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Cartagena’s Secrets are Mountainous EVIL Aliens! “Top Line” reviewed! (Cauldron Films / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

When Everyone’s Out To Get You, You Get “Top Line” on Blu-ray!

Washed up, alcoholic feature journalist Ted Angelo drinks himself into a stupor on the porticos of Columbia.  Having just been fired by his magazine editor for lack of content, Angelo scores big when led down the path of ancient tribal artifacts that proves the terminus of one of Europe’s famous new world explorers, rewriting history of the disappeared pioneer, but what he truly discovers is bigger, and more frightening, than history itself as he unearths a large alien spacecraft hidden within the Columbian mountains, big enough to enclose the explorer’s lost mast ship.  The discovery of a lifetime becomes the bane of Ted Angelo’s existence as he’s suddenly on a kill list and every organization, from the C.I.A., to the K.G.B., to former Nazis, is hunting him and wanting him dead.  Unable to trust anyone and nowhere to run and hide, the desperate writer is determined to expose the secret-to-kill-for to the world but not if the aliens have anything to say about it. 

Let’s talk about a film that is a bit of a smorgasbord with tapas plate tastings of just about every genre that exists.  That’s one way to serve the description of Nello Rossati’s “Top Line” with an inarguable action coating menu overtop the varietal lifeblood veins of science fiction, espionage, drama, parody, horror, and driven by a sensationalized historical context.  Directed under Rossati’s Americanized pen name, Ted Archer, and known alternatively as “Alien Terminator,” “Top Line” tries to appeal to western audiences with brazenly broad script cowritten by “The Woman in the Night” director and Roberto Gianviti (“Don’t Torture the Duckling,” “Murder Rock”) at the height of Italian ripping of popular American movies.  Filmed on site in Cartagena, Colombia, the Italian production was produced by Luciano Martino (“The Island of the Fishmen”) and productionally sanctioned under companies Dania Film, Reteitalia and the National Cinematografica. 

What’s likeable about Ted Angelo is he’s simply a writer.  He’s not a crack-shot, he’s not a world-class fighter, and he’s not one for conjuring up a complex master plan.  Instead, Ted Angelo is a flawed man under the influence of a bottle and is a low-level womanizer where the bedroom interests are more about local information than about the sexual activities.  Franco Nero (“Django,” “High Crime”) goes against his multifaceted ruggedness and muscular physique to be the more of an adaptable and instinctual hero that tries to make up for slouching about Columbia’s drink selection.  Nero’s the hero while Deborah Moore, of “Warriors of the Apocalypse” and daughter of former James Bond Roger Moore, tiptoes about the love interest trope after her character’s senior colleague, who is also Angelo’s good friend, is murdered in the plot and the two become intwined and more goal oriented in unearthing the reason in a minor ploy of revenge.  Yet, the trick is on them after discovering a U.F.O. right in their mountainous backyard and the hunt for their lives is on by a former Nazi and antiquities collector Heinrich Holzmann (George Kennedy, “Naked Gun”), a whole slew of clandestine organization spooks, and Rodrigo Obregón (“Savage Beach”) doing his best Arnold Schwarzenegger “Terminator” act as a large cybernetic man with a stoic and half-exposed face.  “Top Line” supporting cast includes William Berger (“Devil Fish”), Sherly Hernandez, Larry Dolgin (“Caligula:  The Untold Story”), Steven Luotto, Robert Redcross, and Mary Stavin (“House”) as Ted Angelo’s ex-blonde beauty editor girlfriend.

“Top Line” has one of those cinematic stories that’s all over the place pieced together by western inspiration like some sort of genre stitched together Frankenstein’s monster.  Unlike the flat top and bolt-necked creature born of electrical current and held together by suture and mad scientist sorcery, “Top Line” doesn’t have any hideous scars or an unfavorable attitude deterrent but what the Nello Rossati film does feature similarly are the monstrous best parts, such as unpredictability, a pendulum of excitements, and an everyone has grabbed their pitchforks and is out to get you sentiment.  “Top Line” is a wild, exciting, volatile ride set in the heart of a landscape and culturally showcased Cartagena and the ever game, Italian actor Franco Nero at the helm steering what at first appears to be an adventurous escapade of treasuring hunting and covert coverups in act one and two suddenly careens into an assault of astro-terrestrials forces to the tune of the fourth Indiana Jones film, “The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, by crescendoing third act.  “Top Line” is just as theatrically thrilling without the whipcrackin’, fedora-wearing, family friendly archaeologist with multiple blood squib shootouts, a superb tongue-and-cheek car chase down winding mountainside road, and the hydraulics-driven special effects transfiguration your eyes need to see to below.

Cauldron Films proudly presents “Top Line” onto Blu-ray for the first time, the resulting 2K transfer sourced from the camera negative. The AVC encoded, 1080p high-definition, BD25 decodes a clean, color stable picture that feels organic around the diffused color scheme, and that palette pops without being artificially enhanced. Grain appears in check, natural, and consistent throughout. Presented in the original aspect ratio, a widescreen European ratio 1.66:1, does capture the grandiose of a 17th century exploration ship inside the cavernous mountain without a squeeze of the frame, providing more depth with the help of the art direction to visualize and construct an actual set. Textures, fibers, and other tactile s are limited around the jungle setting that does offer a nice leafy and lush setting that depicts a thicket of a developing country without just being a smear of the same color arrangement but outside of that, what does source de facto is sumptuous textural material. Two audio options are available to choose from with an English DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 mono and an Italian DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 mono. The Italian is done in post with ADR and has that nagging space between action and voice while the English track goes through less dubbing, or more exact dubbing, with Franco Nero, and other cast, having their voice heard in scene and in synch. The only issue concerning comes with George Kennedy’s dialogue which is dubbed to be more archetypical German of the Nazi-era; however, this route was not heavily travelled with very few lines being delivered by Kennedy, or rather Kennedy’s voiceover actor. Ambience travels amply and disseminates well for a single signal to travel through a stereo output and this jumps the eclectic range of action from the speakers to your ears. Granted, the action is very selective as you don’t every nuisance of jungle skirmishes and the other village landscapes, but there is enough and what’s not covered is often overlayed with Maurizio Dami’s tribal, tropical paradisio percussion and parallel synth with echoing vocal snips, such as whistling, and peppered with scene bytes – the chase sequence where the first batch of armed men running down Ted Angelo is audio composition gold. Special features on Cauldron’s standard Blu-ray contain an exclusive, new interview with lead man Franco Nero Black Top!, an interview with Eugenio Ercolani The Strange Case of Ted Archer, parapolitic researcher Robert Skvarla takes at examples of known alien sightings and speculations in Alien Terminated: The Alien Theories, an audio commentary by film historian Eric Zaldivar that includes interviews from Deborah Moore and Robert Redcross, and with additional insight on Italian cult films from actors Brett Halsey and Richard Harrison. The clear Amaray Blu-ray houses reversible cover art, both representing original artwork from the film’s release. The primary art is more adventurously exciting with Angelo’s arm wrapped around Moore and a rope, reminiscent of “Romancing the Stone,” while the interior cover plays to the science fiction side of the story, more “Terminator-y” to be exact. There are no inserts or other tangible items included. The 92-minute feature is presented unrated with a hard encoded region A playback.

Last Rites: “Top Line” is a top tier title with a little bit of everything for everybody that’s accentuated by a on-the-run Franco Nero performance with a new, gorgeous 2K transfer Blu-ray packed with special features from our friends at Cauldron Films.

When Everyone’s Out To Get You, You Get “Top Line” on Blu-ray!

Young Girl Gets Her Insides Shattered by a Large, Evil….Dildo?

Posted by Steven Lewis on


Inspector Gianni Di Salvo is called in to investigate the discovery of a wrapped in plastic nude body of a young girl, located and waterlogged at the base of a dam. Her death was ruled a homicide after the coroner discovers her insides ripped apart from the blunt trauma of an extremely large dildo. The case leads the detective to an all-girl private school that aims to keep it’s pristine reputation, but with many suspects at hand, Inspector Di Salvo has no choice but to play the wildcard in tracking down a killer and breaking all the rules handed down to him by his superior, Chief Inspector Louis Roccaglio. The deeper he digs into the case, his long list of suspects shortens when they turn up murdered themselves, but the inspector’s key to solving this case lies with the young girl’s inseparable friends, Franca, Paola, and Virginia, whom frantically try to keep their secret under a tight lip.

“Someone with a cock this big raped Angela Russo and threw her in the river!” Trust me, thats not a line from a porn, but spoken by popular lead actor Fabio Tetsi is the ultimate hook. The long, hard, veiny lure that sucks you deep into this 1978 giallo known as “Enigma Rosso,” the first feature film by television director Alberto Negrin. Also known as “Red Rings of Fear” or just simply “Rings of Fear,” a plethora of screenwriters penned the uber-sleazy murder mystery, including Marcello Coscia (“The Living Dead at Manchester Morgue”), Massimo Dallamano (“What Have They Done to Your Daughters?”), Franco Ferrini (“Demons 2”), Peter Berling, Stefano Ubezio, and, the director as well, Alberto Negrin. “Enigma Rosso” completes the “school girl in peril” trilogy, following director Massimo Dallamano’s two films, “What Have You Done to Solange?” and “What Have They Done to Your Daughters?”, that don’t connect via a storyline but the reigns were unfortunately handed to Negrin to finish the task after tragedy struck Dallamano that rendered him deceased before production.

Lucio Fulci’s “Contraband” star Fabio Tetsi sizes up as the determined Inspector Gianni Di Salvo with a penchant for his kleptomaniac girlfriend. Tetsi’s a handsome, rugged actor with a defined jawline, dark and thick features, and a dimpled chin when he’s not sporting a beard or a goatee, such as in “Enigma Rosso.” Di Salvo goes from suspect-to-suspect with his equally eager assistant Bruno Allessandra. The two cops report to the off hands Chief Inspector played by a very worldly Ivan Desny and Desny’s casual style is polar opposite of the act first, look later of Tetsi. The officers go through a slew of suspects, including one played by American actor Jack Taylor (“Pieces”) as a very wealthy and scandalous shop owner who likes young women and three lovelies, Silvia Aguilar, Taida Urruzola, and Carolin Ohrner as “The Inseparables” form a forbidden click of girls who know what has transpired but are too scared to say a word. Tony Isbert (“Tragic Ceremony”) also has a role of a German teacher whose too involved with one female student in particular. Rounding out the cast is Helga Liné, from the sexploitation “Madame Olga’s Pupils,” María Asquerino, and Christine Kaufman as the Inspector’s love interest with a insatiable habit for stealing, but that romance fizzles in a matter of two scenes that don’t quite build up the tension between them.

“Enigma Rosso” puts the school girl in obscene peril, for sure. And, also, puts the school girl full frontal in various scenes ranging from desire to showers and in such scenes that exhibit the exploits of a large dildo being used during a sex party to pave the way for a crime, giving the film a perverseness air about it that glorifies the giallo that it embodies and embraces. Complete with the killer’s first person point of view, ominous gloved murderous hands, and the mysterious allure of an elaborate reason behind the murder, “Enigma Rosso” has everything a thirsty giallo drinker would gulp down. However, with the long list of writers, Negrin’s film partakes in a nonconformist pattern from intriguing and intricate mystery to wild hair hunches and scattered brain antics that jive about as a well as grape jam on a hot dog. the finale also wraps up too easily that Inspect Di Salvo doesn’t even break a sweat figuring out the whodunit aspect and more goes in line with a talking head scene that’s an exposition of events rendering a lackluster finale. However, the ending does wrap up the story nicely, leaving no unanswered or unsolved enigmas about the crime.

Scorpion Releasing and Doppelgänger Releasing present “Enigma Rosso,” also known as “Trauma” or “Virgin Terror,” onto a not rated 1080p High-Definition Blu-ray in a widescreen 2.35:1 aspect ratio. From brand new scans of the original negatives with extensive color correction, noted as done in The States, this is, and will ever be, the best version of the Negrin’s giallo. For instance, the coloring vastly outscores any other version with natural skin tones and in the brilliancy of conventional giallo color palettes. Some issue still surface to rear the unfortunate blemishes from the original negatives, such as vertical (blue) scratches that poison a couple of scenes. Also, there’s also a color correctness issue far right of the screen through the entire 85 minute duration, showing an fault in the scan with the unintentional exhibition of the untouched negative. Two audio versions exist on the static menu: an Italian language with English Subtitles and an English dubbed. The mono track has no real serious issues other than a slight static during more high frequency effects. “Don’t Torture a Duckling’s” Riz Ortolani furnished score has a robust quality that highlights the upbeat swanky tones of a 1970’s Italian crime film. Only an audio commentary with historian and author of the Mondo Digital website Nathaniel Thompson. Sizzlingly laced with casual nudity, glued together by elaborate criminal coverup, “Enigma Rosso” is one of Alberto Negrin’s most memorable shiplapped pieces of work in the most polished impressions of the original negative.

Evil Thoughts: Out with the Old, In with the New?

Posted by Steven Lewis on

MOH

Masters of horror. You know. Those legendary filmmakers that become iconic in our beloved genre. The monumental men who made history by evolving the monsters, killers, and madmen to the very monsters, killers, and madmen we see today on the big and small screen. These giants of horror are household names to ordinary film fans and Gods to those who dedicate their lives just to live in a moment in a very small portion of their foot heel shadow. You, reading this op-ed, know the very names of these directors without even me mentioning their names. For those who are virgin to horror, however,…

George A. Romero
John Carpenter
Wes Craven
Stuart Gordon
Tobe Hooper
Joe Dante
Clive Barker

The list could go on with more familiar names. Familiar. That seems like a term for old people now, like myself, the thirty-years of living on this planet. Why is ‘familiar’ now for the old fogies? For one, I don’t think much of the younger generation are aware, or even respect, the above list of names. And why should they? Because, secondly, those listed about have done squat in, I don’t know, how many years? Think about. The Masters of Horror are no longer producing any great horror films and there seems to be no clear cut answer to why. A couple of theories swirl in my clustered little mind.

Theory one
They’re old. Getting elderly is tough and when you’re youth runs dry, you’re energy goes right along with it. Take Romero for example. The man is 74 years old. Wes Craven is even older than Romero by one year. Could their old school imaginations keep a generation, doped up on ADD medication, entertained for more than 10 minutes. Much of today’s horror is about the blood and the tits and the “how scary you can make a CGI monster.” Creativity has gone out the window and I think that “Saw 7” and the soon to be fifth sequel to “Paranormal Activity” have proven just that.

Rhauer

Theory two
Old school horror has run out of ideas. Can you remember the last time Romero, Carpenter, Stuart has made a good movie? Romero’s last film was “Survival of the Dead” back in 2009 which flopped. Before that “Diary of the dead” and that was another flop. Since the turn of the century, the king of the zombies has only directed four films with Land of the Dead being the more successful. Take a look at “Halloween” director John Carpenter. “Halloween” is the highest grossing independent film ever, yet also in the last decade, nothing spectacular from Carpenter. His vision of “The Thing” is classic, his character Snake Plissken is iconic in “Escape from New York”, “Big Trouble in Little China” is timeless cut, but “The Ward” and “Ghost of Mars” have been absolute below the bar with audiences. This theory doesn’t exclude international directors because we can also examine, point in case, Italian director Dario Argento. Argento famous for his colorful, psychedelic intense films such as “Suspiria”, “Phenomena”, and “Don’t Torture the Duckling”, has been reduced to direct a “Dracula 3D” movie starring Rutger Hauer. Freaking RUTGER HAUER!?!? Don’t get me wrong, I love Rutger Hauer – “Blind Fury” and “The Hitcher” are some favorites – but you can’t have a strawberry haired Van Helsing. Maybe you can – I don’t know. Let’s not forget poor Wes Craven who can’t seem to get off the “Scream” franchise train and everything else he touches turns into a limp, floppy mess.

Now that we’ve gone over my theories, there lies another question to be discussed. Who are the NEW masters of horror? Today’s films rely on blood and guts and not so much suspense and story. Would Eli Roth be my first example of a more current master? His films seemed to be well criticized – “Cabin Fever” with a fresh 63% and “Hostel” with a fresh 61% respectively on Rotten tomatoes. Also, his latest project “The Green Inferno” held promise until it’s untimely indefinite on hold status declared a few weeks ago. Who else? Alexandre Aja? More shock than schlock but hasn’t really produced anything original as he’s banked on remakes – “The Hills Have Eyes”, “Piranha 2” – but with his breakthrough hit “High Tension” and his upcoming release “Horns” starring Daniel Radcliffe, we could be watching a master in the making.
dradcliffe
I want to hear from you. Who do you think will step in the shoes of a master? Lucky McKee? Adam Wingard? Let me hear your choices and your thoughts on these!