miller, Mother Teresa, Pixar, Only Fans and Back to the Future.
It was preceded by a short on industrial accidents called "It's Your Accident". It's supposed to show people how they should take responsibility on work safety. It centers on two guys named Mike who injure their hands, and a guy named Joe who seems to like to dodge forklifts.
It's not as good as "Shake Hands With Danger" or "Live and Learn", but it does show a weird scene where the older Mike's teen daughter fed the younger Mike some tomatoes. A better way to describe it is "Andy Richter in Falling Down".
The Rifftrax guys should be commended for getting this year's live show season off the ground after losing a year due to the COVID 19 pandemic. Hopefully, it'll be business as usual next year when they have a new Kickstarter campaign going.
