"You get lonely, you get weird." -- Mac.
Marie (Marilyn Hamlin), who is separated from her husband, Greg (Jeff Pomerantz), goes to the country for the weekend with her boyfriend, Robert (Jim Doerr), sister Shirley (Caitlin O'Heaney of He Knows You're Alone), gay buddy Nicky (Christopher Allport), and Robert's friend, Jay (Devin Goldenberg). Marie wants to love and marry Robert, who owns a farm near a lake, but she is sexually drawn to his employee Mac (David Gale). Meanwhile Shirley is dallying with Jay, whom she later turns against. Then a killer wearing a fright mask starts snuffing the people in the party. Could it be weird Otis (William Sanderson), who also works for Robert and is rumored to have a violent history? Or someone else?
Savage Weekend is a strange slasher film with an adult cast -- instead of teens -- that meanders along until the killings begin but never quite boils over into anything worthwhile despite some good sequences. Although the movie works overtime trying to develop its red herrings, the killer will not come as much surprise to most viewers. Busy actor Christopher Allport plays Nicky as a mincing queen most of the time, but in an amusing scene beats up a couple of fag-bashers in a bar: "I wasn't brought up in the South Bronx for nothing." Although still affected, O'Heaney is better in this than she was in He Knows You're Alone. William Sanderson has had a very long career, but he might be most famous for playing Larry on Newhart; he gives a typically flavorful performance in this. One gets the feeling Weekend is a half-hearted attempt, with a screenplay just thrown together, and slayings thrown into the mix because horror was profitable. David Paulsen also directed Schizoid. Savage Weekend was actually made some years before its official release, so it predates Halloween and other slasher films.
Verdict: If this was an attempt at something different, it just doesn't work. **.
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