Category Archives: foreign film

Break a Promise with EVIL And Pay the Little-Big Price! “Unwelcome” reviewed! (Well Go USA Entertainment / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Not the Leprechauns This Time.  It’d Be Goblins that “Unwelcome” You!  

Trying desperately to become pregnant for some time, Jamie and Maya celebrate the news of learning they’re expecting but their jovial rejoice is cut short when three thugs break into their city apartment home, nearly bringing an end to their lives and the baby.  When Jamie’s great aunt Maeve wills him a rural cottage in Ireland, the married couple jump at the chance to start afresh away from the urban chaos and the trauma in hopes for a peaceful life with their child.  The friendly village residents take in Jamie and Maya unconditionally but one stipulation is highly encouraged to be met if living at great aunt Maeve’s cottage:  they must leave out a blood offering for the little people, the Redcaps, of the forest butted up against their home.   Just happy to be out of the city, Jamie and Maya shrug off what they believe to be folkloric wives tales of old Ireland and on such short notice, they hire Mr. Whelan and his children, who come with an unfavorable village reputation, to do much-needed repairs around the house.  When dealings with the Whelan clan go violently sideways, Maya invokes superstitious belief to draw the Repcaps out of hiding and implore their murderous mischievousness for dire neighborly assistance. 

Welcome to the “Unwelcome!”  Pint-sized evil continues to be mondo popular around the world, especially in the Full Moon empire that’s built a kingdom off the backs of supernatural ankle biters.  However, “Unwelcome” is not a Charles Band production that’s rushed straight through to a fast-tracked, direct-to-video release of shoddy, schlocky proportions.  Instead, this release comes from overseas, the UK specifically, with some quality production footing that lands the 2023 released film into a limited theatrical run before hitting the home entertainment market.  Behind the film is Jon Wright, director of dark humored revenge against high school bullies in the “Tormented,” who directs and co-writes “Unwelcome’s” grim fairytale-like narrative of personal growth, inner fight, and underfoot goblins gone wild with Mark Stay, reuniting with Wright for the first time since their script collaboration on the 2014 automaton invasion epic, “Robot Overlords.”  Under the once working title of “The Little People,” “Unwelcome” is a production of the Yorkshire based Tempo Productions Limited, with cofounders by Jo Bamford and Piers Tempest as executive producer and producer, and the private equity investment group, Ingenious Media, with producer Peter Touche along with Warner Bros. and Well Go USA Entertainment distributing. 

“Unwelcome” has such unusual casting in a good way.  The entire Whelan clan consists of actors plucked from successful, multi-seasonal television shows that have essentially shaped their careers from their well-known, fan-adored roles, but the unintended adverse effect in such triumph stamina is being recognized only for that performance.  In my mind, Colm Meaney will forever be embedded in my hippocampus as Engineer Chief Miles O’Brien from “Star Trek:  Deep Space Nine.”  “Con Air,” “Under Siege,” and even as a British Airways pilot doomed for landing in “Die Hard 2,” Chief O’Brien, I mean Colm Meaney, is still in space tinkering with transporter buffers.  Here in “Unwelcome,” Meany is Daddy, aka Mr. Whelan, a rough around the edge contractor who beats his kids, let them get away with whatever they please, and has a real notoriety around town.  When I say kids, I mean grown adults stuck in Daddy’s hooligan wake and are played by more outstanding and familiar faces from Ireland, such as Hodor from “Game of Thrones,” Kristian Naim, Netflix’s “Derry Girls’s” Jamie-Lee O’Donnell, and the “1917” actor and upcoming principals of “Last Voyage of the Demeter,” Chris Walley, make up the trio of terribly laid construction workers who have really no business being around a hammer, a ladder, or anybody’s valuables.  That brings me to “Unwelcome’s” lead actors as the scarred couple who hires out Whelan’s band of delinquent spawns to do the handiwork repairs.  I realize Wright and Stay wrote Douglas Booth (“Pride, Prejudice, & Zombies”) to be an overly optimistic and fairly useless good guy with Jamie, but the insecurities are just ostentatiously oozing out of the husband without a clue.  Jamie’s arc also doesn’t quite flesh out by the end of the film as he’s blocked by the baby mama instincts of Maya, played by “Resident Evil:  Welcome to Raccoon City’s” Hannah John-Kamen, with an unspoken I’ll-do-it-my-damn-self attitude that sends the narrative into a knife-brandishing gob of Redcaps eager to do her bidding for an unfavorable exchange.  Maya sacrifices all for a good man with good intentions who can’t do diddlysquat to save her and, in the end, that doesn’t seem balanced for this ferocious fairytale. 

If there is one aspect, above all us, to note about “Unwelcome’s” shin kicking goblins as a takeaway is that the rambunctious and ravenous Redcaps are not computer generated, are not puppets, and are not even animatronics.  Actors and stuntmen fill those small shows with a little help of disproportionate movie magic, heeding to the ways of a lost art in miniaturizing actors, such as in “Willow” or “Honey, I Shrunk the Kids,” and touching up with some CGI on the tangible face molds for a layered composition that’s super fun to see come to life on screen.  Unfortunately, the Redcaps make a late appearance into a yarn unspooled with mostly the pent up pile of frustrations of Jamie and Maya as an unlucky couple without a chance of peace in the world.  Trouble finds them wherever they go in what’s essentially a trade for city thugs for unfriendly country versions of the same type of ill-mannered.  “Unwelcome” plays very much into it’s title that no place feels welcoming for a couple on the verge of the already daunting premise of parenthood life and everything appears now alien as the world is being upended by concessions for your child in what has turned terrifying in what was supposed to be a warm, welcoming of a new adventure.  That’s the sensation setup for the pair who trust dip into trusting superstitions and magical beings to be their guardians.  Folklore then takes over; its has, in fact, been welcomed to save the day no matter how maligned the backstories.  Wright and cinematographer Hamish Doyne-Ditmas do, in fact, construct an ocular stage crafted out of an ethereal red and yellow fire lit sky with an overall color theory toned to contrast as a mystical storybook set in what is usually flush with greenery around an Irish village, reminiscent of late 70s-early 80’s European horror sets built to detailed scale, built with vibrant backlighting, and yet built to feel distant, apprehensively off, and strange like another world, a Redcap ecosphere.  “Unwelcome’s” ending also pulls from that unabashed time to be creatively mad in an innately mad universe with an unexpected Redcap reason that doesn’t clarify so much their hunger for blood offers, which the diet includes raw store-bought meat and the frothy flesh of felonious individuals, but better explains their twisted promises and intentions for their knife-jabbing services rendered.

With Goblins, there’s always a price to pay but for the Blu-ray release of “Unwelcome,” the price is worth the admission.  The single-layered, AVC encoded, high-definition 1080p Well Go USA Entertainment release presents the film in a widescreen 1.78:1 aspect ratio.  Slightly squeeze onto a BD25, there’s some minor irregular compression patches that degrade solid darker colors and the image loses a bit of sharpness in the background – you can see an example when the Redcaps pop up out of the keep tower appearing more like moving globules than well-defined humanoids.  Goblin facial features and skin and clothes textures have tactile appeal during closeups with the same being said with the cast in their natural color tones.  Computer-generated facial movements have seamless pertinence to the surrounding action and the motion of the Goblin actors themselves with layering of frames looking clean to create their smallness around principal characters.  The English DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio mix maintains a stout dialogue track but deploys no depth into recordings resulting in all the dialogue tracks to be at the forefront, even when characters are in the background in the scene.  The weird spatiality with the dialogue doesn’t translate over to ambient noise as those tracks are well designed into the scheme with levels of depth that add richness to the storybook atmospherics.  English SDH are optionally available.  Bonus features include a behind-the-scenes cast and crew interviews discussing their time forming the idea and working on the project, a making the Redcaps segment with special effects supervisor Shaune Harrison (“Nightbreed,” “Attack of the Adult Babies”) discussing the step-be-step process of bringing these little devils to life, including showcasing their head and body molds, and the theatrical trailer. The physical property comes in a standard Blu-ray snapper with latch with one-sided cover art of a knife-out Goblin starring up at the new mistress of the house.  Inside, a single-leaf advert of Well Go USA films and the disc pressed art with a blue-graded Goblin looking menacing makeup the inner contents. “Unwelcome” runs at 101 minutes, is rated R for strong violence and gore, pervasive language, some drug use, and sexual material. From an ironic perspective, “Unwelcome” uses the mythological mischievous of Goblins as a gas pedal accelerator to mature a pair of genteel gulls faced with a parlous reality and to be factotum in life in general told inside in the linings of a dark and gory fairytale universe.

Not the Leprechauns This Time.  It’d Be Goblins that “Unwelcome” You!  

Doppelganger EVIL Shares a Deadly Family Secret. “AmnesiA” reviewed! (Cult Epics / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Become Caught Up in the Mystery of “AmnesiA” on Limited Edition Blu-ray!

Alex, a meek photographer, is called back to his family home by his estranged identical twin brother, Aram, on the news of their mother’s severe illness.  Agreeing to help look after her for a while, Alex travels back home with his new girlfriend in tow, a pyromania epileptic named Sandra.  Upon his arrival in Amnesia, the home of the family business of tinkering on broken down cars around the property, Alex is met face-to-face with a past he’s long tried to forget.  Aloof Aram’s peculiar involvement with organized crime, his heart-healthy mother’s obsession with heart conditions, Sandra’s fire infatuation, and himself crippled by a imprinted, photographic fear swirls with ridicule tension around the crumbling junkyard estate.  The years long secrets between the brothers about their childhood past have taken a personalized toll on them and being in the same space together after a long time a part has loosed embedded raw emotions and dug back up the past again to finish what they started all those years ago.

“Amnesia” is a curious and mysterious black comedy thriller from the Netherlands and is the surrealistically bold effect of duality and family skeletons in the closet from filmmaker, the Hague native, Martin Koolhoven.  Taking similar household elements from the avant, 60’s inspired “Suzy Q,” writer-director Koolhoven pours another fractured glass of dysfunctional family-ade to sour perfection, squeezing every last drop out of neglected relationships in order for the truth to the be tasted.  With themes around secrets, guilt, processing that guilt, and family, “Amnesia,” or as originally spelled, “AmnesiA,” progresses a narrative of an irreversible broken family from through the looking glass of dark comedy and layered mystery to it’s ultimate destruction perceived as bittersweet.  Shot in Belgium, “Amnesia” is produced by Paul Verhoeven “Black Book” producers, Jeroen Beker and Frans van Gestel, under the partners’ 1995 established, Amsterdam-based production company, Motel Films. 

If unable to locate two suitable actors to play siblings, why not have one great actor to be both?  That’s the approach Martin Koolhoven erected when falling head over heels with Fedja van Huêt who could intuitively give Koolhoven the exactness of each brother’s personality.  Brothers Alex and Amar are so distinct in how they carry themselves as well as in their appearance that your mind and eyes can barely keep the registered fact that the brothers are inhabited by the one and the same Huêt.  Huêt, along with some good writing from Koolhoven, keeps insecurities close to the chest, blossoming a massive bubble of enigma that often repels the brothers against one another to keep audiences from homing in too close to the exact cause of their personal strife.  Tension works wonderfully despite not having the ability to act against the actual physical embodiment of the antithesis to spar with and the editing fully supports the duality with perfectly seamed visual effects touchup efforts.  Other support efforts come from a great supporting cast, including the international success Carice van Houten who starred in Verhoeven’s “Black Book” and won an Emmy for her high priestess role of Melisandre on HBO’s “Game of Thrones.”  Houten’s cagy, pyromaniac Sandra is just as odd as her appearing suddenly into Alex’s life, or rather into the backseat of his car, when things are beginning to feel complicated for Alex having to return home after many years away.  Sandra’s emotionally supportive, almost as Alex’s backbone or a buffer, when dealing with Aram but she’s interpreted as not normal by the brothers’ mother (Sacha Bulthuis) who herself is a representation of the past that keeps the individualized brothers connected and tries to keep both boys nearby without angering them; she even attempts to turn Alex into his mechanic father, whether done consciously or subconsciously goes unsaid, but in the end, the past always creeps back to the present and the unresolved coming to a close will put the final nail into the coffin of the Amnesia family business for good.  Theo Maassen, Cas Enklaar, Eva van der Gucht, and Erik van der Horst costar.

“Amnesia” is a thought-provoking puzzle box of rearranging clues and drop in visitants that instill an uneasy, surrealism surrounding chiefly these two brothers.  Bubbling to the surface through a series of baby step flashbacks is the root cause for much of the tension coursing the narrative. History becomes the driving force behind Alex’s apprehension in returning home, seeing his naive mother, and interacting with sycophantic brother who’s also jaded by the life’s little lurid lesson by turning toward a life of crime and holding onto not only a grudge against his brother’s abandonment but also against a decision his father made many times over that he now sees as unfinished and unsatisfied. What’s even more interesting is the lack of urgency and empathy surrounding them and to resolve what has been stayed stagnant for years from their adolescence and into their adult established lives. Immediate attention matters become secondary to the underfoot game that occupies mental space between them, infects those around them, and spills out of the shadows to eventually into the light. For example, Amar’s partner Wouter is critically injured after a botched heist and comes to Amnesia to wait for further instructions from Eugene, Amar and Wouter’s boss; yet, while Wouter bleeds from his abdomen, Amar saunters around the house and Wouter is equally leisured when it came down to his mortal wound. Eventually, Sandra and the brothers’ mother grow accustomed to Wouter’s state, just like Wouter, and though their mother’s deteriorating health inches itself back and forth into the conversation, the only thing that doesn’t shy from the forefront and never becomes accustomed is the lingering sense of that something isn’t copacetic between Alex, Amar, and their father in what transforms into a problem of masculinity affairs in which Amar steers the way in accordance to alpha theory. Koolhoven uses closeups and arranges characters in scenes that makes them feel right on top of each other, in various ways, that perpetuates the incommodious communalism of Amnesia.

With the associated restoration from the Eye Film Institute, Cult Epics introduces a new 4K HD transfer and restoration of Martin Koolhoven’s “AmnesiA” onto a limited edition, 2-Disc, dual-layered Blu-ray from the original camera negative. IMDB.com lists “Amnesia” as an Arriflex 16mm film blown up to 35mm, but the is incredibly sharp for 16mm and there doesn’t appear to be a ton of makeup work to cover 16mm’s sizzling grainy and jitteriness. However, the film is presented in the European standard 1.66:1 aspect ratio that’s shot in Super 16 and is particularly fascinating how Koolhoven’s color schemes and depth shadowing adds to the noir fashion of Menno Westendorp’s beautifully warm and splintering specious cinematography. Restoratively, “AmnesiA” is a perfectly graded film with a sharp, invigorating image that exhibits no compressions issues on the dual-layer BD50, available on both discs. The Dutch language audio options on the Cult Epics release has three options: a LPCM 2.0 stereo, a DTS-HD 5.1, and a Dolby Digital 5.1. Jumping back and forth between the audio choices, I settled upon the DTS-HD surround sound mix that produces a better full-bodied output, if only by a little better with notifiable sharper crackling of the tire and car fires to bring an audible warmth to the scene. Sometimes, it’s the smallest vibrations that make a biggest impact. Dialogue renders nicely on each of the three tracks with clarity and a cleanliness of the recordings. Tracks are dynamically distinct in each scene that creates a nice depth in many of the closeup scenes with more than one actor. English subtitles are available on all three audio options. Special features on the first disc include an optional presentation introduction by director Martin Koolhoven, audio commentary by Koolhoven and star Fedja van Huêt that’s moderated by Peter Verstraten, a 44-minute theater aisle retrospective conversation with Koolhoven and actress Carice van Houten, a making-of featurette, an archive behind-the-scenes with Carice von Houten from 2001, and the theatrical trailer. The second disc includes two bonus films from Martin Koolhoven’: “Suzy Q” from 1999 and “Dark Light” from 1997. The release itself comes in a clear traditional Blu-ray snapper case inside a cardboard slipcover with a new burning tire lens illustrative artwork from Peter Strain. The snapper cover art is a split screen of Alex and Amar with Sandra divisively in the middle and the reverse side of the artwork contains original poster reproductions for “Suzy Q” and “Dark Light.” Disc art is pressed with the same cover design on the feature presentation while the disc two is pressed with an image for “Suzy Q.” The 89-minute “AmnesiA” comes unrated and the both Blu-rays are tested region free. A real mind flayer that gets under your skin in a humorously surreal way, director Martin Koolhoven’s “AmnesiA” stuns as an official debut feature film, a real under-the-radar sleeper hit for the Netherland filmmaking canon, that only Cult Epics could deliver pristinely with a time-of-day restoration and high-definition scan.

Become Caught Up in the Mystery of “AmnesiA” on Limited Edition Blu-ray!

A Family of EVIL Walks, Talks, and Comes in a Putrid Shade of Blue! “Super Z” reviewed! (Synergetic / DVD)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

“Super Z” Has Bites and Baffoonery!  Amazon.com Has it on DVD!

A genetically produced, made-to-order zombie foursome are grown in a private laboratory and continue to be experimented on by a greedy CEO and his team of mad scientists from conception to create a group of governable, intelligent, and unstoppable do-bidders.  The latest batch of untested cultivating serum provides the four with the ability to think and talk, the only severe drawback side-effect is the  foulmouthed and uncivilized behavior makes them spitefully aggressive.  Able to speak for the first time, the zombies are actually a family of four and are able to use their undead abilities to escape with their undead lives to plot a revenge on all of humankind for all the cruelty brought down upon the zombie gene.  Feasting on a nearby couple to stave their hunger and infecting the couple’s white-boy rapper son to join the family as one of their own, a male heir of sorts amongst two older sister siblings, the now nuclear zombie family forages for human flesh while turning a rundown cabin in the woods into a place they can call home and plan their worldwide retribution, but as mother and father work on their relationship issues, a son finding love to become a man, and two sisters with an uncontrollable bloodlust, the impatient CEO hires mercenaries to hunt them down as retrievable property.

Who better to create an absurd, over-the-top zombie comedy than the people of France, the national birthplace of the absurdism philosophy.  That is what the gonzo-gory “Super Z” reflects, a heightened realization of life and intelligence after many years of being a docile dead becomes the basis for French writer-directors Julien de Volte and Arnaud Tabarly in their first feature length film.  Grossly saturated with explicit pejoratives, zany antics, and is hairbrained on a level I never would have thought could be achieved, “Super Z,” short for Super Zombie, is based off the filmmakers’ 17-minute 2014 short film “The Foodies” and now in 2022, the film unlocks yet again a very seldomly explored narrative that walks the same flip-the-script lines on taking the George Romero-style zombie perspective, such as with 2007’s “Aaah! Zombies!!” or 2013’s “Warm Bodies,” and laces it with an unrestrainable absurdist style.  To be honest, “Super Z” will repel the majority of audiences who can’t embrace its border crossing childishness and cartoon consorting pursuance.   Following the success of the short film, Tabarly and Volte’s Orléans, France based La Ruche Productions is the production company’s first feature film outside the regular shorts and documentaries accomplished by the company and is produced Laura Townsend.

The story engrosses us into the ebb and flows of family dynamics, but not just any kind of family dynamics as it’s made up of genetically modified zombies.  Yet, Arnaud Tarably and Julien de Volte don’t divide the extremities of the living and dead too far apart.  Family dinners are still held together around the table, the purpose of existence within the fragile relationship construct comes into question quite about between father and mother, and even a teenage boy coming into manhood when washed over with an overpowering smitten sensation at first sight of a farm girl are all the things the zombie family experience making a life away from human interaction with the only human interacting being the one where the zombies have the upper hand as well as the severed torsos, the castrated genital organs, or the decapitated heads as a full table spread with dad’s special gravy (aka blood) as the secret sauce.  While their performances won’t win any kind of awards, at all, I do believe “High Lane’s” Johan Libéreau as the father Gertre and “Savage State’s” Julien Courbey as the mother Stephana cater to the bloody nub of gnarly passion between two also covered in filth and body fluid zombies lovingly trying to protect their unique family at a normalized primal cost and formulate a monumental revenge against humans.  One question that rises out of Gertre and Stephana’s relationship is is Stephana supposed to be a man actor playing a woman character assigned gender by genetic disposition or a zombified gay man in transition?  It’s never clear but it also doesn’t really matter as it adds to Stephana idiosyncratic comedy as she removes a female corpses breast to sew to her own chest but also pees blood standing up!  It becomes just a curiosity that arises but the crux of the character is nailed down by Courbey who shows a sensitive and savage side being a cabin-wife to three children and providing for Gertre’s quest to queen her zombie world domination.  Gertre and Stephana’s children are played by returning “The Foodies” actors Fabien Ara as the baby boy Yvon and Florence Bebic-Veruin as sister Georgette with the addition of Audrey Giacomini being adopted into the ferociously multifaceted family cast as the second sister Marcelline.  Ara and Bebic-Veruin reprise their colorfully blue necrotic-skinned and blood-red splattered characters as squabbling siblings as the babied Yvon is coddled to the point of seeking love in a local farmer’s verbally abused but carefree and nearly toothless daughter Augustine, another reprised performance by Marion Mezadorian who was also a farm gal in “The Foodies.”  “Super Z” fills out the cast with lots of zombie fodder but also includes Jean-François arises, (“Time Demon”), Ludovic Schoendoerffer (“Crime Scenes”), Jacques Boudet (“Dracula and Son”), Laurent Bouhnik, and Jo Prestia of “Irreversible” as the mercenary’s very much alive cousin and the zombie family’s bodiless uncle!  Wait, and you’ll see what I mean.

“Super Z” will not sate everyone’s thirst of comedy nor will be gripping horror, but the French absurdist film will quench with gore galore with a setup that’s real light on its feet, swiftly making haste through a narrative that if you blink or didn’t hear a certain part of the dialogue, or read the subtitles if you don’t understand French, than you’re left holding the bag trying to play catchup on what the hell is going on.  Not your fault by any means as “Super Z” goes at a super breakneck speed that aggressively aggregates zombie intelligence, a laboratory escape, a zombie-turned-son, and a quiet, secluded abode to make camp all within the first 15 minutes or so.  From there, we ease into the zombie family country life, getting to understand their troubles, their ambitions, and their family squabbles more-and-more while father and his daughters hunt down bypassing humans with a machete and make a smorgasbord of homecooked organs, blood, and flesh out of them that is fit for an undead king while the wife cooks the food and showers the biologically unrelated brat with pet names and adorable little hairdos to much of his disgust.  Zany can’t describe “Super Z’s” overzealous rubbish yet within that zany overzealous rubbish, a thin stream of guilty pleasures can result in keeping attentions from pressing the off button and burning the disc to a crisp.  “Super Z” is not a too terrible horror-comedy as long as understanding the premised background helps focus on the filmmakers’ key conveyances within an absurdist designed paradigm that just happens to have lots of blood and guts. 

If the zombie subgenre was becoming too stale as week old bread, then “Super Z” keeps the rotting bags of walking meat fresh with a managing ménage of the uncouth undead. Synergetic distribution goes international with domestic releases with “Super Z” on DVD. The Smart-Ass Zombies are presented in a widescreen 2.39:1 aspect ratio with a picture quality that renders clean just like many modern-day digital models. The Synergetic DVD has consistent Mbps decoding reliability on the DVD5, decoding at a rate of 8.9 Mbps with hardly a blip on compression. In regard to the coloring, the zombie family’s forest background pops with lush greenery that becomes invariably evident in other mise-en-scene aspects as a higher contrast delineation defines the boundaries super well, materializing emerging imagery with deep shadows and a vibrantly eclectic color palette resembling near comic book visuals that luckily absorb Cyril Féron’s cut-and-paste visual effects into the crass configuration. The French Stereo 2.0 offers free from nuisance tracks but definitely output in a two-dimensional standard that, since there’s more range than one might expect, softens the punch of this madcap zombie mayhem to a par mix that works well enough. The zombified autotune adds a layer of obstruction over the dialogue track but if reading the burned in English subtitles, then there’s nothing lost in that respect. The entire mix is an overall healthy dose of ambient bustle, sprightly dialogue, and lots of buffoonery snaking in between. The Synergetic DVD doesn’t support bonus material with only the feature and a chapter selection on the main menu but there is an after credits stinger of a cow and a severed head that attempts one last quick chuckle out of the viewer. Supporting all region codes, the DVD has a runtime of 80 minutes and is seemingly unrated, there is no stated rating on the back cover. Speaking of which, Synergetic DVD covers skirt the cost with slapdash compositions an eighth grader learning AutoCAD could have completed for a solid C+. The mustard yellow with black, nearly indistinct, vignettes don’t provide any kind of appetizing stimulation and, oppositely, can snuff out any sort of enthusiasm toward checking this French absurdist piece out, but don’t let the lackadaisical cover art dishearten a peak into what could be a considerably wild and gory experience. Just be warned that “Super Z” isn’t for everyone and everyone isn’t for “Super Z” living on a different, bizarro plane of existence.

“Super Z” Has Bites and Baffoonery!  Amazon.com Has it on DVD!

EVIL Strikes with Thousands of Disastrous, Deadly Fangs! “Calamity of Snakes” reviewed! (Unearthed Films / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Save the Date!  “Calamity of Snakes” Slithers onto Blu-ray and DVD!  Available at Amazon!

A greedy, time-is-money land developer pushes his project manager and structural architect to complete his condo building earlier than scheduled, even if that means to cut corners.  While digging to lay the structure’s foundation, a massive pit of deadly snakes is unearthed.  With no times to waste, the land developer orders the mass killing of the snakes by the crew and even takes matters into his own hand using a backhoe as a weapon against the wishes of more sensible architect.  Those who are karma-included and God-fearing believe the mass murder of the snakes will result in retribution with fears being validated when workers fall victim to random snake attacks.  Shrugging it off as superstition mumbo-jumbo, the land developer finishes marvelous residential condo and fills the units in record numbers.  His success becomes the tenant’s death trap who can’t escape the swarming thousands of deadly slithery serpents infesting every nook and cranny and climbing toward his penthouse, seeking revenge against the snakebit developer’s cruelty and greed. 

Warning.  If you have a severely crippling phobia of snakes, then do not press play on “Calamity of Snakes” or you’ll be crying in the fetal position for hours afterwards with imaginational visions of venomous serpents dangling around your neck and arms, clinging to your punctured flesh with their sharp, tapered fangs. Trust me.  I know from experience after having watched the William Chang Kee (Chi Chang) creature feature and going into the viperous vengeance film with my own form of sweat-inducing ophidiophobia, an extreme fear of snakes.  Kee’s 1982 production comes with a bit of notoriety that may put the film in hot water with Peta or other animal rights organization, it also may be a silver lining for those petrified by the carnivorous reptilians that lurk underfoot, but don’t worry, from Unearthed Films news board, the home entertainment distribution company pledges to donate a percentage of the “Calamity of Snakes’” sale profits to the Save the Snakes, an organization that aims to converse and repopulate all species of snake around the world.  Penned by Kee with cowriters Kang-Nien Li (“The Lady Avenger”) and Kuo Jung Tsai (“Crouching Tiger, Hidden Drago”), The Chinese film made in Taiwan, “Calamity of Snakes” wriggles to-and-fro between different genre elements with pieces of horror, martial arts, and comedy packed so tightly together that making diamond shaped heads and rattling tails difficult to define the kind of film Kee intended to convey, but what came to fruition fabulously depicts the can-do attitudes of developing a preposterous idea into something insane, terrifying, and effectuated with countless real snakes.  Chi He Film Company and the Hong-Kong based Kee Woo Film Co. serve as the production companies with Tsai-Ching Wang producing and Golden Sun Films (“Dr. Lamb”) distributing.

Despite the animal cruelty, which undoubtedly can’t be ignored, you have to give credit to the Chinese for their willingness to do just about anything in order to get the shot.  If that means two of the actors’ role violently around on a floor covered with live snakes, screaming their heads off, then they certainly have more cojones than I ever will.  From a recent interview I watched with Michelle Yeoh, the “Everything Everywhere All At Once” Academy Award winning actress describe the Chinese film industry of the 1980s to be stunt demanding and really did lack the strict safety standards when compared to the U.S.  “Calamity of Snakes” appears to be no different with the easily handling of cobras and an overall serpent magnitude that can’t be denied. Yun-Peng Hsiang stars as the young, U.S.-studied architect with a sensible and rational head on top of his shoulders, overcome with the feeling that his dealings with the unscrupulous land developer (Yuen Kao) and the two passive aggressively buttheads throughout the narrative that eventually lends to the developer getting what he wants by way of money, power, and backdoor dealings that denotes an allegory of affluence being blind to the perceptible cause-and-effect dangers ahead while the studiously educated are left ignored, exploited for their talents. “Calamity of Snakes” cast rounds out with Lui Cheung, Ying Lee, Tung-Min Huang, Ying Lee, Pei-Ying Lo, and Ping-Ou Wei as the land developer’s chucklehead assistant.

“Calamity of Snakes'” hardest part to digest is the disgusting display of snake homicide. In what becomes a grouping of three scenarios that are just scene after scene of killing snakes by the hacks of machetes, the release of mongoose going right for the head of the snake, and in a blaze of flame throwing fire, cruelty is terribly too integrated into the pericardium encased heart of Kee’s ecohorror and makes the snake outdoor market delicatessen scene that dispatches a cobra for use of consumption that much more palatable despite the graphic skinning, organ removal, and blood draining for a special drink cocktail that can supposedly cure what ails you. Down the hatch! After the ginormous scenes of genocide, rooting for the snakes to bite back against the unbridled cruelty of humans to come crashing down in a heap of revenge-seeking serpents is a sight of satisfactory glory. Kee, also known for his cheap but fast-paced martial arts films, creates a loose hierarchy amongst the ophidians by fabricating a boa constrictor that can kung-fu with the best human snake whisperer. The showdown scene takes flight with the constrictor whipping through the air using its large, serpentine tail as a formidable blunt object and its body to innately crush the life out of foes. In contrasts, the chop-socky, though wonderfully fast-paced and choreographed, is a bit out of place with a flying, unrealistic boa against the real slithering slitherers creeping along the floors and walls, decorating the rooms with slick, shiny scales that encircle terror around frantic condominium residents and the boss-level land developer who unsheathes a katana in another scene of snake cleaving in slow motion.

The day of the snake is here and now, on a high definition 1080p, AVC encoded, Special Edition Blu-ray from Unearthed Films as part of the boutique distributor’s Unearthed Classics sublabel and slotted at number 12 on the spine. The primary feature is presented in a widescreen 2.35:1 aspect ratio with a genuine digitized effort toward the best possible 2K scan rendition of the photograph film source print. There’s not a ton of wear, tear, or much of anything regarding damage aside from a few vertical scratches. Delineation is consistent with delivering characters and snakes transposed clearly, but often you might see the boa constrictor scenes share a softer exposure because of that accelerated camera work with the martial arts. Color reproduction does maintain a certain image fidelity, but the grading comes off placid, never giving the snake, or snakes, a chance to gleam a venomous glare with those eyelid-less and verticalized wide-angle seeing eyes. The original elements offer little to work with, but the Unearthed Films’ release is still top-notch work in delivering the best possible picture. The Mandarin, Cantonese, and English dub PCM mono 1.0 provide the typical options available when released in Taiwan decades ago; In fact, they’re all scratch tracks but I went with the Mandarin track that synchs not too adversely to viewing pleasure. With the mono, dub track, depth is done before it can even get started but “Calamity of Snakes” has immense range that conveys the whooshing actions of living things flying through the air during fight sequences, flamethrowers singe the very audible air, and the Foley keeps up to any and all actions with a more than satisfactory overlay track. Dialogue being the important aspect of anything film is fine here being in the forefront and clean albeit some moderate background crackling-static throughout. English subtitles are available and discern no issues with pacing or with spelling slips but there is a sense of something lost in translation as the dynamic discourse seesaws in an irregular way that feels forced and unnatural. Unearthed Films doesn’t just deliver one version of the film, the company offers two more edits for equality. If you’re not one for animal cruelty, a cruelty free version is available that omits the snake snuff. Also, the theatrical edit is a censored version, but Unearthed Films does include the 4:3 uncut, unrestored versions that adds back in prolonged sex acts and one very brief nudity scene. A From Shaw to Snake: The Venom And Violence of Early Chinese Language Horror Cinema brings back some key far East scholars, such as Calum Waddel, and new academic faces with Dr. Lin Feng, to discuss the background limbotic tug-a-war of Taiwan between the democratic island and mainland China that also morphs into the rising of Shaw Brothers’ films in the mid-20 century to eventually Golden Sun’s competitive rise, and subsequently the Shaw Brothers’ as well, into the kitschy crowd favorites of the horror genre. Reptilian Recollections: Lin Kuang-Yung In Conversation With Chui-Yi Chung converses in an interview with Lin Kuang-Yung recalling moments from production involving the countless number of snakes and the safety assurances with the cast and crew, despite some being bit a few times. The special features round out with a commentary track with Nathan Hamilton and Brad Slaton, alternate opening and ending credits, and a still gallery. The physical portions of the release come with a traditional Blu-ray snapper case inside a cardboard o-slip with the original Thai poster art by illustrator Kham, provided by the M. Wright Collection. The same poster art is used for the disc art as well. Inside the snapper case lies no insert or reverse cover art. The region A locked Blu-ray clocks the feature presentation in at 96 minutes and is not rated. “Calamity of Snakes’ is the original “Snakes on a Plane” of the 1980’s, a coiling revenge plotted by nature with potent venom and disturbing imagery that deserves to be a classic in its own right soon to once again see the light of day on DVD and Blu-ray come April 25 from Unearthed Films.

Save the Date!  “Calamity of Snakes” Slithers onto Blu-ray and DVD!  Available at Amazon!

EVIL Follows the Virtuous. “Justine” reviewed! (Blue Underground / 4K UHD & Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Own Your Piece of Virtue with this 2-Disc “Justine” set from Blue Undergrounda and MVD Visual!  

Unable to continue their religious education, left with a meager currency to afford room, board and food, and holding no station or options for social pursuit, Justine and her sister Juliette are put out to the streets of 18th century France.  While Juliette recruits herself into a Madame’s established brothel for money, shelter, and sleight of hand opportunities, leading a life sinful in flesh, murder, and exploit that reaps luxurious benefits into high society, a more chaste Justine finds her path to be far less desirable.  Her virtue becomes the object of obsession, lust, and is taken advantage of for other’s personal gain.  No longer protected by her parents or the convent’s shelter, Justine is exposed to the wickedness of the world in every form and fashion with only slithers of bliss here and there as a reward of her decency only to be immediately snatched from her grasp before she can even enjoy a second.  Accused of stealing and murder, tortured and branded, imprisoned and convicted, labeled an escaped enemy of France, and with her virtue corrupted by a cult of pleasure seekers, Justine questions a life led in chastity and overall goodness that has brought her nothing but pain and strife. 

On the heels of my own personal overseas trip to France, a trip for pleasure if you must know, I found it timely and fitting that the Jess Franco directed film, the Marquis de Sade’s “Justine,” would be the next celluloid critique of enticing pulpy obscura.  A part of a pair of Marquis de Sade-themed productions from producer Harry Alan Towers, the other being “Eugenie,” the Eurotrash sexploitation is based off Marquis de Sade’s 1791 novel Justine, or The Misfortunes of Virtue and is adapted for screen by Towers from an original treatment penned by Arpad DeRiso (“Death Steps in the Dark”) and Erich Kronte. “Justine” is one of Franco’s most ambitious visual epics with ornate time period customers, elaborate and grand locations, and an anthology of sorts of the titular character’s misadventures through France that disenchant her chastity. Corona Filmproduktion and the Aica Cinematografica S.R.L. served as the co-productions of this Italian-Spanish 1969 film.

Perhaps the most recognizable and most notable adaptation of Marquis de Sade’s novel, “Justine” is also popularized by its identifiable cast with big names in not only Europe but also in America. The opening scenes with Klaus Kinski, in a wraparound narrative as the Marquis de Sade himself imprisoned and suffering visions of bloodied and bound naked women, immediately draws you into the “Nosferatu the Vampyre” and “Schizoid” actor’s character plight and muted damnation into writing about virtue, a misfortunate respectability. The other famous face in the film, one that spans from Europe to the U.S., is Romina Power as the titular “Justine.” Power, daughter of actor-songwriter Tyrone Power, was, in her own right, a well-known Eurovision singer after the release of the Franco film, but it was her father’s musical talents who landed the sweet-faced Romina into the denigrated young woman role. While Kinski acts on pure facial expression alone, using his iconic, distinct facial features, Power offered a more rigid approach like a child locked by confusion and while unintentional and usually not what any filmmaker wants in a devoid of relaying vicarious expressive emotions, Power naive innocence proves key to Justine’s, well dare I say it, naive innocence. Power’s beauty alone could have stood ground in making the attack from angles perversity film work like a charm. One of the more surprising casted members is Jack Palance. Yes, Curly from “City Slickers” or Jake Stone from “Cops and Robbersons” outlines the formidable pleasure-seeking cult leader Brother Antonin with such gusto flamboyance, the must-see and most-enjoyable performance seemingly feels alien to the usual stoic and stern typecasted actor who could rival Clint Eastwood with a fierce thousand-yard stare. Having co-starred in the Franco-de Sade film “Eugenie” a few years later, Maria Rohm, aka Harry Alan Towers wife, plays the role of Juliette and while the story is ultimately a dichotomy of virtue and sin, there’s an imbalance between the two characters for screen time. The Marquis de Sade’s novel was named “Justine” after all. For her alotted screen time, Rohm provides a suitable sinful scarlet woman climbing the aristocratic ladder by cheating, stealing, and killing her way to the top. The cast fills out with Harold Leiptnitz (“The Brides of Fu Manchu”), Horst Frank (“The Cat o’ Nine Tails”), Gustavo Re (“Horror Story”), Sylva Koscina (“Uncle was a Vampire”), Akim Tamiroff, Rosalba Neri (“The French Sex Murders”), and “99 Women’s” Mercedes McCambridge in an unforgettable role as a nasty gang-leading woman whose high-velocity cruelty rockets are so homed in on Justine it’s explosively devastating to watch.

Having seen the elegance of interior architectures inside Paris’s Opera house, walked the cobblestone streets surrounding the monumental Eiffel Tower, and taking in the laissez-faire of the French way of life, I can honestly say Jess Franco captures France impeccably well for an self-exiled Spaniard known more for his sleaziness and horror than his efforts in cinematic expressionism.   Arching with one big showcase revolving around the idea that virtue will get you nowhere and will be nothing but trouble, ultimately putting to question the validity of the decency concept, the narrative is broken up into a mini-scenarios, mostly of Justine being completely subjugated to the wicked whims of others and a handful of Juliette erecting a better life off the backs of others she’s duped or snuffed.  Franco mastered false hope and misconceptions with each of Justine’s encounters as they lure her in with promises of salvation to then only kick her when she’s down and reap full advantage of her inexperience and gullibility that the world is full of good people.  Sordid and cruel, “Justine” is a contradiction of actionable cynicism in the foreground of depicted magnificence in location, costume, and cinematography choices that hews into the coarse callousness; one particular scene comes to mind involves Jack Palance’s Antonin arranged with hand positioning that abbreviates the name Jesus Christ and as Antonin is holding this hand arrangement, he seemingly glides or floats down the stone corridors toward Justine, demonstrating religious imagery as a form of abusive power or corrupted guidance to serve one’s own deviant devices.  Though labeled in some circles a sexploitation film and certainly full of skin from Romina Power, Maria Rohm, and Rosalba Neri amongst others peekabooing their assets through cut potato sacks during the sex slave orientation scene, much of the sex is heavily implied with a limited gratuitous outcome.  Before going fully into an Eurotrash market by the late 70s and all the way through to the 90s, Franco made every effort to be a considerable filmmaker for a broad audience in numerous countries and his dislike for censorship shines through to his work, despite the likelihood of costing him acclaimed fame as a director. 

“Justine” arrives on 4K UHD in a Blu-ray combo set from Blue Underground.  The two disc set is AVC encoded Blu-ray 50gig and a triple layered Blu-ray 100gig with 1080p (standard BR) and 2160p (UHD) high-definition resolution, and presented in the original European widescreen aspect ratio of 1.66:1.  The brand new 4K restoration from the uncensored original camera negative of the 35mm film with Dolby Vision HDR is a foremost upgrade to the highest power, an ultra-balanced grading that reels in a wide variety of colors from interior to exterior that helps bring the ornamentation of 18th century France to a vivacious life on screen.  The saturation is enriched and finitely retuned to deliver the best and naturalistic grading as humanly possible, or as current technology allows.  The Blu-ray offers a just as reasonable presentation but does lack that high attention to detail because of the lower pixel count.  Bitrate decades are a comfortable average in the high 30s to low 40s.  The UHD and standard Blu-ray offer a clean and free from compression artifacts with immeasurable format capacity to render an unimpeachable picture. Both formats come with an English DTS-HD mono, dubbed in English by voice actors and not the original cast. No hissing, popping, and only a slight interference hum. Dialogue is dub boxy but clean, clear, and right forefront without question of what’s being discoursed and is well-folded into the ambient and Bruno Nicolai epic vein-coursing score that triumphs a military march over a classical base. English SDH are optional. In regard to special features, both formats include a new audio commentary with film historians Nathaniel Thompson and Troy Howarth and the French trailer, but the Blu-ray contains archive interviews with director Jess Franco and writer-producer Harry Alan Towers, an interview with author Stephen Thrower of Murderous Passions: The Delirious Cinema of Jesus Franco, a new interview with actress Rosalba Neri, in Italian with English subtitles, On Set With Jess, a newly expanded poster and still gallery, and a Jess Franco dreaded censored cut of the Americanized shorter version of the film under the “Deadly Sanctuary” title in HD and clocking in at 96 minutes, a nearly 30 minutes shorter. The physical features mirror the “Eugenie” 4k/Blu-ray release with a black Blu-ray snapper case with similar thickness. A shackled Justinne graces the front cover, as with the previous DVD Blue Underground release, and has the same cardboard slipcover with an oval shaped like mirror cutout to not block the half-naked Romina Power. Back covers are both the snapper case and cardboard cover have the same layout design but different still images on each. Inside, there is a disc on each side of the case held in by a push lock. The UHD is a sizzling infrared and sultrier posed version of the snapper cover while the Blu-ray, in the same red hue, is a composition of characters clustered together in a circular design. The film comes not rated, region free, and has the presentation feature with a runtime of 124 minutes. The Marquis de Sade divulges a sardonic, topsy-turvy belief that the more you stay virtuous, the more trouble follows as it’s the way of the world and the more you swindle, the more headway you make in life. Jess Franco brings the Marquis’s vision to cinematic life with a grand and sordid tale, dissevering the two ways toward their individual soul crushing path, and discovering morality within the immoral.

Own Your Piece of Virtue with this 2-Disc “Justine” set from Blue Undergrounda and MVD Visual!