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EVIL is a Game Invented by Child and Ran by Clones! “Terminus” reviewed! (Blu-ray / MVDVisual Rewind Collection)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

“Terminus” is a Win for the Rewind Collection! Buy it Here!

Super genius boy Mati programs an artificial intelligence RV known as Monster to trek through adversarial armed forces infested territory in a long-haul driving competition to reach Terminus where the winner will receive their weight in gold.  The Doctor, a mad cloning scientist who created the child, aims to subvert the government with Mati’s and the rest of his “unborn” clones under the malicious intentions of his superior named Sir.  When the lone driver Gus, an American woman competing in the game, is imprisoned and subsequently murdered by a ruthless Major after Monster unusual malfunction, Gus is able to pass along the Monster’s accessibility password to her inmate and lover Stump, a compassionate, for-the-people rebel against the military cruelty.  For his love for Gus and to do what’s right, Stump reluctantly joins Monster and a slaved orphan girl to finish the game while the boy genius Mati observes innocently from Terminus, but Doctor and Sir have other plans to use their clones and Monster to subvert government control.  

As you can tell from the synopsis alone, the French-German coproduced, science fiction dystopian actioner “Terminus” makes about as much sense as jumping out of an airplane without a parachute – an exhilarating ride without any understanding from a safety cushion.  Director Pierre-William Glenn, who was born at the height of Nazi-occupied France in 1943, helms the dystopian, futuristic picture from a script cowritten between Alain Gillot, Glenn and Patrice Duvic’s modifications, and Wallace Potts addition of English dialogue.  Glenn, whose main profession is a cinematographer, with a prior 1987 select filmography including “Death Watch,” “The Murdered Young Girl,” and “Wheel of Ashes,” removes his eye from the camera viewfinder to being incorporated into all aspects of the production for one of his first feature length films.  Anne François produces the film that was shot much in the landscapes and studios of Bavaria and Hungary under the European coalition of production companies of Initial Groupe, Les Films du Cheval de Fer, Films A2, CBL Films, and Cat Productions.

The script calls for and delivers color characters in a science fictional scope of subversive intentions, mad science, lone wolves, flawed good guys, mysterious pasts, unjustified brutality, and other varietal traits that run the gamut in this wild and untamed neo-revenge and sense of duty narrative.  For Pierre-William Glenn, he likes to color outside the lines, shading layers with precise measure to flesh out their nature, such as with Stump, a bleeding heart, anti-violence, maverick unwilling to see the impoverished and innocent violated by authoritative rule, played by French rock-n-roll singer and actor Johnny Hallyday.  Stump’s story stretches from how he lost his hand to his reasoning for joining the fight for Terminus unlike his companion Gus embodied by a notable American actress, “Indiana Jones and the Lost Ark’s” Karen Allen.  Gus’s is specifically pointed out as American, perhaps only in the U.S. cut, but her background or reason why she plays the game is ultimately lost or never provided in the cryptic conversations she has with stump during their incarceration intimacies.  We don’t even know why Gus is finitely taken out of the game by the callous Major (Dominique Valera) by either the eluding to the Major’s men gang-raping her or just severing her legs.  Again, very cryptic.  Allen co-headlines with the then up-and-coming “Das Boot” breakout star and Berlin, Germany born Jürgen Prochnow donning three roles, beginning with the head villain and red kimono-cladded Sir and his two clowns, the boy-genius creating “Doctor” and his more brutish field task rabbit Little Brother.  “Robocop 2’s” Gabriel Damon plays whiz kid Mati, designer of the game and of Monster whose being manipulated by Sir as a guinea pig for a super army of super smart clones like himself.  Julie Glenn, daughter of director Pierre-William Glen, brings up the rear as slave girl Princess.  While Julie is no princess Leia joining the rebellion, the young actress is kept mostly quiet without much dialogue to give the gradually important character silent with only a couple of defining narrative moments that save the day.  

“Terminus” has the componential makings of a surreal science fiction fantasy with a “Mad Max” tarpaulin overtop a “Flight of the Navigator” dominant core involving an A.I. Monster truck as a sanctioned, and calculating, entity guiding a path through the onslaught of roll caged government vehicles that drive about as good as Stormtroopers shoot.  Clones are at the precipice of usurpation and the international game of drive hard and fast becomes a ploy for the genetic deception, but Glenn can never really harness that energy at the heart of “Terminus’s” well-built special effects, fascinating characters, set locations and production designs that evoke a failed, if not futile, future.  The oppression angle loosely holds the yoke while Sir and his clones barely scratch the surface of being the true villains lurking in the shadows.  Instead, much of “Terminus” is contained around Stump and Monster’s fostering trust and solidifying the key connection between Mati and Princess and what they mean to a semisoft society.  “Terminus” is terribly lighthearted despite the story’s ugliness which is fleeting at best and audiences will not be confident in what they’re watching that have been intended for general audiences or restricted to an age limit as it all depends on which version, either U.S. or European, is viewed. 

Landing as the 66th release on the MVD Rewind Collection sublabel, “Terminus” provides two varying versions on a new Blu-ray release.  The AVC encoded, 1080p high-definition, BD50 is a collaborative release between MVDVisual and Multicom with a spectacular visual palette from a 2K scan of the original 35mm negative.  There are two cuts of the film both presented in different aspect ratios based on country.  The European Director’s Cut exhibits in the Eurpeaon 1.661 and incorporates back into the story all the edited violence and expands upon scenes with more context and accents by a whole 32 minutes, clocking in a total runtime of 115 minutes, comparatively to the U.S. version’s severely cut 83 minutes and is scene re-edited sequences.  The European Director’s Cut is slightly more compressed horizontally whereas for US audiences is more vertically but there’s no overall image loss other than the cuts themselves.  Grain appears and appeases healthily with little-to-no damage on a softer, lower contrast that brightens details but retains good textural value, especially around facial and skin features with equally organic tones.  Both cuts come with a LPCM 2.0 Stereo mix; however, the Euroean Director’s Cut is strictly French with optional English subtitles while the US Version is English with optional English subtitles.  Fun fact:  Both cuts are of the same film but two different shoots as because due to financial obligations and marketing, production had to principal shoot the same scenes in two different languages and thus is why if it looks like Karen Allen’s mouth appears to be saying the French words, she is actually speaking French.  However, both dialogues are a product of ADR so there’s some dyssynchronous between image and dialogue.  Even Monster’s voice is changed radically between the two films with a more computerized squeaky female (or child) voice in the Euro-cut and a hip-hop and slang crafted male voice that’s less robotic.  Both features handle the Stereo about as well as any front-loaded sound output could but a little more power in this track could go a long way with the explosions, crashes, and visual effect audio bytes being less emphasized and underfoot of the dialogue differences.  Encoded special features include a new video interview with Jürgen Prochnow on the film and growing up in the German/US industries, a new We All Descent – The Making-of Terminus featurette that sees interviews with Pierre-William Glenn’s now adult children Vincent Glenn and Julie Glenn, the latter had the role of Princess in the story, and archival, French dialogued, English-subtitled interviews with the director.  A photo gallery and the original theatrical trailer round out the extras.  The MVD Rewind Collections continues to provide the never-old, always-awesome faux retro encasement with a cardboard o-slipcover with artificial poster wear imagery of an illustrative composition of Johnny Hallyday, Jürgen Prochnow, and Karen Allen and a VHS sticker as the cherry on top.  The reverse cover of the primary, inside the clear Amaray case, has more colorfully alternative and little more kid friendly cover art and the disc is pressed with the plastic grooves of a VHS tape.  An unlikely reviewed PG rated release has region free capabilities to be played across the globe. 

Last Rites: Neither cut of “Terminus” outlines a clear-cut picture, but that ambivalence dotes cult and spurs disarray in parallel function that urges more from a story that wanes to the very end. At least the new MVD release is exceptional!

“Terminus” is a Win for the Rewind Collection! Buy it Here!

How Many Chickens Need to Have Their Throats Cut to Satisfying Ritualistic, Naked EVIL! “Voodoo Passion” reviewed! (Full Moon Features / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Get Entranced by Full Moon’s “Voodoo Passion” Blu-ray!

Newly married Susan House travels to Haiti to join her consulate husband, Jack House, who has been stationed at the British Embassy.   Captivated by the Haitian voodoo religion and culture, Susan is eager to tour the island nation’s most ambiguous practice most don’t or will never understand all the while Jack’s naked and nymphomaniac Sister, Olga, makes forward, flirtatious advances toward her.  That fervor for voodooism and Olga’s point-blank seduction has seemingly incepted terrible nightmares of naked, animal sacrificial rituals and murder conducted beguilingly by a priestess in the form of Jack House’s native housekeeper, Inês.  When Susan awakes, the realism of her dreams afflicts her but her husband Jack and his colleague, a psychiatrist by the name of Dr. Pierre Barré swear there have been no police reported murders.  Night after night, Susan’s entranced nightmares continue to be vivid with murderous mysticism that’s slowly driving her mad in the land of voodoo. 

One of Jesus “Jess” Franco’s more bosom and bush erotic-thrillers, “Voodoo Passion” is nearly a fully naked runtime feature sprinkled with hints of the nation’s cultural religion.  The 1977 released, German Production, also known by the titles “”Call of the Blonde Goddess” or “Der Ruf der blonden Göttin,” was less about his own stylistic substance and auteur stamp and more about spasmatic, gyrating nudity under rhythmic bongo beats for the Spanish sleaze and exploitation genre filmmaker.   The gratuitously sexed-up, multinational feature is penned by the Switzerland born, sexploitation and adult genre screenwriter Erwin C. Dietrich under one of his pen names, Manfred Gregor.  Dietrich also produces the film amongst a substantially historical collaborative effort between himself and Franco over the course of the late 70s to early 80s.  Nestor Film Producktion serves as the production company, filming entirely not in Haiti but in the beautifully scenic and old-world allure of the seaside capital of Lisbon, Portugal.  

Lots of hot body action in this beat-driven, voodooism thriller primarily between a trio of character-diverse, titillating ladies and peppered with peripheral nude women and men tribals engaged in a ceaseless native, ritual thrusting, pulsing, and shaking trance dance.  “Voodoo Passion” grips itself around the rags-to-riches character of Mrs. Susan House in what is a matron-look for Spanish actress Ada Tauler (“The Sexy Horrible Vampire,” “Love Camp”) brought to Haiti at the behest of her British consult, newlywed husband Jack House, played by the stony-faced and “Eugenie” and “Pieces” American actor Jack Taylor able to swing both thrills and feminine frills in his films.  While Tauler’s doesn’t shy away from full nudity of Susan House’s fever dream state, the actress pales in comparison to the other two-thirds who are more engaged in sexual promiscuity and the liberating fervor of ethnic ceremony.   Those two actresses are “Caged Women’s” Karine Gambier as the nymphomaniac sister of Jack House and the face of most of “Voodoo Passion’s” physical marketing with French actress Muriel Montossé (“Cecilia”), under the more westernized stage name of Vicky Adams.  With a face and body like a model, Vicky Adams’s wild arm and stoic expression dance moves will hypnotize viewers entranced with the bongo tempo’s transfixing pomp, contributing to the film’s psychotronic premise of magical and religious rites, obfuscated nightmares, and, cue Austin Powers’s voice, murder.  Yeah, Baby!  “Voodoo Passion” has curves for days and in all different personas that keep things weirdly, but welcomingly, platonic on some level and not just an overly saturated sex-fest.  The film’s cast rounds out with Vitor Mendes (“Swedish Nympho Slaves”) and Ly Frey.

If asked to describe or give an opinion on “Voodoo Passion,” one would say cheekily the Jess Franco film is a thriller swathed in an eyeful of bosom and bush.  If the 4-minute introductory scene with voiceover exposition to the ceremonial voodoo band and half-naked native dancers wasn’t enough of a clue, Ada Tauler and Karine Gambier pull you right back into the soaking tub with their soapy, wet bodies as they immediately take a bath together upon meeting for the first time.  From that point on, the bosom and bush bar has been set and in that the thicket of unshaven landing strips, there’s a good story underneath about the mystics and misconceptions of Haitian voodooism.  Unfortunately, much of that story falls behind the showcases of skin, thrusting the principal ladies into the spotlight, overshadowing Jack Taylor’s performance as well as doing nothing for the poor psychologist in Vitor Mendes, and undercutting the very theme of ritual exploitation and misconduct which is half of “Voodoo Passion’s” concept.  The entirety is all quickly surmised in one fell swoop of exposition without the necessary leg work, that should have been carried out by either Susan House or the consul assistant Inês, of building evidence for or against the contrary exposed in the finale.  Then again, does gorgeous naked women dancing about really need a well-rounded plot?  All depends on the eyes of the beholder and these eyes needed that equilibrium!

Full Moon Features conjures up a Blu-ray for this Jess Franco thriller debased in sexploitation slather.  The AVC encoded, high-definition 1080p, is housed on a single layer BD25, yet not encoded heavily with bonus content, “Voodoo Passion” is able to retain a full-bodied image from a remastered German original negative owned by producer Erwin C. Dietrich.  Vivid color saturation, contrast levels accompanying each other, natural looking skin tons, and the stunning detail render this Full Moon Features release the bees’ knees.  No signs of blocking or banding but some celluloid frames are slightly grainier than others that might be a result of age, wear, or the variable of film stock.  There is only a single audio option, an English LPCM 5.1 renders lossless audio, clearing each channel with ease, and delivering a rhythmic bongo drum beat with intensity.  Dialogue mirrors the richness despite the ADR track overtop the diverse nationalities’ native tongues.  There are no English subtitles, or any setup option for that matter, for this English only track release.  Special features included are an archival interview with Jess Franco with forced English subtitles Franco, Bloody Franco, a rare photo slideshow of images from the film, the German trailer, and a Jess Franco vintage trailer reel of most of his schlocky Eurosleaze fair.  What’s party treasured about these newly re-released films onto a new full HD transfer is Full Moon’s physical package redesigns that offer a cardboard slipcover with new illustrated, pinup-esque, art.  “Voodoo Passion” has a half-naked woman, presumably the nymphomaniac sister Olga, moaning in ecstasy while holding a…hand mirror?  Wonder if that should have been the champaign bottle Olga uses to, well, you know, pleasure herself with.   There’s also a striking, NSFW, Muriel Montossé pose in a scene from the film on the traditional Blu-ray Amaray front cover with additional explicit scenes on the backside.  The disc is pressed with the same slipcover illustration and there are no inserts inside the case.  Presented uncut and region free, this Full Moon release of Jess Franco’s vintage sleaze has a runtime of 86-minutes.   

Last Rites:  Another wholly impressive picture quality presentation of another unwholesome, softcore sexploitation by Full Moon Features, a friend to Haitian voodoo and you, the licentiously greedy viewer! 

Get Entranced by Full Moon’s “Voodoo Passion” Blu-ray!

EVIL Sentences You to the Torture Dungeon and his Bedroom! “Night of the Blood Monster” reviewed! (Blue Underground / 4K UHD + Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

“Night of the Blood Monster” on 4K + Blu-ray is Here and On Sale!

After the death of King Stewart, 17th century England went into asunder chaos with the ruthless, usurping King James and the rightful, exiled King William of Orange who sought to return and topple King James’s authoritarian rule of a false claim to monarchy.  During the beginning and at the height of the revolution, Chief Justice George Jefferies presides over witchcraft cases with extreme and unethical prejudice, subjecting them to the torture chamber for what is labeled a ‘thorough examination” of their heretic ways, and eventually sentencing to public execution.  When the sister of one of the condemned women attempts to flee the country with a nobleman’s son, Jefferies learns of their dissidence and sends his henchmen to fetch the lovely woman to exploit her within the context of his own licentious litigiousness but closer and closer do the rebels and William of Orange’s men come to men like Chief Justice Jefferies who believe their power, influence, and proximity to God will save them from the noose.

A 17th century Eurotrash period piece forged out of mostly flesh and wolfish self-importance, “The Night of the Blood Monster” is yet another reteaming of Jesús (Jess) Franco and Sir Christopher Lee based loosely on historical context despite Lee’s best efforts for the contrary.  Also wildly and otherwise known as “The Bloody Judge,” and not to neglect mention the exorbitant unofficial titles from around the globe like “Witch Killer of Broadmoor,” “Throne of the Blood Monster,” and “Trial of the Witches” to name a few, the Spanish-German-British coproduction, cowritten between Jess Franco and Enrico Columbo (“Hell Commandos”) is a biographical interpretation of the Chief Justice George Jefferies and the brief span of his cruel litigator’s life set against an epic regime kerfuffle and grimy, exploitation barbarity.  The storyline concept was imagined by longtime Jess Franco producer and overall B-movie votarist Harry Alan Towers (“99 Women,” “The Blood of Fu Manchu”) alongside Columbo and Arturo Marcos (“She Killed in Ecstasy”) under production firms of Fenix Cooperative Cinematografica, Prodimex Film, and Towers of London Productions.

In yet another instance similar to Jess Franco’s “Eugenie” of a prior year or two where Christopher Lee channels the spiritual embodiment of a pain-and-pleasure pundit connected to the Marquis de Sade yet is unaware of the actual skin-and-sleaze that’s happening all around him while he crafts his melodramatic character, “The Night of the Blood Monster” has Lee conduct a stern symphony for Chief Justice George Jefferies’ conceited righteous carnage, living true to the factual George Jefferies designation of a hanging judge.  Lee is ruthless and cold while proper in public as he peeps beautiful bosoms and skirts from afar.  His costar, the gorgeous blonde with soul pierce eyes in fellow “Eugenie” thespian, Maria Rohm, who was also Harry Alan Towers wife at the time, definitely wasn’t clueless about the more undressed scenes, going full frontal in a couple of occasions with one of the supposedly with Lee as the exploiter of her beauty and circumstances.  However, Lee is never shown and only Jefferies’ hands are seen caressing Rohm’s character’s, Mary Gray, bare skin with post-event moments alluding to the implied affect.  Yet, there’s plenty of well-scripted dynamic play for Lee to bounce off against, which Franco is good at in his work as long as his at least 75% of the work makes it to the screen and not too terribly chopped up and spliced for the sex appeal and gratuitous blood.  Milo Quesada (“The 10th Victim”) swings a mean bastard sword as one of Jefferies head knights of dirty work, Hans Hess (“X312 – Flight to Hell”) is more vanilla than complex as the rebellious nobleman son and Mary Gray paramour Harry Selton, and Leo Genn, who initially wasn’t supposed to play the Lord Wessex, really cements Lee’s genuine performance with his own as the aristocratical, oppositional counterpart to Jefferies sadism.  “Night of the Blood Monster” rounds out with Peter Martell (“The French Sex Murders”), Margaret Lee (“Asylum Erotica”), Howard Vernon (“Angel of Death”), and Maria Schell (“99 Women”) as the clairvoyant old woman Mother Rosa living in the hills. 

Like “Eugenie,” “The Night of the Blood Monster,” and most of Franco’s scripts and films, the historical accuracy you must take with a grain of salt.  Though the underline basis of historical figures and perhaps time periods are more-or-less on point, there’s a greater number of misrepresentation of events or an imprecise use of period appropriate props and costuming that is deemed close enough by a fast-and-loose industry standard. Yet, with any Jess Franco film, the modern-day consumer is not expecting award-winning and emotionally moving cinema but rather fleapit flicks of the fleshy kind with handfuls of equally perversive cruelty.  “The Night of the Blood Monster” fits the bill perfectly with a dressing that, to the untrained eye, would pass historical surroundings, give tribute to sordid bygone figures, and revel in its own unabashed filth outside the interpretations of its own core group of filmmakers.  On one hand I feel bad for Christopher Lee who didn’t know, maybe, that the edification of the character was being twisted into something more carnal but on the other hand, the man has been in quite a few Franco and Towers productions to have learned by then.  However, Franco does depict a remarkable presence of a low-level epic with fabricated Classicism set dresses and interior architecture while keeping the budget down by having multiple scenes of men on horses gallop through an unrecognizable, middle-of-world forest.  With that said, the story doesn’t have perfect fluidity with a choppy sense of tempo that fails to coordinate our specific concepts of time.  Seasons don’t change yet months pass between the wrongful execution of Alicia Gray and the impending arrival of William of Orange’s invasion. In all, there’s a brilliance in the behind the face value and a heart to make Chief Justice George Jefferies the worst person possible yet the timing feels off and the story suffers for it.

I’m curious to understand why Blue Underground used the title “Night of the Blood Monster” on their new 2-Disc 4K UHD and Blu-ray set instead of their previous DVD that had the less-generic-more-fitting title “The Bloody Judge.” No judge-ment here really other than “Night of the Blood Monster” isn’t as catchy. The 4K UHD is HVEC encoded, 2160p high-definition, on a double layered BD-66 presents a new 2023 Dolby Vision HDR 4K scan that is gorgeously sharp in detail of interior structures, brighter exteriors, and even the dungeon scenes invoke the dewy coldness and bloodletting squirms. The skin tones can get a little funky at times with an overly warm, and orange-ish, glow not conducive to elements around the ambiance. Other than a few instances of the skin tones, the grading is overall rich in saturation where we get some really nice and thick contrasting reds and yellows with no artefact inference that cause distraction in darker spots or around the edge of objects. The Blu-ray format offers a lesser immersive picture with a lower pixel count but the compression decoding around 35-38Mbps and the compilation of transfer as well as the high-definition pixels is worth the combo set alone. The English language DTS-HD Master Audio Mono track has lossless compression that renders a clean and unfiltered fidelity in dialogue and in the other audio composited audio layers. Granted, some actors are dubbed due to the international co-production with German and Spanish natives not speaking their native tongues but the dub itself, especially in Lee’s own dubbed track, is one of the better inlaid and integrated tracks compared to most with not a load of static feedback. Blue Underground was able to obtain a cut that is the complete and uncensored version of “Night of the Blood Monster” by combining multiple transfers but in adding additional scenes of nudity and blood from a German transfer, the English dialogue track does briefly switch over to German with burned in English subtitles for two segments. English, French and Spanish optional subtitles are available. The 4K UHD carries with it three historian audio commentaries: 1) Troy Howarth and Nathaniel Thompson, 2) Kim Newman and Barry Forshaw, and 3) David Flint and Adrian Smith. The Blu-ray carries a bit more. Including the aforementioned commentaries, there is also deleted scenes and alternate scenes that rework scenarios or add stylistic choices, an archival interview Bloody Jess with Jess Franco and Christopher Lee, an interview with Stephen Thrower, author of “Murderous Passions: The Delirious Cinema of Jesus Franco, in Judgement Day, an interview with Alan Birkinshaw and Author Stephen Thrower as they discuss producer Harry Alan Towers in In the Shadows, and rounds off with trailers, TV spots, and still galleries. What I love about this new Blue Underground UHD+Blu-ray combo release is not only the picture but also the cardboard slipcover, a remarkable blend of film factuality and gratuitous sleaze of half-naked and scared women chained up in the dungeon with the embossed tactile title “Night of the Blood Monster” in bold gothic lettering. The same image graces the front cover of the black 4K UHD Amary case but if you do want “The Bloody Judge” title, you can reverse the cover art and there it is but with a different, less fun front cover art that’s more in tune with the narrative. Each disc, punch locked into its own side of the interior case, is pressed with a different illustrated image, 4K being the same as the slipcover while the Blu-ray is more Lee and Executioner focused. No inserts or books included. The not rated, 103-minute release comes region free on both formats.

Last Rites: The verdict is in! “The Night of the Blood Monster” now has the best-looking, most-complete version possible with a new, uncensored cut from Blue Underground. Christopher Lee heralds in hopelessness in squalid measure while holding his nose up high as one of England’s most notorious magistrates to ever rule and the brazen Jess Franco brandishes brilliance that glints through the cracks of an overrun production.

“Night of the Blood Monster” on 4K + Blu-ray is Here and On Sale!

This Spy’s Sex Serum Will Drive Men EVILLY Mad! “Blue Rita” reviewed! (Full Moon Features / Blu-ray – DVD)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Own “Blue Rita” on Blu-ray and DVD Combo Set Today!

Misandrist Blue Rita owns a high-end gentlemen’s cabaret.  Her renowned nightclub is also a front for espionage activities.  With the help of a Bergen, her handling, and her right-hand club manager Gina, she’s fed male targets that are affluent and powerful to kidnap and torture to extract sensitive intelligence information.  As a side hustle, a perk that comes with exploiting the naked and chained up men in her underground boxed cells, Blue Rita uses her chemical powers of seduction to sexually torture her captives into withdrawing their bank accounts dry.  When new girl Sun is hired in to not only titillate the nightclub client with her erotic Pippi Longstocking performances, the Blue Rita pledger works her first mission to reel in a wealthy, international boxer as the next target but Sun’s own conflictions collide with Rita’s sworn hate for all men, cracking the door open ajar just enough for Interpol and the Russian intelligence agencies to try and undermine Blue Rita’s confrontational spy operations. 

What’s renowned most about eurotrash filmmaker Jesus (Jess) Franco is his diverse contributions to the European and American movie-making markets.  Though most of his work is regarded as schlocky, beneath the sleaze and sordidness is a carefully calculating psychotronic director.  True, Franco may not be famously esteemed as, let’s say Martin Scorsese or Steven Spielberg, but his infamy should not be ignored amongst the present company of similar filmmakers like Tinto Brass or even Roman Polanski.  One of the late Franco’s few spy game theme films, “Blue Rita” is a hot house of sleaze and deceit, written by the director.  Filmed in Germany with German actors and actresses, the film went under the original title “Das Frauenhaus” translated as “The House of Women,” referring to the Blue Rita’s distaste for men and keeping an all-femme fatale, and mostly nude, workforce for her clandestine affairs.  Elite Film is the production company with Erwin C. Deitrich (“Love Letters of a Portuguese Nun,” “Swedish Nympho Slaves”) producing.

Much like Franco’s diverse dips into a variety of subgenres, “Blue Rita’s” cast is also quite an assorted lot in talent from sexploitation, horror, and the XXX industry.  The German production also garnered not just homefield advantage with German actors but also lured into the fold some of the French cast cuisine to spice up the affair.  Martine Fléty is one of those French foreigners, embodying the lead role of Blue Rita.  An adult actress of primarily the 70s, “Blue Rita” became Fléty only titular role but wasn’t her last Jess Franco feature, having continued her X-rated run with the director in “Elles Font Tout,” “I Burn All Over,” and “Claire.”  Either half or entirely naked for the entire narrative, Fléty’s comfortability bare-bottom relays power in her performance as an unwavering femme fatale agent that has men begging for sex and begging for their very lives.  Back then, the lines blurred between porn and sexploitation, often times melding into European coalescence hitting the same marquee theaters until it’s eventual separation.  Esther Moser (“Around the World in 80 Beds,” “Ilsa, The Wicked Warden”), Angela Ritschard (“Jack the Ripper,” “Bangkok Connection”), Vicky Mesmin (“Dancers for Tangier,” “Love Inferno”), Roman Huber (“Girls in the Night Traffic,” “Sex Swedish Girls in a Boarding School”), Olivier Mathot (“Diamonds of Kilimandjaro,” “French Erection”) and Pamela Stanford (“Sexy Sisters,” “Furies sexuelles”) rode, among other things, that fine line between grindhouse gauche and the taboo and certainly do well to incorporate both traits in Franco’s equally indeterminate genre film.  German actor and one of the principal leads Eric Falk (“Caged Women,” Secrets of a French Maid”) too dappled between crowds as a tall, dark, and chiseled chin but the actor chiefly sought limelight in sexploitation and as the haughty boxer Janosch Lassard, who karate chops at lightning speed, Falk adds to “Blue Rita’s” sexy-spy thriller.  Opposite the titular vixen is “Wicked Women’s” Dagmar Bürger who, like the rest of the cast, have crossed paths in a handful of exploitation exciters.  Bürger has perhaps the least built-up character Sun as she’s subtly folded into Blue Rite’s innermost circle without as much as a single ounce of doubt in her character, perhaps due in part to Bergen, Blue Rita’s handler, was once Sun’s direct-to, but Sun becomes the impetus key to everything falling apart at the seams and her role’s framework feels unsatisfactory just as her crumbling infatuation that’s more arbitrary than motivationally centric.

“Blue Rita” doesn’t necessarily broach as a film by Jess Franco whose typical undertakings are coated with sleazy gothic and historical context.  The 1979 feature, set around the extraction of international intelligence data by way of chemical approach, not terribly farfetched considering how the CIA once used LSD as a truth serum, is about as sordid and sexually graphic as any Jess Franco film gets but brings about a futuristic air laced with not just super cool spy gadgets and weaponry, to which there are really none to speak of as an example, there lies a more ultramodern verge upon unseen in much of the earlier, Spanish-born director’s work.  A futuristic holding pen with a capacity no bigger than an industrial-sized washing machine with a descending spiked barred ceiling, a hyper-aphrodisiac goo that makes men so horny it puts them on the edge of insanity and death, and the sleek, contemporary sex room with translucent furniture and stark white walls all in the routine hustle and bustle of Paris, France. “Blue Rita’s” contrarian patinas add to the film’s colorful charisma of avant-garde stripteases and a black operations nightclub, two of which combined play more into the “Austin Powers” funky 1970s ecosphere rather than in the high-powered espionage world of James Bond, the Roger Moore years.

For the first time on Blu-ray in the North American market, Full Moon Features puts out into the world a fully remastered, high-definition, 2-disc Blu-ray and DVD set. The AVC encoded, 1080p, BD25 entails picture perfect image quality that sharpen “Blue Rita” with greater resolution in comparison to previous DVD versions with full-bodied color, in setting tones and in body tones, and a contour-creating delineation that establishes depth and texture better, presented in a widescreen 1.85:1 aspect ratio. Not flawless mind you with soft spots rearing up every so often in the variety of interior and exterior, organically and inorganically lit scenes but there’s distinct contrast that delivers a recognizing lighting scheme that deepens the shadows in the right places without signs of an inadequate compression, especially on a single layer Blu-ray, and the Full Moon release retains natural grain with no DNR or other image enhancements. The release comes with two audio options, a lossy Dolby Digital 5.1 and a French Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo, both of which have a horrendously acted burned-in English dub of not the original actors’ voices. Banal dub does take the quality of Franco’s dialogue down a good peg or two, which the original dub track was likely spoken in native German and some French judging by the cast list nationalities and where the bigger distribution market was for the planned; yet, though the dialogue is verbose and ploddingly straightforward to make do, losing some of the depth in the process, the quality is voluminous to ensure no mistake is made in underemphasizing the story’s outline when necessary. Ambience and other design markers hit more than well enough to sell the surroundings and the action to make those qualities palpable. English subtitles are option but not available on the setup; they will have to added in per your setup’s options. The Blu-ray extras come with a rare photo gallery, an archived interview with Chris Alexander with Peter Strickland discussing Franco circa 2013, and a vintage Jess Franco Trailer Reel. The DVD houses a different set of special features, separate from the Blu-ray’s, with Slave in the Women’s House interview with Eric’s Falk plus the DVD also offers Eurocine trailers. Those interested in supplementary content will be forced to pop in both discs to fully abreast of all bonus material. What’s eye-catching about the Full Moon Feature’s release is the erotic front cover on the cardboard O-slipcover, sleekly illustrated for your kink and perversive pleasure. The Blu-ray Amary inside has a NSFW story still of Dagmar Bürger walking down a spiral staircase in the buff. The same Dagmar Bürger image graces the DVD cover while a new illustrated luscious lips are pressed on the Blu-ray disc opposite side. There is no insert or booklet included. The region free release has a runtime of 78 minutes and is not rated.

Last Rites: The late Jess Franco may have a cache full of sleaze in his repertoire, but the director had a sense of panache and intensity that’s sorely underrated outside his fanbase. “Blue Rita” shows Franco’s range, stylistically and genre, and Full Moon’s sultry release is now high-definition gold in the color blue.

Own “Blue Rita” on Blu-ray and DVD Combo Set Today!

When Men Want More, They Receive More… EVIL! “Red Sun” reviewed! (Radiance Films / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

“Red Sun” on Limited Edition Blu-ray from Radiance Films!

Peggy, Sylvie, Christine, and Isolde have made a mortiferous pact to lure wanton men into their spider’s web before snuffing them out. Armed with guns and homemade explosives, the four women find themselves strapped for cash but managing to get by with their all-in scheme to take out as many licentious men as possible. When the nomadic loafer Thomas re-enters Peggy’s life, she initially sees him as just another mark to relieve from the mortal coil, but Thomas’ uninterest in sexual desires appeal to Peggy’s compassion and care for the man she once loved who just happened to show up in her life one night. As the two become closer, Peggy’s accomplices continue their deadly ideology, working their individual johns, but Christine and Sylvie find Peggy slipping under Thomas’ beguiling draw, an affect she can’t seem to comprehend, and pressures Peggy to be thorough with Thomas to the bitter end.

“Rote Sonne,” or “Red Sun” translated into English, is the 1970 feministic crime drama from German filmmaker Rudolf Thome and penned by the late Switzerland born screenwriter, Max Zihlmann.  Thought-provoking as it is enticingly cold, “Red Sun” tears open a void between lust and violence that separates the sexes of scorned scars.   The pre-European Union film looks at feminism during a highly patriarchal Germany time, West Germany to be specific, when women rights were essentially molded and determined by men.  Wives relied heavily on their husbands to make decisions for them on a permissible granted condition and even some marriage-related abuse crimes we’re not punishable under German law.  Thome helmed a politically anti-conservative and socially anti-inequality picture during the second wave of German feminism of the 1960s with ironfisted and revenge-seeking protagonists as an active cell blending into cultural norm.  “Red Sun” is produced by the director as well as Heinz Angermeyer of Independent Film productions and is part one of our double bill look at radical feminism with Marleen Gorris’ “A Question of Silence” to follow.

At the tip of the cast spear is a Rudolf Thome regular, Marquard Bohm, having had roles in another of Thome’s empowering women feature “Supergirl – The Girl from the Stars” as well as the skin-laden “Detektive,” and the narrative’s focal character stirs confounding interest in that it revolves around a male principal of a women liberation-by-force feature.  As Thomas, Bohm is not a traditionally depicted German man but has all the some of the minuscular familiar qualities of masculine behavior.  Thomas loafs into to life of Peggy, played by fellow “Detektive” star Uschi Obermaier, and her cohort of conniving men eaters – Christine (Diana Körner, “Barry Lyndon”), Sylviie (Sylvia Kekulé) and Isolde (Gaby Go) – simply by being at the right place at the right time or visa-versa, depending on how you look at it.  For Thomas, his nonchalant leeching onto Peggy morphs into something more than just freeloading off of already strapped for cash Peggy and friends, becoming a distraction and an attraction from his previously failed relationship in Munich.  The role is in a mirror reversal of the then current German society with Thomas being a stay-at-home man, running errands at the behest of the woman Peggy as she goes to work and earns to keep their clandestine killing chugging along, but Thomas does what he wants, whether be spending Peggy’s extra cash on cigars or eating all the food in ladies’ fridge.  Opportunistically asserting his needs onto their, often inimical, hospitality, Thomas is the Peggy beloved free-range chicken strutting his stuff around other hungry, more axe-wielding, farmers that put the pressure on Peggy to nix him before he insidiously collapses their pact.  Under the “Red Sun,” the cast fills out with Don Wahl, Peter Moland, and Henry von Lyck.

Unfortunately, Thomas has inadvertently sowed the seeds of destruction within the four women, dividing the group’s cause and on what to do with Thomas.  The women are arranged in a spectrum range of how to handle their contested guest; Thomas has caught the eye of Peggy and Isolde, though active in certain measures of man-slaughter, refuses to partake in the act of killing altogether where Sylvie pushes back against her indifference amiability for Thomas to continue the good fight and Christine just flat out owns her oppositional stance to eliminate the man many would find lackadaisical and nocuous to their friendship and plans, like an usurping boyfriend coming in between two best friends.  What Thomas represents is the potential squash, or delay of, the feminist movement against an arrogant and authoritatively unfair patriarchal society and each woman is a different perspective and reaction to the measures of feministic movement.  “Red Sun” is also a tragic love story that pits rightful duty against the heart’s urges and Thome is able to fashion a path through the commentary to depict both views in a sad, yet heartful conclusion.  What Thome doesn’t do well is the appropriate stitching of time passed.  Perhaps through editing or the within the confined text of the script, what feels like weeks passed is actually only a handful of days, but Thomas’s comfort level is so ingrained, coupled with the brief mentioning of how long he’s been around, the comings-and-goings of time blend into one jerky story that can’t properly materialize a granular tone and “Red Sun” becomes a bit sun blind at times when trying to keep with the characters’ narrative.

“Red Sun” blazes onto a world debut, limited edition Blu-ray release from independent cult film distributor, Radiance Films. The AVC encoded, high-definition release has been scanned in 2K from the original 35mm camera negatives, supervised by director Rulfe Thome, at the Cinegreti Postfactory in Berlin as well as additional touchup restoration work to spruce up the dust, dirt, and scratches. Radiance Films’ presentation features a brilliant quality that has restored to void out any celluloid cankers. Grading appears natural and vivid under the breadth of the welcomed 35mm grain. Aside from a handful of faint vertical scratches here and there, this Blu-ray has none the worse for wear with compression issues as the transfer is stored on an ample BD50 to reduce any compression artefact effects. The original German language LPCM 2.0 mono track vivaciously keeps up with a clean, clear, and robust post-production dialogue recording. No major issues with hissing or popping though minor specimens rear their ugly audibles sporadically to a negligible outcome. Since ADR is used, depth is lost amongst the dialogue track, but the environmental ambience nicely courses through the output with a small explosion and episodic skirmishes to keep the range from being too concentrated. English subtitles are available and are well-synced, well-paced, and are grammatically sound from start to finish. Bonus features include an audio commentary track with director Rudolf Thome and Rainer Langhans and also two visual essays with film academics Johannes von Moltke, in German with English subtitles, on the subject of cultural and social influences on “Red Sun” titled Rote Sonne: Between Pop Sensibility and Social Critique, and Margaret Deriaz exploring the developments on the New German cinema, titled From Oberhausen to the Fall of the Wall. The physical attributes are just as enticing with non-traditional and clear Blu-ray snapper case with a thicket, 51-page color booklet insert featuring the 2022 Guerrilla girls: Radical Politics in Rudolf Thome’s “Red Sun” essay by Samm Deighan, an interview with the director, Letters to the German Film Evaluation Office by Wim Wenders and Enno Patalas from 1969, film review extracts between 1970 and 1991, and transfer notes and full package release credits. Sheathed inside the case is a reversible cover art with a Bond-esque prime cover of Uschi Obermaier in a white, short-skirted outfit holding a revolver in front of a shoreline red sun. Alternate, inside cover notes the original German language title “Rote Sonne” with the 3 of the 4 femme fatales posed around Peggy’s VW bug. The disc press art is perhaps the less exciting aspect with just a plain, off-white disc with red letter of the title. Radiance Films’ release comes region free, has a runtime of 87 minutes, and is not rated. Limited to 1500 copies should not stop a film aficionado from looking directly into the “Red Sun,” a highly provocative and pulpy thriller full of contempt and full of ambivalence curated to pack a punch on a new Radiance Films Blu-ray.

“Red Sun” on Limited Edition Blu-ray from Radiance Films!