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An Indie Anthology Worth an EVIL Look! “Creatures of the Night” reviewed! (Wild Eye Releasing / DVD)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Wild Eye Releasing’s “Creatures of the Night” Now Available on DVD!

A hitman is summoned to arrive an old manor home and offered to be paid to babysit an elderly wheelchair bound man.  The disabled, eccentric loner only gives the hitman one task, to keep him alive until 3 A.M.  The task is easier said than done as the client has the gift for gab that pulls ever so roughly on the strings of the hitman’s already agitated patience, threatening the man with harm from his double barrel shotgun if his playfully doting name calling and persistent chit chat continues through into the night.  In order to pass the time, the old man pulls out of a scrapbook filled with news clippings of mysterious deaths around the surrounding area, regaling a presumptive truth around the circumstances of the victim’s demise:  a Halloween party guest finds himself in the clutches of an aristocratic, demonic cult, a man collects fresh dead bodies to host at his apartment as part of an exclusive club, a work retreat turned into a frightening alien abduction, and bingo night results in a monstrous transformation of screams and blood.

Wild Eye Releasing has a hallmark of putting forth at the same time a string of films helmed by the same director.  We also see this theme in their subsidiary boutique label Visual Vengeance that specializes in underground, SOV films deserving a second, or third, chance by giving them a Hi-Def release.  British director John Williams is one of those repeated filmmakers.  We’ve recently reviewed and approved positively the dead mother and occult tensioner “Watch Me Sleep” from 2023 and now we’re overtop the microscope again looking at another Williams’ production, a horror anthology from a year earlier, entitled “Creatures of the Night.”  Originally and more commonly known as “Tales of the Creeping Death,” the 2022 anthology too tackles the occult but also branches out to divergent purposes of the dead, extraterrestrial interests, and werewolves with mother issues.  Williams wrote the screenplay for the crowdfunded Kickstarter indie with Williams co-producing with Clair Ward (“There’s Something in the Shadows,” “Watch Me Sleep”).

The unnamed wraparound begins with Michael Socha (“As Dead As It Gets”) as a fast car-driving, black cloth-cladded hitman hired to oversee the inexplicable life-or-death of the invalid but chatty Harold, played by television actor Andrew Readman in an over-the-top showcase of uncomfortable friendliness.  With no board games or show of kinetic entertainment afoot, Harold goes into his stories stemmed from the newspaper clippings of unsolved deaths that bring us to four individual tales to pass the time between the two men.  Halloween night proves to be a dud when Billy and his friends can’t find a good, alcoholic party to attend.  Dressed in zombie attire, Billy Cook (“Eat Locals”) is the centric principal amongst on-screen friends Sophie (Solaya Rowley) and Jon (John Solomonides, “There’s Something in the Shadows”) who make him aware of a private invitation to an exclusive party where they meet the formally dressed elders, known as the Gentlemen and named only by their individual numbers, with sinister plans surrounding demons and an unborn twin brother.  The second segment is less serious with a seemingly unstable man collecting bodies of the recently deceased to stage his own exclusive friends club.  Kev, played by the distinct face of Dean Ackerman (“Crispy’s Curse”), caters a performance around being the entertainment host at an old folks home but doesn’t quite seem to fit the loser loner narrative with having friends that are living and dead but Ackerman’s ported derangement is cheeky fun it the playful yet ghastly tale.  Rebecca Parsons is one of a trio of actors whose characters are travelling to a work-related team building retreat but along the way they stop to check out a touristy cave exhibit when the outside world essentially changes as people have disappeared, nothing mechanical works, and the blue glow of alien visitors reveals the terrible truth of an otherworldly abduction.  There’s not much to note performance wise here as the workplace banter, within the confines of the car, quickly evolves into mysterious situations and visuals that leave the group into a dumbfounded and confused what-happened-here state.  The last segment is more visceral in its violence as Steve Wood (“Watch Me Sleep”) plays a disabled son grieving the death of his viciously attacked mother in the woods with her boyfriend but also practices as the new bingo hall host in lieu of his mother demise.  His debut is cut short when a monstrous lycanthrope continues the bloody rampage that began with his mother.  Like his performance in “Watch Me Sleep,” Wood’s range of emotions and precise, performative acting nails his character Peter to the narrative board, fastening a great finale segment to “Creatures of the Nights’” favorable anthology format.  The cast rounds out with Ricky Tomlinson, Darren McAree, James Whitehurst, Wesley Martin, and George Newton.

Just from looking at the cover and reading the synopsis, without doing any research prior to viewing, “Creatures of the Night” doesn’t appear to be an anthology until you get the meat and bone of story where the wheelchair bound Harold opens his book to amuse with darkly grim tales and that’s the moment you know you’re in for a multi-short story fright with a diverse lot of horror.  What’s impressive about this Kickstarter production is its practice effects that produces a disintegrating body and werewolf destruction with detailed suit and deep lacerations.  Visual effects are limited to areas where they’re needed for a smaller production, such as the third story of an alien abduction that composites scenes together to create an unsettling environment.  While the effects are neat and not overbearing, each story is mostly driven by the story structure and acting to establish and flesh out idiosyncrasies in character and in scenarios, adding that something extra to the segments rather than rely heavily on the glitzy yet shallow terror and chase of horrifying situations without an ounce of personality.  On more a negative note, the stories do have a disjointed way about them with the stories, especially more so in stories 2 through 4 that limit exposition to heighten that mystery factor that puts that small morsel of fear in our cerebral nodes.

Those who gravitate to anthologies should find their way to “Creatures of the Night,” a Wild Eye Releasing DVD now available.  The MPEG2 encoded, 720p standard definition, DVD5 is fashioned just as it’s spec’d in a fair reproduction of quality based on the storage capacity and compression codec.  Certainly not polished with a slick grading, there’s a bit of tired veneer on it but the cinematography and special effects more than makes up for the dull grading with a cozy lighting, natural lighting, a slick-and-sick werewolf design, and seamless practical effects.  Depth sates special range and plenty of contrast to set the mood and scene appropriately.  The English LPCM Stereo 2.0 shows no signs of qualms or problematic areas of concern with a clear and presently forth dialogue of the UK dialect.  Range and depth work fine and no issues in the balancing of layers.  Sound design is able to fill in the monstrous roars or the breaking down of biological matter within the context of the scene at the right distance from the camera, never seemingly distant or misplaced.  Bonus features include segment outtakes and the trailer along with other Wild Eye Releasing trailers.  The DVD cover presents an accurate representation of what’s inside which is surprising because usually Wild Eye embellishes the cover to make a more visceral or large-than-life draw toward the film but the “Creatures of the Night” receives an accurate account.  The reverse side of the cover art pulls a shocking scene into a still image.  The DVD houses in a clear Amaray, eco-lite case.  The film is not rated and the DVD is region free with a runtime of 100 minutes.

Last Rites: “Creatures of the Night” holds its own as an anthology, one that can get horror fans behind it, offering a variety of occult tales to surely be mortally hazardous!

Wild Eye Releasing’s “Creatures of the Night” Now Available on DVD!

The EVIL of the Land Before Time Is Awake and Hungry! “Saurians” reviewed! (Visual Vengeance / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

“Saurians” on Visual Vengeance Collector’s Edition!

A controlled construction site blast along the area of what is known as Fossil Valley, an idyllic area where bone relics of dinosaurs can be unearthed, inadvertently opens up a rock gas-oxygenated pocket that kept preserved two slumbering prehistoric dinosaurs – one herbivore and one carnivore.  Caught in the middle is a group of paleontology students on assignment to find, study, and record their discoveries.  Also caught in the middle are the unlucky ones the carnivore has for a long-awaited meal.  Informing their professor of their extraordinary findings of living, breathing, and full of teeth fossils, the students believe help is on the way but what confronts them is a black-market hunter hired by the professors for monetary gain for their primeval trophy heads.  The students are under the forced direction of a hunter to lead the way but the hunter’s arrogance leaves him ill-equipped to tackle larger-than-life creatures from another time. 

One of the earlier films of “Church of the Damned” and “Splatter Farm” indie-filmmaker Mark Polonia from 1994, “Saurians” is a stop-motion, puppet-staging, super 8-filmed creature feature with Jurassic-sized aspirations to be the “Jurassic Park” of the micro market.  Polonia not only directed but the Pennsylvania-born auteur also wrote the script, produced the film, edited the reel, and had a starring role that secured him his first dino-disaster picture and be a foundation to his prolific, latter career that doesn’t seem to be slowing down one bit.  “Saurians” is filmed local to Polonia in Wellsboro, Pennsylvania, an area he’s filmed many of his budget projects, and doubles as underlying theme on the naturalistic dangers and disasters of fracking and blasting as the hills of Wellsboro does contain man-made modernized vision of unearthing for profit margins, which greed is also ingrained into the narrative as well.  Along with Mark Polonia producing the film was his late, twin brother John and the siblings’ Polonia Brothers Entertainment” company was the studio on the film.

As noted, Mark Polonia stars as the nerdy fossilist student Alan who scours the low water level riverbeds for ancient animal relics in Fossil Valley with a pair of colleagues on assignment.  With him are the foretold love interest Lynette, played by Maria Davis (“How to Slay a Vampire”) who would become Polonia’s wife, and the more blitheful to the assignment Charlie, played by Matthew Satterly (“Church of the Damned”).  With a bowl cut, large, framed glasses, and a caterpillar mustache overtop his slender physique, Polonia’s appearance, along with his Lewis Skolnick button down collar shirt and church slacks, screams studious student of archeology compared to the others in more relaxed attire and trendy physical fads.   Their acts contrive adequate concern but still often feel stiff with hesitation, especially with large man-eating dinosaurs attending the all-you-can-eat human buffet.  The personality award goes to the fourth and final principal actor Todd Carpenter (“Bad Magic”) as the hired hunter to track down and kill the dinosaurs like African game, dressed ironically in a bright orange reflector and even more ironically wielding a gunslinger revolver to hunt carnivores, elephant-sized reptilians.  With a theatrical and condescending melodrama in his voice, Carpenter’s caricature villain bites off more than he can chew as his arrogance will get the best of him, or rather the Allosaur type dino.  When the two groups meet, there is no denying their distinction of roles and play into the tension of a prehistoric terror.  The remaining cast round out with victims of the primeval times come to clash with modern times; these roles are played by supporting cast members Dustin Davis, Chris Jones, Josh Nagy, Courtney Marie, Paula Nobles and Todd Rimatti.

Back in the early to mid-1990s, Dinosaurs landing in modern times, wreaking havoc amongst mankind, was all the rage with the height of success of “Jurassic Park,” many thanks toward director Steven Spielberg.  Even dinosploitaiton flicks that released before “Jurassic Park,” such as “Carnosaur” a few months earlier, saw post-release success because on how influential the Spielberg blockbuster was that gave extinct predators a new lease on life.  “Saurians” is no Hollywood mega blockbuster and is extremely lo-fi in all areas from special effects to A/V but there’s no difference of ambition between Spielberg and Mark Polonia who set out to make an adventurous thriller of prehistoric proportions to the extent and limits of their given budget.  The “Saurians” tale is about as routine of a dormant-now-awake monster movie as it comes without involving scientific and technical mumbo-jumbo to exposition a reason for the revival of dinosaurs but still follows core plot devices and themes that parallel bigger productions, such as the unearthing of said creatures, whether be a lifeform preserving pocket of rock gas or a fossilized mosquito in tree sap, and the subject of sin where greed comes into play with the hunter and the turncoat professor try to bank off dino hide by selling it on the black market. 

Visual Vengeance’s 2K scan of the original tape elements keeps the standard definition and early triacetate celluloid Imperfections.  Now, you may say to yourself, “Tape elements?  Didn’t you say Mark Polonia used Super 8 film?”  Yes, I certainly did, but since the film was edited on and for tape, Visual Vengeance scan is from the tape material, which was also approved by director Mark Polonia.  Presented in 1.33:1 full screen aspect ratio, there’s miniscule improvement onto Blu-ray to keep the a 8mm reproduction for the final product with a yellowish tint form emulsion fluid, plenty of cell light leaks, and a grainy textures that retains its naturality.  If you’re looking for quality excellence, don’t expect it here from this release or any Visual Vengeance release that tries to keep the original aesthetic and rightfully so or else loses it’s dated charm.  The English Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo is scanned from the second dubbing that was produced years after the release.  There’s obvious separation between visual and audio, but the overall clarity is clean and discernible with the dinosaur roars have a stock quality and recycle about it but retains a consistent volume range and condition. Depth doesn’t work with the ADR that keeps all the action near the forefront.    English subtitles are optionally available on the papier-mâché-like motion menu.  A bountiful of special features include a new commentary by Mark Polonia that’s moderated by the Visual Vengeance team, outtakes of the “Saurians” stop-motion effects, the super 8 raw footage, an Rae Don, never-before-seen alternate version of the film, Mark Polonia’s commentary track for the Rae Don version, a bonus Polonia film “The Dinosaur Chronicles” from 2004, a commentary track for the bonus film, the making-of “The Dinosaur Chronicles,” the “Saurians” Visual Vengeance trailer, the Visual Vengeance trailer for “The Dinosaur Chronicles,” the “Saurians 2” trailer, and other Visual Vengeance trailers for their at-home releases.  The Blu-ray release starts with an Andy Warhol inspired cover art with menacing dinosaur heads swallowing tailored-garbed human legs with an pop art orange background and blood splatter.  Inside the clear Amaray, the primary Blu-ray art has more Godzilla destructiveness with a cityscape under a fiery bedlam and two roaring T-Rexes wreaking havoc with the reverse side containing the original VHS art.  Tangible items inside are a mini-folded poster that’s Jurassic Park inspired, a single-page advert for “The Dinosaur Chronicles,” a dime bag with “Saurian’s Attack” mini-slip with 1 piece of the actual Super 8 mm cell, and the usual retro sticker sheet that comes with Visual Vengeance releases.  The 83-minute film is unrated and encoded to play for all regions. 

Last Rites: “Saurians” is no “Jurassic Park” but has the feral heart of the creature feature subgenre brought back from extinction for a new transfer and package of carnivorism.

“Saurians” on Visual Vengeance Collector’s Edition!

The Red Glow of EVIL Lurks Inside Your Closet of Trauma. “Midnight Monster” reviewed! (Wild Eye Releasing / DVD)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

“Midnight Monster” is On Sale at Amazon.com!

The police track down a serial kidnapper and murderer of women by relying on Veronica’s projection psychic abilities to keep tabs on the killer’s every move before he claims another victim.  When the rescue and apprehension of the killer went off without incident, saving a woman’s life as a direct result of Veronica’s supernatural ability, the exhaust Veronica returns to what’s consider her normal life but when she sleeps, dreams of a monstrous human figure with glowing red eyes haunts her dreams.  Basking in a hot red glow, the monster lives in her closet and comes out when she sleeps, manifesting terrible visions Veronica can’t tell if she’s awake or dreaming of the monster in her wardrobe space.  Every night the dreams become more intense and frightening and she senses losing control, it consumes her psychic powers and entrances her to confront her past with dire consequences that will change her life forever. 

“Midnight Monster,” also originally known as “Closet Monster” and labeled on other global releases, is the Dustin Ferguson written and directed, psychic-powers and burning-eyed, night terror from 2023.  Ferguson is no stranger to low-budget B-horror moviemaking have worn multiple hats in a budget that doesn’t allow for individual expertise.  Having over two decades worth of directorial credits, including the penny-pinched and scantily-cladded thrills and coherent productions of “Horror Movie Workout,” “Mondo Shock,” and more fittingly enough “Penny Pinchers:  The Kings of Low-Budget Horror,” a documentary about making a horror movie on pennies of the dollar, the multi-faceted filmmaker, who also goes by the alias Dark Infinity, utilizes his own independent film production company, SCS Entertainment, to finance and equip production costs by funneling working capital through non-studio and alternative- spurred means as Joseph Williamson (“Arachnado,” “Ebola Rex”) serve as producer and “Liza:  Warden from Hell’s” Kevin Age and Brad Banacka as executive producers, all three have worked previous together on numerous films throughout the years.

Opening up “Midnight Monster” is the dramatic scene of Veronica using her powers inside a police interrogation room to track down a soulless killer before he nixes the life of another victim tied up in the back of his car, setting up Veronica’s uncanny abilities to project into current time through a personal belonging, or more technically known as psychoscopy, and she apparently does it very well to help authorities capture their suspect.  This also sets up for the conjured misfortune of a closet monster haunting her sleep, representing or demonizing personal childhood trauma.  Alana Dro (“Zombie Rage,” “Death Bitch”) steps into psychic-shoes of the closet creature plagued Veronica with little effort put into the character’s complexity of navigating her powers and her dreams to try and understand them better.  Instead, Dro becomes more of a peepshow prop than a proper lead character trying to solve the evil enigma that skulks from out the closet.  Not all the character flaws can be contributed to Dro with Veronica being written half-hearted into a narrative that requires her to be inquisitive and resolute in curing what haunts her.  There are not many scenes shared between Dro and Robert Lankford (“Nemesis 5:  The New Model”), who portrays the closet monster as more a tip-spear figurehead for Veronica’s ship of trauma rather than an actual beast with unknown intentions, but Veronica and the monster have their individualized zoned moments that are shared and connected only through the power of editing to create a surreal space of subliminal supernaturality between them.  Other characters pop in and then pop out for non-reoccurring roles with the 80s-90s scream queen Brinke Stevens (“Slave Girls from Beyond Infinity,” “Nightmare Sisters”) being the most recognizable actress given primary credit.  Jonathan Nation, Ronnie Angel, Joycelyne Lew, Guillaume Rivaud, Richard During, Roger Trexler, Vida Ghaffari, and Breana Mitchell have their moment as the rest of the cast.

Ferguson’s “Midnight Monster” has interesting, dark undertones of childhood trauma expressed through the manifestation of a monster whose power of Veronica holds her entranced, as if the monster is familiar to her.  It can be understood that the monster represents someone who hurt her, abused her, or raped her as a child, someone close to her who’s authority and relationship has likely brainwashed her into trust, love, and affection.  While these themes are provocatively deep and powerful, Ferguson can’t quite pull in “Midnight Monster’s” narrative into a balanced state and cheapens it with wash, rinse, and repeat scenes of Alana Dro full naked in the shower in an extended shoot of her getting wet and soapy.  Not necessarily a bad thing to have an abundance of gratuitous nudity in a grindhouse picture, there’s typically only one shower scene per film and “Midnight Monster” has two with the same actress doing the exact same thing, a slow full-body soap up, for a good chunk of the already fleeting runtime.  The second shower scene forces the narrative to wander off course and Ferguson tries to wrangle it back in by the finale ties all the pieces together with a meaty twist ending I found blindsided by, in a good way, but it also can feel and seem arbitrary and disconnecting with the introduction of new characters suddenly thrust into the fold without warning in its concluding moments.   

A regular outlet for Dustin Ferguson’s films, Wild Eye Releasing continues to shower horror fans with more of filmmaker’s films onto DVD.  “Midnight Monster” receives a MPEG2 encoded DVD5 in true 720p standard definition.  The digital image is deconsecrated from its divinely detailed imagery due to poor, commercial equipment, and a lesser codec that’s not upscaled, creating more of a SOV aesthetic which I wholly believe to be the intent.  Presented in its original aspect ratio of 2.35:1 on the DVD, the compressed image does decent capturing of the peripheral objects but without an spherical lens, there’s limitations to the scene.  There are some gorgeously soft red lighting and glow to get the monster in the mood for scaring and for surrealism, but most of the film is considerably ungraded with not a lot of other pop to its palette.  There LPCM stereo presents a fine U.S. English dialogue that isn’t quite robust in the forefront but has clarity and no obstruction and the rest of the ambient and environment sound is most comprised of added action in post-production.  The entire encoding is a bit rough and ready, and again that’s likely purposeful in attempt to be a grindhouse picture.  Encoded special features include an interview with actress Alana Dro, an image gallery, and trailers for “Midnight Monster” as well as other Wild Eye Releasing titles.  There are also three fake grindhouse trailers at the beginning as 9-minutes’ worth of B-movie coming attractions with retro visual graphics and each film encased with a 8mm film filter to mimic vintage film stock and films. The clear DVD Amaray case has a neat and red color-infused, illustrated graphic art of the titular monster overlooking a sleeping woman with a reverse side containing a still of the monster.  The runtime listed is 60 minutes, but I had clocked the film in under 50 minutes, even with the faux trailers.  The region free DVD is not rated. 

Last Rites: “Midnight Monster” plays out like a fever dream of serial killers and daddy issues but there’s not enough Scotch tape to make this digital reel work effectively, leaving Ferguson to piece together slim pickings on what could have been a promising night terror.

“Midnight Monster” is On Sale at Amazon.com!

There’s Nothing More EVIL than a Brother’s Revenge. “Dead Man’s Shoes” reviewed! (Second Sight / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Richard, a former special forces soldier, returns to his hometown to exact revenge on a gang of townie drug dealers who teased and tormented his younger, simpleton brother Anthony.  Unawre of Richard’s return, the local drug runners find vandalization of their property and even of their person as they slept through the night, a playful jest of threats send pointing fingers at each other rather than an outsider looking in to destroy them.  When some drugs go missing and one of them recognizes Richard as Anthony’s brother, the recollection of what happened to Anthony sends them into an anxious state that Richard may want retribution for his little brother’s pain and suffering.  Pranks and thefts are only a prelude to the pain and suffering Richard seeks to unload onto them with plans of snuffing them out one-by-one but beating them at their own game of fooling around but with the intent to kill.  How far will Richard go before he succumbs to the level of those who fed into his wrath? 

“Dead Man’s Shoes” is a very meat and potatoes, independent revenge thriller from cowriter and director Shane Meadows that features the dangers of the bullying against those not able to withstand the mental capacity to absorb such unprovoked abuse and brutality as their unable to process and comprehend what that looks like. The story is also a relatable to the siblings having experienced a brother or sister at the receiving end of the abuse and wanting to do something extreme about it, and those who have done something extreme about it, with the retribution acts swallowing the soul. Paddy Considine debuts as cowriter on the UK production under the Warp Films, Big Arty Productions, and Film4 collaboration. Mark Herbert and Louise Meadows coproduce the film in the rolling hills and low agricultural landscape of Derbyshire that feature small English towns and skeletal abbeys.

Cowriter Paddy Considine stars as Richard, the former soldier and older brother deadest on avenging his brother’s honor.  Considine has that 1000-yard stare with a stoic, emotionless expression of a man who masks his hurt with murderous action that speaks louder than words.  Garbed in a long green, military fatigue-like coat, a short, boxed beard, and his military duffle, Considine set himself to take on rinky-dink drug operation of a smalltown in the English countryside.  Richard control leaves gang leader Sonny (Gary Stretch, “Mega Shark Vs Crocosaurus”) at a disadvantage by dropping in unexpectedly with erratic behavior and not hint a plan against his crew made up of mostly bumbling and bickering buffoons, played by Stuart Wolfenden (“The Eschartrilogy:  Book of the Dead”), Neil Bell (“Dune Part I and II”), Paul Sadot, Seamus O’Neill (“Attack of the Adult Babies”), Paul Hurstfield (“The Spell”), and George Newton (“Creatures of the Night”).  However, one of the men are not like the others, carrying a different vibe from the rest of the hyena-rowdy drug pushers that puts Richard in a predicamental position of with how rapidly h’s succumbed to violence to the likes of those he’s toying with and dispatching that makes him reflect and be more contemplative with his brother.  We don’t get much time with little brother Anthony (Toby Kebbell, “RocknRolla”) who mentally handicap and follows his brother around to point out who wronged him back when, being exploited for the amusement of Sonny and his men, but Anthony puts into question older brother Richard’s sanity and motivational drive that continues a downward spiral of apathetic derangement.  “Prevenge’s” Jo Hartley and “Butterfly Kiss’s” Emily Aston are the only two female actresses in the film but the story’s nearly completely male centric that leave Hartley and Aston’s characters in the dust of minor support rather than significantly operating in the narrative. 

For a revenge thriller, Shane Meadows doesn’t dress up the violence. There are no extravagant shootouts, prolonged chases, explosions, surviving by the skin of your teeth, or anything of that nail-biting, edge-sitting, hair-raising tension to raise the stakes and create the anxiety of a live or die moment.  Instead, “Dead Man Shoes” carries out like any premediated murder would with an unexpected calmness in handing down wrath with a touch of class.  The bells and whistles are saves for the cast to portray a raw sliver of life in crime and the shared blood between two brothers with nothing in common and on opposite ends of the spectrum. Anthony was a deep shame from within Richard and that shame converts to violence in an afterthought of atonement for his own feelings about his brother.  He must run through a slew of bad guys who abused him to see his own faults in their relationship. As Richard and Anthony walk through the countryside on their way to town, there’s hardly a word or two between them but their proximity to each other is relaxed, comfortable, and without sibling difficulty that initially will have audiences believe a strong bond but the twist ending sheds a different, more problematic connection of poignant regret and disgrace that puts a good soldier on a downward path.  While the rest of the cast, mostly the gang, are petty shallows of people with no depth of character, only one other character rivals Richard’s complexity and it’s the one who’s left standing after Richard’s steamrolling, yet quiet as a church mouse, dysfunctional onslaught. 

“Dead Man’s Shoes” receive new life with a Second Sight Films Blu-ray release.”  Second Sight’s Blu-ray is AVC encoded with high-definition, 1080p resolution onto a dual-layer BD50.  Shot on Super 16mm film and then blown up to 35mm for theatrical exhibition prints, Meadows’ film doesn’t look like a Super 16mm shot production with the appears of more a 35mm detail.  The natural grading doesn’t add any pizazz but that was not Meadow’s goal with heavily stylization.  Details are still touch and go, mostly leaning toward the lesser defined aspects of texture as some aspects of the Midlands are lost in the background and in the rolling foliage Richard treks, but delineation and contour check out okay.  No blatant or obvious issues of compression pains.  Second Sight presents the film in a widescreen 1.78:1 aspect ratio.  The UK English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 is more firepower than it needs but definitely is a solid sound design that levels the three major aspects:  dialogue, soundtrack, and ambience.  Dialogue is clean, clear, and prominent while the environment and action subside to fit with exact dynamics to scene.  The various indie-folk soundtrack wanders with Richard and Anthony across the land, also providing a prologue and epilogue bookend of resonation that connects with the tale tattering themes of loss of one’s physical and mental self.  There are English subtitles available for selection.  Second Sight provides plenty of special features with a raw, bare, indie production with a new audio commentary by director Shane Meadows and producer Mark Herbert, a second audio commentary by Andrew Graves and Jon Towlson, and a third audio commentary with director Meadows, lead actor Paddy Considine, and producer Herbert.  Also included is a new interview with Meadows and Herbert Quite a Journey, a new interview with actor Toby Kebbell A Very Fine Line, a new interview with Gary Stretch The Right Horse, an interview with director of photography Danny Cohen Made an Impact, deleted scenes, extended scenes, the short film “In Shane’s Shoes,” the short film “Northern Soul,” and the music video from Danger Mouse and Jemini.  The release comes in a smokey gray Amaray Blu-ray case with an uncredited new artwork on the single sided sleeve.  There are no other tangible features included.  The UK certified 18 film contains strong language, strong revenge violence, and hard drug use.  The region B encoded Blu-ray has a 90-minute runtime shelf life. 

Last Rites: “Dead Man’s Shoes” is quaint, hyper-local, and simply vengeance. The Second Sight Films Blu-ray is a great celebration of Shane Meadow’s tiny but tenacious thriller.

It’s in Human Nature to be EVIL! “Cradle of Fear” reviewed! (Unearthed Films / 2-Disc Limited Edition Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

“Cradle of Fear” Available on a 2-Disc Unearthed Films Release!

Occultist and hypnotician Kemper has been locked away in a criminal asylum for years for a gruesome series of murders, involving not only men and women but also some children.  Kemper seethes against the arresting and prosecuting team who = put him away.  Able to sneak out a list of targets and their addresses, Kemper uses his black magic lineage to carry out revenge on his behalf, a violent revenge on the loved ones of who incarcerated him to a life in imprisonment.  Four gruesome assassins through Kemper’s supernatural means leaves a body trail for eccentric Inspector Neilson whose unusual investigative methods has him highly sensitive to the case and his temper has him in the crosshairs of his commanding supervisor.  With no leads on how Kemper is committing a new string of gruesome crimes, Neilson pieces together that all the victims are related to the case that put Kemper away and when his son becomes the last target, Neilson goes to extreme lengths to see the serial killer is put down for good. 

A gory and cynical narrative of indelicate irony, “Cradle of Fear” is the British, anthological horror that speaks to the insidiously widespread evil that courses through the inevitable fallible and immoral side of human nature, leaving no good deed unpunished in its circumference of supernatural punitive karma.  The early 2000s anthology is written and directed by Alex Chandon, director behind the 1980s sex comedies “The Perv Parlor” and “Pervirella” as well as directing select music videos for the UK extreme black metal band Cradle of Filth, whose Goth-cladded lead signer Dani Filth stars in the film and is the poster boy for film art, hence the title’s similarity to the band’s name.  Eddie Kane, Ciska Faulkner, and Nico Rilla produced the film with Paul Luke and Andy Skivington serving as executive producers for the Pragmatic Pictures production. 

Aforementioned, Dani Filth stars as the ghoul with the ultimate evil of transforming his human form into a demonic creature that can rip to shreds those unlucky to be in his path, the opening gives us a glimpse into his power by viciously terminating two would-be, back-alley muggers.   From there, the story goes into the gruesome crime scene of two young women (Emily Bouffante, “Evil Aliens,” and Melissa Forti) laid strewn with their innards outwards and inspector Neilson (Edmund Dehn, “The Containment”) copping a feel as his way of rain-manning the scene.  Their end first storyline begins the moment the two goth club women were fated for untimely demise when they spotted Filth’s more-goth-then-they-are The Man.  Eventually, Inspector Neilson figures out the victims are connected by their last names and those related to trial participants with the next tales of sharing ill-fated death in the ghastliest and most gruesome ways, anthological style.  Another two women (Rebecca Eden, “Pervirella,” and Emma Rice) try to nick an old-timer of his bed stashed savings but find there is no honor between the combination of friends and thieves, an amputee (Louie Brownsell) murders an acquaintance to use his leg for longshot transplant only to have his leg reject in the most horrifying way, and a officer man (Stuart Laing, “Lie Still”) risks everything in life to get his rocks off gawking at online snuff films only to find himself in one!  There’s also the wrap around story that peppers transition scenes in between to bridge gaps and bring the short stories together into one long feature.  Kemper is the story’s chief antagonist but isn’t the only bad guy in the narrative but is our resemblance of a hero Inspector Neilson’s force to stop as the inspector doesn’t really just how purely symbolizing the embodied of pure evil Kemper really is perhaps even the Devil himself, as the orchestrator is the marionette pulling the strings that leaves Neilson chasing his tale.  Performances all around are gritty, apathetic, cynical, and mean that leaves no ounce of hope or feel-good intentions.

The early short films are not set up with Kemper as the man behind the curtain and this can put some confusion into the mix with seemingly rough transitions from one story to the next.  Plus, the non-linear first film isn’t mirrored into the other three, leaving the first third of the movie wandering, or grasping, to cling to something whole.  By the end of the second short, “Cradle of Fear” levels and becomes clear that an anthology is playing out with each tale containing a formula narrative:  a setup, the rising action or transgression, a brief, jovial high, and then it all comes crashing with gory horror.  The gore is a blend between practical and composite VFX that gets away with a range of simple stab wounds to more complicated head popping deaths while the visual effects has obvious green screen incongruity but dishes some devilish effects from deformed spider-like legs sprawled out from a half-severed head to some shoddy-level effects like a European car flying through and crashing through traffic.  What’s ingrained in the gore and horror is the sex, an element that’s immensely weighed in “Cradle of Fear’s” content that showcases scenes of sensual romance, to gratuitous nudity, to tasteful moments but keep the skin touched upon at least once in every episode.  “Cradle of Fear’s” circulated theme speaks toward the persistence and ever-present evil that’s within us all and from within it can’t be contained as human nature is ultimately fallible and every soul can be conditioned to expel the verhy worst in us all. 

Unearthed Films “Credle of Fear” arrives onto Blu-ray home video with a new 2-Disc, limited-edition collector’s set release encoded with AVC onto a BD25 and presented in an European widescreen of 1.66:1 aspect ratio with 1080p, high-definition resolution.  The 2-Disc set has for a long time seemingly vanished out of Unearthed Films’ newly released lineup, aside from the dual-format releases but it’s nice to see a comeback that’s more special features driven rather than playback format.  The dark grading leads to plenty of finer detail loss but the film has clear delineation and when it is key lit, textures flourish.  With a color scheme of mostly darker shades, keeping in line with its bleak noir tone and the gothic model, this early 2000’s horror fashions a polished veneer as one of the earlier pioneers of digital capturing.  The CGI is not at its finest being that it’s early early 2000’s VFX tech and on a budget too nonetheless and you can the shift in reality whenever the effect is composited into a scene.  Depth is mostly retained for closeups and medium closeup shots as Chandon’s does stylize quite a bit with fade in and outs, negative images, lighting, slow-motion, and various edits to make a swirl of designer continuity.  The British English audio is encoded with an uncompressed PCM 2.0 stereo.  Strong dialogue track doesn’t clash with the imposed, arterial soundtrack comprised of industrial goth and rock bands including Cradle of Filth, for obvious reasons, and The Dark Poets, Jezebel, Slacker, Lungworm, Intense, Quicksilver, and Crotchet.  Often, the ambience and Foley has chaotic aversion to one another that disrupt the audiological flow of the film, except for a few excellently crafted scenes such as Mel’s walk Emily Bouffante’s walk through the downtown area and see demon faces is harmonized very well.  The Foley can be slapstick at times with hits to the body being overexaggerated with cartoonish tones.  English subtitles are available on the feature disc. Disc one contains some ride-along aspecial features, including a brief making-of, a second behind-the-scenes Important Words that has direct Alex Chandon and cast members rambling about other topics rather than being topically relevant to the film, the German DVD making-of the feature, a behind-the-scenes gallery, and three original trailers for the film.  Disc two is mainlhy comprised off Alex Chandon’s short films – “Chainsaw Scumfuck,” “Bad Manor,” “Bad Karma,” “Drillbit,” “Night Pastor,” “Bullshit News,” and “Borderline.”  Also included is a promo for Film Extremes 3, outtakes for the shorts, a behind-the-scenes gallery for the shorts, and their trailers.  Packaging includes a traditional Blu-ray Amaray with new composition cover art on a one-sided sleeve.  The limited-edition O-ring slipcover contains the same primary image.  The discs are held in place on the inner layer of the Ameray with snaplocks and pressed with controversial and provocative imagery including a bloodied baby head and an illustrated eviscerated naked woman.  The region A locked film has a runtime of 120 minutes and is unrated. 

Last Rites: “Cradle of Fear” rocks the anthological horror subgenre not to sleep but to give rise to the killer instinct from within and to show the self-inflicted suffering from the innate debasement in the dark recesses of our soul.

“Cradle of Fear” Available on a 2-Disc Unearthed Films Release!