Category Archives: comedy

Slacking Off at School is Grade A EVIL! “Cutting Class” reviewed! (MVD Visual / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

“Cutting Class” Available on 4K UHD and Blu-ray at Amazon.com

Paula Carson seems to be the eye of affection.  The popular, walk-the-line student and high school cheerleader finds fast-and-loose fun as the girlfriend of jock and overall jocular lesson slacker Dwight but is also pursued by Brian, a loner recently released from the mental hospital after killing his father, and even the quirky principal Mr. Dante who can’t careen his aberrant attention away from his lovely young student.  When faculty and students go missing and the vice principal is found brutally murdered, the recently released, convicted criminally insane Brian becomes the prime suspect and flees the scene, but days later coming out of hiding, Brian pleas with Paula to help convince people he’s innocent of the crime and not responsible for those missing.  Suspicions and accusations disperse in many directions as a killer continues to thin out the student body with Paula stuck at the center of the killer’s chaos. 

Many of today’s A-lister leading men have had a role in a horror film at one point in time early in their careers.  Before being the face of the latest “Ocean’s 11” films, George Clooney starred in “Grizzly II:  Revenge” and “Return to Horror High” in the 1980s.  Before being a lovable halfwit with good fortunate in “Forrest Gump” and the voice of Woody in “Toy Story, Tom Hanks’ debut feature was “He Knows You’re Alone,” a horror-thriller about stalked woman unable to escape a serial killer.  Then, there’s Clooney’s “Ocean 11” co-star Brad Pitt and he’s no exception to the rule with “Cutting Class,” an American high school melodrama with strong hints of the slasher genre helmed by a not-so-American director in “Excalibur” adaptation screenwriter Rospo Pallenberg from the United Kingdom.  The script is penned by Steve Slavkin which would turn out to be his one and only feature film work before remaining in television.  Shot in Los Angeles, the April Productions and Gower Street Pictures film is produced by Donald R. Beck and Rudy Cohen, who the latter went on to produce “Feardotcom” and “The Black Dahlia.” 

A youthfully green Brad Pitt joins the remake of the “The Blob’s” Donovan Leitch and “The Stepfather’s” Jill Schoelen in an unfolding love triangle of student shenanigans, peer pressure, and murderous suspicion.  Pitt plays Dwight, a popular basketball stud with a carefree attitude that’s slowly being chipped away by his parents, teachers, and even girlfriend Paula to be more responsible and forward thinking.  As Paula, Schoelen indulges herself into the perfect student who is studious, kind, and beautiful that attracts seemingly all walks of school hallway life from peers to teachers and doesn’t even bat an eyelash about it either by obliviousness or just likes to lap up the attention.  Leitch as the school misfit Brian Woods dons the oversized black blazer and soft-spikey hair to give his character more of an edge, but the script is thin on showcasing Brian to feel like an outcast or even makes the protuberant effort of a character convicted murderer, mentally unstable and recently deinstitutionalized.  Leitch crafts his own approach to elevate Brain Woods into that persona while teetering the line of being a suspected bad or good guy for the approx. 90 minute runtime.  Acting legends Martin Mull and Roddy McDowall are integrated into more cameo roles that are running gags on the comedic side of “Cutting Class’s” genre blend.  “Clue’s” Mull, playing as the district attorney and Paula’s father going duck hunting for the weekend, has an orbiting role that surrounds the whodunit trunk narrative with subplot intercut scenes after he’s been perforated with an arrow and crawls back to civilization, amusingly frustrated and weary as he continues to be passed by and stepped on while in the muck.  McDowell’s absurdity is illuminated in a different objectifying light as a sock-covering mic sniffer with a giddy perversion for Paula.  See McDowell gawk at the stretched panties of a bent over Jill Shoelen made me personally feel really uncomfortable, perhaps I still see McDowall as the heroic Fearless Vampire Hunter Peter Vincent from “Fright Night” and can’t unseen him to be anything else, especially a smirking, sexualizing oddball.  “Cutting Class” fills out the cast with Brenda James (“Slither”), Mark Barnet, Robert Glaudini (“Parasite”), Dirk Blocker (“Prince of Darkness”), Eric Boles (“C.H.U.D. II: Bud the Chud”), Nancy Fish (“Exorcist III”), and Robert Machray.

Prefacing this review’s analysis, I understand “Cutting Class’s” campy comedy intentions before its backlot slasher sublet.  The smell of teen palaver and mischievous comedy odorously laces the late 80’s production and its eccentric character, more so with the latter of the two.  This also includes sexual perversities to run rampant in what was then a free-for-all of anything goes types of behavior.  Character Paula Carson, the near epitome of good high school student, becomes the lust of every principal male character with a hypersexualization of her innocence.  Paula, cladded with a short skirt and white panties, can’t get through many of her earlier scenes without being objectified.  She’s penned to bend straight over, exposing her panties, and have Principal Mr. Dante gleaming with a grin and gawk in his hots for the student, caught half naked washing her hair over the bathtub, caught in a conversational scene with suspected killer Brian Woods, and is repeatedly pleaded with by Dwight to take advantage of her father being not home for extra circular activities.  Not to forget to mention constantly being googly eyed by all three throughout the picture.  It’s funny how this particular perception becomes the one thing to catch my eye and discuss as it speaks to the kind of depraved person, I am but also factors into what “Cutting Class” really is, a dumb movie.  The sit back and enjoy the ride type of teen-comedy, semi-slasher hits upon most of the benchmarks expected of a Pallenburg slasher made in a America with a fair amount of personal style and not enough connective tissue to strengthen the bond between the two battling genres.  For example, the out of left field satire of Martin Mull’s swampy trek back to civilization has the detached sensation of an out of place running gag, lost amongst the rest of the film by the lack of detail (Mull’s character is shot with an arrow but has seemingly healed miraculously as he’s able to crawl and walk back to the suburbs) and spatial awareness (Paula’s class fieldtrip to the very same swamp Mull’s character was shot, making the area appear in proximity to the high school and suburbs instead of isolated backwoods).

MVD Visual, through the MVD Rewind Collection, proudly presents “Cutting Class” on a new 4K UHD and Blu-ray 2-disc set. Both scans of the 35mm original camera negative are from the Vinegar Syndrome 2018 restored print; however, MVD’s LaserVision Collection edition is the first fully functional 4K resolution with a HEVC encoded, Ultra High-Definition 2160p, BD66 as well as tagging along an AVC encoded, High-Definition 1080p, BD50. Can’t complain at all about this print despite negligible differences other than the increased resolution in HDR10, a format that often misrepresents true image fidelity with irregularity. Yet, we don’t see that that really here with a shade darker image that results rounder delineation on the characters and objects. Same can be said about the 1080p, a crisp image defines mostly through. There are rough patches of varying grain levels within the 1.85:1 aspect ratio presentation that leave a scene or two looking optically haggard for a brief moment as if stretched and overly granulated. Grading design has a natural 35mm film saturation that’s robust with a vast range of hues that don’t bleed or run together, sticking to distinction rather than attempting to be fancy to a fault. The audio options on both formats include a lossless PCM 2.0 mono and a lossy Dolby Stereo. For better fidelity, the uncompressed PCM really opens up the English inlaid audio mix by appealing to vigorously clear and forefront dialogue with ambience and soundtrack firmly encroaching but stays firmly moderate in the depth. There’s a nice breadth of effects captured, such as the machine shop climax with isolating each cutting, sawing, and drilling tool’s specific sound in its specific space. English subtitles are optionally available. Special features mostly reside on the Blu-ray disc as the UHD’s capacity is limited to just 66 gigabytes, barely enough for higher dynamic resolution feature with the only additional supplementary being the HD theatrical trailer. On the Blu-ray, a quite a few Vinegar Syndrome produced content is encoded into this release in what practically a mirrored 1080p copy with an interview with actress Jill Schoelen who, in summing up her discussion of “Cutting Class,” would love to erase this film from her memory and career bank, an interview with Donovan Leitch and his experiences hired in on the role as well as working with the cast and crew, a Kill Comparisons featurette that contrasts the edited and unrated feature kill scenes with additional seconds added into for more gruesome, lingering effects, the VHS retailer promo Find the Killer and Win, and the original theatrical trailer. Also included is the 91-minute R-rated edit with the shorter death scenes, but I don’t understand why anyone would want to watch something edited. Like the first three MVD LaserVision Collector’s Editions, the fourth entry is incorporated with retro finesse that doesn’t stray away from original marketing elements. The cardboard O-slipover views as a porthole into the original poster art of the three principal characters. A black Amary cover houses the same cropped encirclement of the characters but with a solid black other rim while inside the 4K disc (right side snapper) and the Blu-ray (left side snapper) each pay tribute to the laserdisc era in their own way. The insert houses a folded mini-poster of the slipcover design. The front cover is reversible with a complete poster element reduced to fit centered on the design with a wooden school desk serving with pencil, paper, and ringlets of blood as the border design. Unrated, region free, and with a runtime of 91 minutes, “Cutting Class” is worth skipping your school studies.

Last Rites: A highly favorable and upgraded release for the Brad Pitt startup campy teen slasher that confirms to us the actor hasn’t changed his acting method in the last 35 years, but “Cutting Class” doesn’t stand out amongst the masses of similar 80’s ilk with a fickle way of handling the nebulous and illusory villain killer on school grounds and an obtuse comedy angle too out of alignment to be risible. The only option left is to sit back, hit play, and soak into the mindless meat-and-potatoes.

“Cutting Class” Available on 4K UHD and Blu-ray at Amazon.com

This One Has the EVIL Touch! “The Hand” reviewed! (Synergetic / DVD)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

“The Hand” Pops Onto DVD at Amazon! Click Here to Purchase.

After a night of heavy drinking, Bong-soo wakes up from a strange nightmare.  The nightmare continues when he habitually walks into the bathroom and discovers a grotesque hand sticking up and out of the toilet bowl.  The confused yet calm Bong-soo wakes his wife who passes out at the sight after the hand twitches right in front of them.  Bong-soo calls 911 to report the strange occurrence and when his residence’s security guard and the dispatched EMTs check out the scene and see his wife passed out on the floor and a supposed severed hand sticking out of the toilet, the unbelievable scenario spirals into suspicion and Bong-soo is detained for suspected gruesome acts of foul play, but when the hand violent moves again and the bathroom door suddenly becomes stuck, those left standing, out of the hand’s deadly reach, are left with only toiletries at their disposal to do battle against the a force their unable to flush.

Preying on one of the more irrational fears that something will slither up the toilet while you make the business, “The Hand” extends that fear with a supernatural startlement.  Shot in 2020 but released in 2023, “The Hand,” or “The Hand:  Attack of the Things” is to the degree of a ghostly-demonic thriller sprinkled with dry humor from South Korea by writer-director Choi Yun-ho, claustrophobically shot inside an apartment bathroom which, and let’s be being honest, is roomier than most bathrooms in two-story houses.  Toilet horror is a subgenre that’s not everyone’s cup of eau de toilette but has resiliently found a niche audience and continues to live quietly in the indie shadows, such as with Evan Jacob’s “Death Toilet” films, Matthew Mark Hunter’s “Killer Poop” franchise, and the Asian market, specifically, has an interest in potty horror-humor, “Zombie Ass:  Toilet of the Dead” instantly comes to mind.  However, the absurdity of these titles doesn’t infect Choi Yun-ho’s less feces-filled horror, focusing more on the curled, demonically-skinned hand from out of the toilet.  “The Hand” is a feature presented by Korea Creative Content Agency and Inoi Media and a production of Spooky House, and R202 studio.

With an intimate setting comes an intimate cast to do battle with the mysteriously unknown monstrous hand.  Lee Jae-won is up to the task, or, well, placidly taking in the situation with subtle caution, as the expressionless alcoholic husband Bong-soo.  The regular Korean television actor infiltrates into his first leading man feature, or perhaps barely a feature with a film runtime of under 60-minutes, tackling close-quarter dynamics and a computer-generated thing with finger fingers, elongated fingernails, and a reach that turns the already compact bathroom into practically the size of a coat closet.  Considering the mention of his drinking problem more than once, Bong-soo’s alcoholism isn’t one of the more centric elements, especially at the chagrin of his wife Joohee (Jeong Seo-ha) to create a dynamic hurdle to arc over.  Once the building security guard (Soo-ho Ahn) and 3-person 911 team, with Park Sang-wook portraying lead paramedic, the energy devolves to a humorous suspicion of Bong-soo and the pigeon-hearted presence of the lead paramedic as the two men ever so lightly buttheads in a confounding position and through the progression of the ordeal, the squabbling pair form along the way a bond out of insta-desperation.  When the wife finally revives, another breakthrough moment between Bong-soo and his wife becomes realized that they’ll never take each other for granted again as they do slow motion poses and battles with an army of apartment wall-protruding hands who carry a deadly touch.  The jagged line graph tone maintains a comedic constant right through the heart of “The Hand” that lets the characters sway freely in various complexions without jarring their principles too flippantly. 

The titular hand is a fully operational character in itself.  A complete CGI mockup straight from the backstory sewers of Hell, conceived from a threadbare anecdote of a woman found dead in a nearby sewer tunnel with her arm missing a few days prior told by the paramedic leader.  That arm, with gnarled hand attached, is thought and assumed to be the same wretched one sticking ominously straight up and out from the toilet bowl.  Texturally, the synthetically composited hand looks pretty darn good with barely a trace of smoothed over plastic-splash veneer.  These scenes are also intermixed with a rubber hand cast with obvious contrast against the CGI hand.  That is until the arm extends feet beyond its chamber pot dwelling to tightly grip unsuspecting prey, like a crocodile lying in wait.  When in more a realistic scale, the hand’s movements are tremendously naturally looking with the help of green-suited animator and between appearance and mobility, the captured result, though miniscule in size appropriate for the indie film, has realistic attraction that edges “The Hand” out of the absurdity of circumstances and into more thrilling territory while still focus lit by comedic lighting.  The characters themselves are the more farcical models in comparison with representatives often aloof or arrogantly confident with ostentation as terror responses straddling between nonsensical and pragmaticism.  

“The Hand” arrives onto DVD home video from Synergetic, presented in a widescreen 1.78:1 aspect ratio on a MPEG2 encoded, standard definition, DVD5.  Decoding at a fairly high compression rate of 7 to 8Mbps, image quality has a fair amount of detail and color saturation from off the lesser disc capacity.  Facial details can appear soft throughout, sometime blotchy or waxy that fuses the contours and skin without delineation, and the CGI hand, though textured nicely, can have an early day video game blockiness about it in a handful of scenes.  The surround locations, such as bathroom and apartment, are hue balanced and display distinct visual variation.  The Korean Dolby Digital 2.0 mix is the only audio option available that comes with burned in English subtitles.  Dialogue renders over clearly inside the natural digital recording and prominent amongst the rest of the mix, isolating the changing levels of inflections and tones of what the moment calls for.  The English subtitles synch consistently with the action, but there are spot grammatical errors.  Aside from the play and chapter menu selection on the static menu, there are no selectable bonus features.  The after credits contains how the CGI scenes are composited together so stay tuned after the movie.  The scroll-like artwork with a monstrous hand, illustrated with a mock age-fading, is really neat visually and well-done.  Inside the bendy Amary case is just the disc with the same artwork in concise form.  With the region free playback, the Synergetic release runs at 62 minutes and, assumingly, comes unrated, as the rating is not listed on the back cover.

Last Rites:  Comedy and horror create stationary white-knuckle tension in “The Hand” despite not reining in a tightfisted backstory on the hand itself which ultimately turns the five fingered paw into more of a marginal footnote. 

“The Hand” Pops Onto DVD at Amazon! Click Here to Purchase.

Re-Electrifying a Dead Cop to Stop EVIL! “The Blue Jean Monster” reviewed! (88 Films / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Click Here to Purchase “The Blue Jean Monster” available on Blu-ray!

Soon-to-be first-time dad Tsu Hsiang can’t wait to meet his son.  Often times, his cop vocation intrudes on being there for his wife during her pregnancy as his torn between work and family, trying to be a good man in both regards, but when a tip comes through of a suspected bank robbery, Hsiang can’t neglect his duty and pursues the thieves in a high speed and gun-blazing chase that ends in his death as a construction site pile of steel rebar crushes him during the arrest.  His corpse left under the rebar overnight, a storm causes a transformer to fall on top of him and a cat providing a mystical lifeforce.  The electrical currents course through his dead body, reanimating him with the superhuman strength and invulnerable to pain, but with a cost as Tsiang is slowly rotting away, unable to heal or enjoy any of his senses.  Tsiang also has to recharge his body with electrical volts direct to body in order to continue being reanimated.  With time running out, the cop’s two goals are to meet his unborn child and to capture the gang responsible for him becoming an undead monster. 

While “The Blue Jean Monster” is not the eminent representation of comedy-action with elements of science fictional horror to come out of the Hong Kong movie industry, the early 90’s Category III film does rank high marshalling an entertaining “Dead Heat” (1988) interpretation for Eastern audiences.  The sophomore film of director Ivan Lai, aka Kai-Ming Lai, (“Daughter of Darkness,” “The Peeping Tom”) and the last script credit for Kam-Hung Ng emerges as a bucket list imbroglio of the inexplicable mysticisms at play as well as the good die young but win in the end.  The Jonathan Chow (“Haunted Jail House”) produced film is a coproduction of Golden Harvest Films, Diagonal Pictures, and Paragon Films. 

Not just a mindless killing machine resurrected like an electrified phoenix for revenge and murderous rout, Tsu Hsiang’s rebirth out of death arouses complications around fleeting special moments.  Playing exactly his profile of a mid-30-year-old is the late “Her Vengeance” and “The Killer” actor Fui-on Shing as a cop torn between life and death, literally.  Struggling to comprehend what’s happened to him, Tsu Hsiang has no time to explore the root cause; instead, Hsiang instantly moves forward, learning on the fly, his newfound postmortem powers of invulnerability, immense strength, and to be exasperated right into a pale-eyed version of the angry Hulk.  Shing’s duality on levity and fierce cleaves “The Blue Jean Monster” into its well-intended multifaceted of genres with soft buttery ease.  Shing’s square jaw and large frame doesn’t quell the lighter touch he brings an even softer side to Tsu Hsiang with his intake of Power Steering (Wai-Kit Tse, “Mr. Vampire 1992”), a street nickname for a former hooligan took under Hsiang’s wing after killing his father, in a supposed criminal altercation gone awry.  Power Steering best friend Gucci (“Gloria Yip, “Riki-Oh: The Story of Ricky”) becomes the primary target for the gang as she inadvertently becomes a hostage and winds up with the thieves’ hard stolen loot.  The circular, trifold connection between Hsiang, the troublesome young acquaintances, and the gang, helmed by Japanese actor Jun Kunimura (“Audition”) creates double edged complications Hsiang has to juggle and manage while being undead and a soon-to-be father.  Mei-yee Wu, Bei-Dak Lai, and “Mr. Vampire’s” Siu-Fung Wong playing Fui-on Shing’s wife Chu along with “Sex and Zen” star Amy Yip as the lustfully bosomed Death Ray, a gay man conversion therapy seductress, fill out the cast. 

The 1991 film has fast-paced action, politically incorrect humor, and spectacular physical and hand-drawn visual effects.   “The Blue Jean Monster” relied heavily on the skill of the cast and crew to elevate a staggering, fast-and-loose story that barely bridges gaps of its presaged plot holes.  There’s also some fast-and-loose editing slips that expose oversights, such as reused unmasking scene of Jun Kunimura’s head robber and showing five members of a five-member gang huddled behind a flipped van in a scene that was supposed to be sans Kunimura as his character was chasing after Gucci and the money through a construction zone.  Yet, “The Blue Jean Monster” is too enjoyable, too funny, and too drop-dead neat that any and all flaws can be written off as negligible.  Heedless humor encapsulates an antiquated way of thinking that shapes “The Blue Jean Monster” into a time bygone novelty.  When Tsu and Power Steering are suspected gay lovers, as they’re physically intertwined in electrocution to recharge Tsu undeadness, and AIDs becomes the center of the joke, casually tossed in a handful of times even by the brief portrayal of two colorfully sweater-wearing, feminine-displayed men wanting nothing to do with Tsu and Power Steering’s misperceived actions for fear of the deadly virus.  That just epitomizes the slapstick wackiness this not typical but warranted Cat III feature that transfixes with a lot of borderline insensitive satire kneaded into the modish action and special effects of every other Hong Kong film in a saturated market. 

“The Blue Jean Monster” takes over United States and North America courtesy of the UK distributor 88 Films, through MVD Visual from the Fortune Star Media Limited catalogue, with a new AVC encoded, 1080p high definition, Blu-ray.  The BD50 comes top of the line within the limits of the format with a bitrate decoding the original aspect ratioed widescreen 1.85:1 presented and newly restored 2K scanned film an average of at or just under 35Mbps.  Nearly being a non-issue coinciding with a pristine original print, the dual layer disc offers plenty of breathing room to display “The Blue Jean Monster’s’ range of motion, sufferable color palette, painted composite effects, and masterstrokes in lighting a fast-paced pressing without the blight of artefacts.  A few darker scenes are not as rich because of compositional effects but still render significantly with detail under a slightly more penetrating grain.  The overall grain naturally infuses with the 35mm print and translates nicely to a transferred digital scan.   The original, uncompressed Cantonese LPCM 2.0 mono track is the sole offering that, in truth, is all this comical, cosmic caper needs with agreeable action Foley and ambience and some looney absurdity tacked on for good measure.  None of the assortment ever sounds pressed and squished through the single channel suggesting a pretty clean, well-kempt sound design from over the years.  ADR dialogue favors less spatial position but that’s expected with 90’s Hong Kong cinema and is also well-preserved in its fidelity with a clear and damage free recording.  English subtitles are optionally available.  This special edition includes a new interview with assistant director Sam Leong Man Made Monster, the original Hong Kong trailer, and image gallery.  The limited-edition set comes with reflective and glistening slipcase sheathing the same but lusterless composite illustration, artwork created by James Neal.  Inside the green Amaray Blu-ray case, the reverse side of the cover art sports the original Hong Kong one sheet illustration stretching both ends, inferring nearly all the action and characters in the story, along with a doubled-sided cardboard poster of the reversible cover art.  The not rated release comes region locked on A and B and has a runtime of 96 minutes.

Last Rites: If a fan of “Dead Heat,” “The Blue Jean Monster” can prolong the action-caffeinated, narcotized high with supercharged unrest, necropsy humor, and the walking, talking, inexplicable undead in another stellar package and quality release from 88 Films!

Click Here to Purchase “The Blue Jean Monster” available on Blu-ray!

To Be an Intolerant Human Is to Be EVIL! “Lion-Girl” reviewed! (Cleopatra Entertainment / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Here is “Lion-Girl.” Hear Her Roar on Blu-ray!

In the year 2045, a rain of meteorites harbingers the possible destruction of the human race as the space rocks contain harmful, radioactive rays that either kill a human within seconds or doesn’t kill them at all but transformers them into bloodletting, mutated beasts with superhuman abilities known as Anoroc.  While the rest of the world collapses, only Tokyo remains as the last human stronghold governed by a fascist dictator Nobuhide Fujinaga and his band of ruthless, police state Shogun led by despotic Kaisei Kishi.  Fujinaga and Kishi’s prejudices extend decades later when children in utero are exposed to Anoroc rays that keep their human appearances and behaviors only to have gained the psychokinetic energy powers.  These evolved man and Anoroc are labeled Man-Anoroc and are sought out for extermination but one defender of the weak and less fortunate, known as Lion-Girl, takes a stand against the forces of evil and bigotry, making Lion-Girl Earth’s last and only hope.

Inspired by the prolific manga works of Gô Nagai (“Cutie Honey,” “Devilman”) and Nagai providing the conceptual illustrations, the Japanese filmmaker behind the pulse-pounding pistol-whipper  “Gun Woman,” starring cult erotic-actress Asami, and the Italian yellow picture, or giallo, influenced “Maniac Driver” turns his eclectic, electric style to reproduce his love for manga and the classic Japanese superhero canon with a new heroine in “Lion Girl.”  Kurando Mitsutake endears to his audiences through passion for cutting-edge manga’s commanding nudity, a hero’s odyssey in a dystopian future, and a comic’s style depicting graphically good versus evil.   The COVID era stymied production costs due to supply issues, affecting various departments such as special effects and even the cast with relative unknown faces, but Mitsutake pushes forward with the Japanese Toei Video Company (“Battle Royale”) co-production with America’s Flag Productions and Nagai’s Dynamic Planning.  Masayuki Yamada, Gaku Kawasaki (“The Parasite Doctor Suzune”), and Mami Akari (“Maniac Driver”) produce the film.

As stated, “Lion-Girl” is filled with unrecognizable faces save for one, an actor who is usually behind the masks, such as in “The Hills Have Eyes 2” ’07,” “Predators,” and even donning the iconic hockey mask for the 2009 reboot of “Friday the 13th” as Jason Voorhees.  Derek Mears headlines being the film’s core villain, shogun Kaisei Kishi, the remorseless, power-hungry right-hand man of the Fujinaga state, as Mears’ towering 6’5” stature and unique facial features pit him against a then 22-year-old newcomer Tori Griffith in a highly visibly protagonist role requiring fully onboard nudity and choreographed physical altercations.  Griffith pulls off both requirements going through the tokusatsu, hoodoo cliffside and other desert terrain, geometries of motion that fortunately conceal a more softened performance when compared to Mears’ who actually puts a fair amount of attitude into the shogun role.  As the Lion-Girl’s sworn protector, as well as one-eyed uncle, Damian Toofeek Raven (“Komodo vs. Cobra”) resembles the sempai fostering and mentoring a younger, stronger apprentice to one day save the world.  Raven, like most of the film’s cross-cultural influences, is able to ride the line as force into an honorable fatherhood with Ken Shishikura but the character poorly exorcises compassion of a father substitute until the very end when the right moment in the script calls for it.  One flaw in “Lion-Girl’s” casting stitch is the feature could have been meatier as keystone supporting characters come and go so quickly that it could rival the likes of “Mortal Kombat 2:  Annihilation.”  Thus, rapid firing subordinate roles just to progress the story creates more questions than answers and creates more plot holes than necessary.   Nobuhide Fujinaga (Tomoki Kimura, “A Beast in Love”) leads as the iron fist of bigotry in a tyrannically society but barely has presence other than on television announcements, a pair of Kishi entourage lackeys (David Sakurai, “Karate Kill,” and Jenny Brezinski, “From Jennifer”) get lifted up by the dialogue and some action but have the rug cut out from under them from really being developed and explored, and even principal character Marion Nagata (Joey Iwanaga, “Tokyo Vampire Hotel”), the gunslinging coyote, has zero foundational building blocks being a love interest for Lion-Girl yet crowns as such at the story’s climatic showdown.  “Lion-Girl” is saturated with supporting cast and stock characters with round out by Marianne Bourg, Matt Standley, Shelby Lee Parks, Hideotoshi Imura, Holgie Forrester, Katarina Severen, Stefanie Estes, and Wes Armstrong.

“Lion-Girl” roars as a wild, untamed animal, mangy in its worst moments but also majestic at the same time.  This paradoxical cultural expression befits the co-superpowers production, blending Japanese and American flavors and faults into one oversized bag of live-action manga.  With a derision mostly toward western affairs, such as the media circus surrounding the xenophobic administration’s handling of the corona virus, to which the filmic beasts known as Anaroc is corona spelled backwards, the haughty, bullying state doesn’t stray far from Kurando Mitsutake’s pen-to-paper handiwork as he also invokes Gô Nagai’s freedom sense of nudity and violence aimed to shake up with acculturation in high level eroticism that’s not seen as sleazy or objectifying but rather empowering and artistic.  What Mitsutake does really well and what’s also to the film’s misstep for today’s audiences is the complete blitzkrieg of background setup that’s bombastically overwhelming with incident backstory, dystopian factions, and the new terminologies in a single, longwinded breath, culminating to an early point in the film with a fight between Lion-Girl and an Anaroc beast where mutated breasts are essentially turned into a flamethrower and psychokinetic battles are commissioned in headspace.  That’s the kind of psychotronic tone that bears the cult seal of approval, or in this film, the lion’s share of cult approval. 

Cleopatra Entertainment, the filmic subsidiary company of Cleopatra Records, scores big with Kurando Mitsutake retro-fitted superhero “Lion-Girl” on Blu-ray.  The AVC encoded, high-definition 1080p, single-layered BD25 is literally stuffed to the brim, presented in a 1.78:1 widescreen aspect ratio.  Compression bitrate swings the pendulum, decoding between low 30s and high teens resulting in smoothed over details.  To the film’s advantage, the abated details play into the old-style Japanese action flicks of yore, creating a pseudo-illusion of a flatten color palette and lower resolution last seen on tube televisions.  Okay, might not be to that extent as therein lies decently popping color scheme and rough contouring and lighting in more scarce settings to make the scenes less complex and rely on more smoke and mirrors to stretch the interior-exterior location budget.  The lossy English language Dolby Digital 5.1 surround track is accompanied with also a Dolby Digital 2.0 stereo.  While nothing to negatively harp on in regard to “Lion-Girl’s” sound design and soundtrack as a whole, there’s plenty to like about the wide-ranged, heavy rock-riffing audio with unequivocal balance between the sounds and channeling albeit a lesser fidelity.  Peppered with Japanese words, the dialogue is forefront and clear that red-carpet the numerous monologues with all-day importance.  The release does not come with any subtitle option.  Bonus content includes a director’s commentary track, a conversation between Kurando Mitsutake and manage artist Gô Nagai as they discuss nudity, working in America, genesis for “Lion-Girl,” and their COVID era collaborations, the making-of “Lion-Girl,” “The Hollywood premier screen with cast and director Q&A, a picture slideshow, and the theatrical trailer.  Cleopatra’s release caters to a conventional standard retail market with a commonplace Amaray and disc release and nothing more.  The front cover design is not terribly appeasing with a crowded image composite bathed in an eye-deafening and searing red.  Disc represents the same front cover image and there is no insert inside the Amaray casing.  The region free release is unrated and has an impressively entertaining runtime of a 121-minutes.  Marketed to be a different kind of superhero movie, “Lion-Girl” is certainly more than that, portrayed by Kurando Mitsutake as a love song toward the pulp exposure of his childhood and the film really glows passionately like an Anaroc with supernatural powers ready to strike with nostalgia at the heart of Japanese pop culture.

Here is “Lion-Girl.” Hear Her Roar on Blu-ray!

Isolated Between Mountains, EVIL Rises Out of the Refuge. “Lycan Colony” reviewed! (Visual Vengeance / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

“Lycan Colony” available on Blui-ray Collector’s Edition!

A big city surgeon on the mend of an alcohol problem and two siblings searching for their father who disappeared in the mountains hunting a mysterious big game find themselves in a small town inhabited by an ancient werewolf tribe.  Mostly seeking a peaceful way of life, many of the werewolves have tamed their inner beast to live normally isolated from their human neighbors to avoid bad blood and fear-driven conflict, but a rogue faction of werewolves has tasted human flesh, transfixing them with an insatiable need to hunt and feed on human outsiders who have uncovered the small town’s truth.  On the verge of the Equinox where every lycanthrope resident will transform into the primal versions of the beast, a select few have been able to conquer not losing their humanity as they team up with trapped, arsenal-ready humans and the eldest werewolf who is half witch to squash the evil werewolf population for good. 

In the rural areas of New Hampshire 2006, Rob Roy tries his creative hand at making a movie, writing a script ingrained with his personal affinity for fantasy and werewolves, with the action-packed, shot-on-MiniDV camcorder thriller “Lycan Colony.”  Roy’s first attempt is ambitious to say in the least with a vim and vigor narrative with a visual and practical effects heavy ornament that Roy single-handily constructs all himself learning all the tricks to the trade as he goes.  What ultimately results is initially a colossal flop of technical mishandlings, bad acting, and rushed final products, but in recent years nearly two-decades later, “Lycan Colony” has been revived with a second chance by fans of the so bad, it’s good sect who, like the evil werewolves in the film, have tasted blood and want more.  Rob Roy self produces the film under his Wits’-End Entertainment company.

In producing a movie yourself, with your time, money, equipment, and the little know-how of the process, Rob Roy casts mostly family, friends, and newcomers in his New England werewolf film.  Both of the director’s sons make it into the picture with the older Ryan playing the mistakenly werewolf bitten teenage son of Dr. Dan (Bill Sykes), the surgeon, and Roy’s youngest, Jacob, as a presumed pup running for his life from hunter Sgt. Roger Allen (Paul Henry) as we see in the preface opening.  Though an important piece to some aspects of the story, such as Stewart’s creaturized adolescent transfiguration to help Dr. Dan and wife Sandy (Kadrolsha Ona Carole, “Attack of the Killer Chickens: The Movie”) understand and cope with their now lycanthropic son, Roy’s boys are not the centralized characters as the narrative awkwardly pivots from building up Dr. Dan’s choppy family dynamics and his alcoholic mishap substory to more nondescript kickass and chew bubblegum action of good versus evil as the missing Sgt. Roger Allen’s offspring, the commando-suited daughter Russ (Gretchen Weisiger) and the bad werewolf killed yet risen to the ranks of being a good lycanthrope Doug (Bill Finley), team up with the eldest wolf-witch  and spiritual liberated Athena (Kristi Lynn, “Hypnagogic”) and David (Sean Burgoyne) who can control his beast side with hero pose mediation and tribal chants.  As you can tell, it all becomes disturbingly clear as mud on what exactly we’re bearing witness to, but the “Lycan Colony” burghers flesh out with Sophia Wong, Steve Pascucci, and Libby Collins.

There’s nothing inherently wrong with Rob Roy’s good wolf pitted against bad wolf with man trapped in the middle story.  Throw in some subtle themes of alcoholism juxtaposition where the mountain water tames the beast with hints of silver nitrate and Dr. Dan’s post-career predicament that sends him to AA meetings and also themes of puberty or some kind of other rite of hormonal passage and “Lycan Colony” can work as an action-fantasy with a strong horror element.  The problem lies in the ambitious undertaking for a first-time filmmaker with more gung-ho carpe diem than actual experience and Roy will be the first one to tell you, as heard in bonus content interviews, his goal is to go big and not limit himself with a tightknit narrative with little-to-no special effects.  To the detriment of “Lycan Colony” however, that mentality of thinking took a three-month shooting-script down to a mere three weeks, rushing the final product to the point of using a blue screen for the nearly the entire third act in a real shoddy piece of VFX compositing.  Transpiring on screen resembles similar to the early days of 2D fighting video games with its mix of antiquated motion capturing technology, practical effects, and digital matte but while those traits appear raw, lifelike, and add that certain je ne sais quoi that makes it so attractive, for “Lycan Colony,” the effect miscarries for its time in what is a laughable imbrication.  For some, “Lycan Colony’s” campy crust will be a holy grail to obtain; one could compare Roy’s film to Dave Wascavage’s “Suburban Sasquatch,” another Visual Vengeance, early 2000s, revived flick that had similar rough-cut visuals.  For others, like me, what comedy rises to surface is digestible, the rest of the movie might make you sheepishly queasy. 

For the first time on Blu-ray, “Lycan Colony” has become a part of the Wild Eye Releasing’s Visual Vengeance tribe.  The AVC encoded, 1080i upscaled, BD50 is presented in a full frame 1.33:1 aspect ratio, sourced from an original tape shot on a Panasonic DVX100 MiniDV at 24fps.  Safe to say nothing will outshine celluloid, millimeter film or even today’s digital cameras as that period of time where videotape made a stand offered a rival format with cheaper costs and comparable picture quality; yet videotape, as with “Lycan Colony,” squeezes the resolution combined with matted visual effects, making inaccurately distanced composite look even more compressed.  Details suffer through the compression of MiniDV’s interference noise, undersaturation, and vertical tape impression lines seared into a few frames.  The undersaturation lies the biggest concern leaving behind darker tones that keep the image popping with color, rendering the entire scheme more overcast even when not exposed to rough gel lens which is used quite often in various Crayola hues.  The English lossy Dolby Digital stereo 2.0 has enough strength to get around and get through with a tenuous dialogue track complicated by the not truest of fidelities on likely the onboard camera mic and by the boxy echoes of a blue screen stage, likely Roy’s garage.  Stock file notes give the full body suited lycanthropes enough growling canine bite and the gunshots are awarded cacophonous explosivity, solidifying a decent range of sound, but there are missed or asynchronized effects against the action with brief seconds of delayed catchup or just plain omission.  Boxy areas eradicate the depth, especially in the whole third act when the last battle is held in the woods but is mainly a blue screened forest, so the compounding loss of milieu affects atmospheric track greatly.  Visual Vengeance’s track record on delivering new special features has not gone unnoticed and the trend continues with “Lycan Colony” with a new interview with director Rob Roy.  Also included are two commentary tracks:  one with director Rob Roy and a second with B&S About Movies’s Sam Panico and Drive-in Asylum’s Bill Van Ryn.  A second version of the film is a full Rifftrax version, a blooper reel, the “Lycan Colony” music video, original trailer, and the Visual Vengeance trailer round out the release’s ancillaries.  The colorful Stephen Gammell-esque, presumably pastel, front cover illustration greatly over exceeds expectations but is nonetheless phenomenal full-moon imagery on the cardboard slipcover and also dichotomizes the style on the translucent Amaray Blu-ray case’s cover art depicting a scene from the film of a hungry wolf behind the alcohol-decked bar.  And also true to Visual Vengeance, the release is jammed-packed with inner goodies, such as a New Hampshire Forest Scent air freshener, retro VHS Sticker sleeve, a 3-page pamphlet with essay from Sam Panico with color picture, and a folded mini-poster of the Blu-ray cover art.  Not also to neglect to mention is the reversible cover art with the original one sheet art.  The Visual Vengeance release comes region free, unrated, and has a runtime of 90-minutes. I’m extremely happy for the appreciation and newfound love director and enjoyer all-things-werewolf-fantasy Rob Roy is receiving for his resuscitated escapism but, for me, “Lycan Colony’s” jerry-built and doesn’t come anywhere close relieving the so good, it’s bad itch in Roy’s filmmaking first pass done on the cuff. 

“Lycan Colony” available on Blui-ray Collector’s Edition!