Just in time for the Friday the 13th reboot, Paramount Home Video has released the original Friday the 13th Parts 1–3 on DVD. The first film is noteworthy for the performance of one then-nubile Kevin Bacon (who looks strikingly like ’70s teen heartthrob Shaun Cassidy), suffering through one of the most creative deaths in the first feature. This film was also noteworthy for its obvious lack of creativity. A mysterious killer shows up and starts hacking up counsellors at a summer camp. There are the obligatory POV shots and lots of teens humping one another, then those teens get sliced up.

The film has an obvious debt to Halloween (which came two years earlier in 1978 and which actually had something going on) and Psycho (here, the twist ending is essentially the inverse of Hitchcock’s 1960 classic). But 13th is essentially a listless movie—it has no suspense, no cunning sense of humour, none of the things that make low-cost horror movies worth seeing or thinking about. The second entry then pretends to offer up some soap opera-esque plot twists—to no avail—and the trouble with Part 3 is that it’s in 3-D. They still really haven’t got the 3-D thing down for home entertainment systems. Those goggles are really nauseating. Be sure to keep the bucket near the TV. I threw up twice.

The other bit of weird DVD news is that Yentl is being released on a two-DVD special edition that includes a new “Director’s cut” of the original film. Seeing as Barbra Streisand starred in, directed, co-wrote and co-produced the original, what use is a director’s cut? Didn’t she already have complete control over this project? Those of you who felt bound to see this one due to your identity (gay, Jewish, or gay and Jewish) have reason to be nervous: Yentl now has exactly what it didn’t need: more running time. La Babs has actually come up with an extended version!