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Nymphomania is EVIL’s Best Time! “Vixen!” / “Supervixens” / “Beneath the Valley of the Ultra-Vixens” (Severin Films / Blu-rays)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

VIXEN!  (1968)

In the untamed wilderness of British Columbia, a bush pilot named Tom picks up fares that give tourist, fisherman, hikers, and the like an experience of a lifetime in raw, Canadian countryside.  Also, an experience of a lifetime is when his clients and guests staying the night in his rugged cabin home meet his nymphomaniac wife, Vixen.  When Tom’s flying about to-and-fro, Vixen slips out of her clothes and into the comforting arms of varietal strangers of men and women alike.  Indoors, outdoors, land, water, men, women…for Vixen, sex is life, and she must take it whatever means necessary, even if that means conniving her way into sleeping with her motorcycling little brother Judd.  No Canadian Mountie can stop her from mounting him.  No lawyer can litigate his way out of her desiring deposition.  In fact, no one can resist the voluptuous Vixen at all except for one man, a negro named Niles, as Vixen’s racist belittlement seeds a strong ambivalence between them.

The first film in Russ Meyer’s “Vixen” trilogy, “Vixen!” is the 1968 produced feature directed by the man dubbed King Leer and The Fellini of the Sex Industry known as Russ Meyer.  The World War II combat photographer saw unequivocal carnage and death in his camera lens but his post-war vocation to become an eroticist earned him being one of the most prolific skin flick filmmakers ever between the 1950s to the 1980s.  With a penchant for heavy-chested women, Meyer’s “Vixen!” is uninhibition incarnate and is a pleasure-seeking good time when the prim-and-proper hubbub is put to the side in this Robert Rudelson penned philandering orgy of ogling based off an original story by the “Faster, Pussycat!  Kill, Kill” and “Motorpsycho!” director and infrequent concept collaborator and producer Anthony-James Ryan (“Black Snake”).  Meyers wife, Eve, served as associate producer alongside Richard S. Brummer and George Costello under the production companies of Goldstein Films, Coldstream Films, and Eve Productions.

SUPERVIXENS (1975)

Gas station attendant Clint maintains the steady pumping of gas and washing of windshields that pull up to be serviced, but his insatiable wife, SuperAngel, wants Clint back home for a little pumping of her own.  Constantly calling him at work and threatening the dissolution of marriage frustrates Clint to the point where their lovemaking turns heated and violent that results in Officer Harry Sledge to knock out Clint and trifle with SuperAngel’s coquettish whims after its all said and done.  Yet, Harry Sledge’s inadequacies release his true nature, a pent-up maniac who mercilessly murders SuperAngel and shifts the blame toward Clint.  On the run, Clint finds himself at the mercy of ride givers who either take advantage of his body and what little money he has or provide him a safe place to stay with a caveat of busty, horny temptations knocking down his spare room door.  Clint finally lands being a gas station attendant again with SuperVixen, a gas station inheritor running both the pumps and the hamburger grill, and he finally feels he’s back on his feet in life being in love with SuperVxen.  That is until Harry Sledge coincidently shows up at his gas pump.

Not so much a sequel to “Vixen!” as one would expect in an unaffirmed trilogy, “Supervixens” is Russ Meyer’s 1975 satirical sex-comedy busting at the seams into insanity and out of blouses.  A bigger cast with even bigger boobs, literal and figurative, plays upon a charade of Meyer’s troubled time through divorce that sees a little more violence toward women while still shitkicking characters with well-endowed powers of sexualized influence.  Unlike “Vixen!,” Meyer writes the film too, adding his flare of elongated exposition that in itself is a foreplay of phonics with its blend of sophistication, wit, and obscenity.  The RM (Russ Meyer) International presented film is produced by Meyer, Fred Owens, Charles Napier, Wilfred Kues, James Parsons, executively produced by Anthony-James Ryan, and filmed mostly in the vast Arizona desert.

BENEATH THE VALLEY OF THE ULTRA-VIXENS (1979)

Junkyard worker Lamar is a studios young man who wants nothing more than to earn his degree in smalltown America.  His wife Lovenia is studios in keeping her bed warm by sating her thirst for every man in said smalltown America.  Yet, Lovenia wants Lamar only and badly too but the one thing that wedges their sex life apart is Lamar’s obsession with the backdoor only and not being eye-to-eye intimate.    To try and fix their broken relationship of rear entries and unrestrained randiness, the two young lovers embark on a journey around town to seek salvation into solace of each other’s arms rather than meeting their needs elsewhere.  A gay marriage counselor/dentist with a kinky lesbian nurse, a radio evangelist busting out of her shirt to save souls, 14-year-old athletes being taught adulthood with hands on experience, junkyard and garbageman rendezvous and scrappy scandals, all play a part in working out Lamar’s kinks and sedating Lovenia’s nymphomania. 

Now this Meyer entry has more sequel components.  “Beneath the Valley of the Ultra-Vixens” has even more sexploitation satire shrouded by a saturation of sordid sleaze in what would be essentially Russ Meyer’s last theatrical feature-length film.  The 1979 production really goes into the pubic bush of pushing public boundaries with sexualized situations, intermingling faith with sexualized fervor, and expressing a provocation freedom only in the way Russ Meyer could deliver it.  The story is conceived by Meyer but is written by none other than Roger Ebert under the penname of R. Hyde in what was the last of three feature film collaborations with the director behind “Beyond the Valley of the Dolls” and “Up!”  Meyer’s RM Films International solely presents the Richard S. Brummer, Fred Owens, and Russ Meyer coproduced “Beneath the Valley of the Ultra-Vixens” shot, yet again, on harsh terrain of the American west in arid and rural portions of California.

CAST

All three films center around one sex-driven consumed woman and one hapless in-one-way-or-another man.  Each of the principal lead actress are made up of parts Russ Meyers admires the most: buxom, curvy, and beautiful.  Each provide their own eccentricity to the role despite their common core theme of nymphomania.  In the titular role of “Vixen!” is the Meyer discovered topless dancer Erica Gavin, sporting D cups that were typically, and funny enough, just a tad small for the Russ Meyer usual collective of busty babes.  Gavin’s envelopes herself completely into the promiscuous role that preys upon men like a shark whiffing a solitary drop of blood to get the olfactory senses working overtime.  Gavin devours her counterparts on screen as a saucy, sassy seductress with hips that hypnotize and a chest that chastises chastity with extreme prejudice.  And speaking of prejudices, “Vixen!” paints an obscene vocabulary depiction of the only black actor through the vile and vicious name-calling by the Vixen herself.  Between the verbal bigotry, U.S. military draft dodging, unpopular Vietnam war beliefs and communism, Meyer disguises 1960s socio- and political topical matter underneath a large rack of sexploitation but does evoke the black character Niles (Harrison Page, “Carnosaur”) as a costar rather than a supporting actor.  Super Angel in “Supervixens” can also be rancorous but not in a prejudice sense; instead, the actress Shari Eubank portraying Super Angel has an impatient demeanor for her rather unhurried beau Clint and what also separates Gavin and Eubank in their respective roles is that Eubank has a dual performance in the most irony of names being a malicious tease as Super Angel and being sweet as pie as Super Vixen.  The contrast between the two women also mirrors a resemblance of what once was even to the detail of Clint obtaining his old job back at a new gas station but their arc as couple must face the formidable Harry Sledge as the peak they both must overcome, representing as perhaps a metaphor, coupled with some sly editing and intention, in being an older version of Clint heading toward impotence, anger, and confusing sexual orientation.  The uninhibited nude dancer and adult film starlet Kitten Navidad led the charge in the third film, “Beneath the Valley of the Ultra-Vixens,” as the uber-compulsive sexual Lovenia.  Before starring in the stags “Bodacious Ta Tas” and “Eat at the Blue Fox,” amongst others, Navidad ran rampantly new in swanky, silly, softcore in front of the camera lens of her then husband Russ Meyer.  Lively and lovely, with large breasts and a hairy bush, Navidad sparks a wide grin under her Latina charm as well as portraying a promiscuous housewife gone wild in a starkly different demean that’s more toon in its titillating manner when compared to “Vixen!” and “Supervixens.”  “Beneath the Valley of the Ultra-Vixens” is the only film in the trilogy to be a sequel, and barely at that, with returning characters of “Supervixens” helpful farmer Lute (Stuart Lancaster, “Starlet!”) and his lovely Austrian wife SuperSoul, played by another adult and genre actress Uschi Digard (“Ilsa:  She Wolf of the S.S.,” “Superchick”).  The three films round out the cast increasingly with Garth Pillsbury, Jon Evans, Robert Aiken, Peter Carpenter, Michaenl Donovan O’Donnell, John Furlong, Charles Pitt, Henry Rowland, John Lazar, Fred Owens, Glen Dixon, Ken Kerr, Patrick Wright, Robert E. Pearson, Michael Finn, Don Scarborough, Aram Katcher, and DeForest Covan with sexploitation and adult industry regulars Vincene Wallace (“A Sweet Sickness”), Deborah McGuire (“The Young Secretaries”), Colleen Brennan (“China and Silk”), Christina Cummings, Ann Marie (“For Your Breasts’ Only”), June Mack, Sharon Hill (“Dawn of the Dead”), and Candy Samples (“Fantasm”).

OVERVIEW

From the flowing creeks and tall pines of British Columbia, Canada, to the arid desert rocks and scantily scenic hardscapes of the western U.S. deserts, Russ Meyer had a fondness for the coarse-nature of the great outdoors put up adjacent to the delicate, soft-skin beauty of voluptuous women prancing, dancing, jumping, skipping and fornicating to the beat of oversexualization, perversion, and the problems that rouse from the unfettered arousal.  Meyer’s interests not only laid with gigantic melons and the overall less-is-more clothing on women, but the director also had a fondness for rural, smalltown settings, a subtle paradoxicality to pepper German aspects into the story’s vast and bosomy berth despite his World War II veterancy, and he really tackled sociological issues of race, orientation, and, of course, a broad spectrum of general sexuality too taboo for much of puritanical America.  Yet, Meyer had an eye for what makes cinema alluring and not only from a taboo and bare skin angle but from the angles of which he shot and a stylistic eye to match to create and edit unforgettable compositions.  An eclectic medley of angles, quick coherent edits, a witty, sarcastic, and philosophical dialogue, a swanky and swinging instrumental soundtrack, and the vibrant, sultry, and pulpy coloring of pinks, reds, blues, yellows, and other fuzzy posh palette colors come together in a beautiful mesh of fast-paced filmmaking that tells about the fast-and-loose times, an exaggerated parallel of the rather an unmentionable underbelly most were too ashamed to mention or even think positively minutely about in that era.  Today, sex is more fashionable but 40-50 years ago, Russ Meyer foresaw a future of polyamory in a fun, lightful, sexy, if not borderline sleazy and perverted, way sewn into an alternate universe of risk and reward told in meta fashion.

If you must take one thing away about Severin Films is that the boutique label knows how to restore and package lost treasures.  Such is the case with Russ Meyer’s broad bare-bosom view of Americana cinema with the Vixen trilogy.  These Russ Meyer Bosomania films are restored and scanned in 4K on the worldwide debut of an AVC encoded, 1080p high-definition, BD50 and presented in a widescreen 1.85:1 aspect ratio except for “Vixen!” which is shown in the European aspect ratio 1.66:1.  Noted on the back covers, “Vixen!” print scanned in 4K from the original negative is restored by MoMA, the Museum of Modern Art, “Supervixens’” print is restored by Severin Films in conjunction with The Russ Meyer Trust with the 4K scanned print originating from The Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences, and “Beneath the Valley of the Ultra-Vixens’” weathered-worn print was painstakingly restored by Severin Films as well with cooperation from The Russ Meyer Trust.  Between 1968 and 1979, there’s more than a subtle difference in image presentation, style, and quality, as expected, whether be Meyer growing as a student of cinematography, film stock upgrades, or just plain print wear and tear.  “Vixen!” has a more muted color palette but nowhere near being totally vapid as Meyer uses less colorfully charged lighting and shadow work that results in an organic image with some inconsequential anemic and barely perceptible damaged frames sporadically throughout.  Details are generally favorable and kind to early colorists, touched up I’m sure in the restoration to pop it out some.  “Supervixens” and “Beneath the Valley of the Ultra-Vixens” do color-pop tremendously, punctuated by Meyer’s stroke of lighting and editing genius to have each scene be enthralling to behold and be aggregated into a class known as the Russ Meyer magnum opus.  Meyer is the David Lynch of the sexploitation subgenre, seducing with sordid and satirical sex-driven maniacs and a peculiarity of situations and themes that often run silent in the general population.  The latter two films are scot-free of print wear which is surprising since “Ultra-Vixens” is noted to have been weathered, which is a true testament to Severin’s dedication to the restoration.  All three films have an ENGLISH LPCM Mono mix of fair fidelity that’s akin to the skin soundtracks of a burlesque-like Benny Hill show.  “Vixen!,” once again,” strays from the pack with glam swing revelry and sultry notes of passion herald in by a smooth piano, percussion, and guitar.  Dialogue renders nicely through from all three films accompanied by more of the near slapstick Foley rather than environment din.  “Vixen!” does emit a bit of an echo is certain scenes, more evidently so when Vixen argues or persuades to get what she wants, and you can hear her dialogue again in like a soft breath underneath.  English closed captioning is available for selection.  Several hours of special hours have been compiled for this set, beginning with “the “Vixen!” allotment that has a second, censor prologue cut of the film in from the theatrical re-release, an archival audio commentary with Russ Meyer, a new audio commentary with Erica Gavin, new interviews with Gavin and Harrison Page in Woman…Or Animal?, a television interview of Russ Meter and Yvette Vickers on the David Del Valle hosted show The Sinister Image, Entertainment… Or Obscenity? Is the Marc Edward Heuck historical and present look at the Cincinnati Censorship Battles against Russ Meyer and his films and rounds out with the feature’s trailer. “Supervixens'” special features include an archival audio commentary with Russ Meyer, an interview between Mike Carroll and Russ Meyer Russ Meyer Versus The Porn-Busters, an interview with The Return of Harry Sledge Charles Napier, S1E5 with Russ Meyer on The Incredibly Strange Film Show, a TV spot, and the trailer. Rounding out the extras on “Beneath the Valley of the Ultra-Dixens” came another archival feature-paralleling commentary with Russ Meyer, The Latin Brünhilde interview with actress Kitten Natividad, an Ellen Adelstein interview with Russ Meyer on her 1979 talk show, a much later and new/current interview with Ellen Adelstein, and the theatrical trailer. All three Amaray cases share the same color scheme of a black case contrasted with a red border on the cover with an inner black border surrounding a still or a retro one sheet with taglines and pulled quotes from past reviews. There are no other tangible elements with the disc pressed roughly with the same primary image. The region free Blus are not rated and have respective runtimes of 71 minutes (“Vixen!”), 106 minutes (“Supervixens”), and 93 minutes (“Beneath the Valley of the Dolls”).

Last Rites: To experience Russ Meyer’s Vixen trilogy is more than these words can ever express. You just have to dive right into the voluminously, voluptuous vixen world and the best, polished way to do it is with Severin’s Russ Meyer Bosomania restored 4K scans!

“Vixen!” Available Here on Blu-ray!

“Supervixens” Available Here on Blu-ray!

“Beneath the Valley of the Ultra-Vixens” Available Here on Blu-ray!

Low Box Office Attendance Won’t Stop This EVIL From a Having a 4K Release! “Zyzzyx Road” reviewed! (Dark Arts Entertainment / 4K UHD and Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

“Zyzzyx Road” Collector’s Edition Now Available on Amazon.com!

Tax accountant Grant has become an unfulfilling, steady husband and father bred by many years of walking the straight line.  When he meets the young, hot Marissa while gambling in Las Vegas, Grant quickly becomes enamored by the youthful blonde with the two of them ending up in a hotel room together, but when Marissa’s violently jealous boyfriend Joey breaks into the room, Grant inadvertently kills him in self-defense.  Eager to do anything for Marissa, the once unadventurous accountant lugs Joey’s corpse into the back of his car and the two drive hours through the night to the middle of the Las Vegas desert off Zyzzyx Road in attempt to bury him.  Intermittent visions and voices drive Grant to put into question Marissa’s intentions and the death of Joey, whose has suddenly absconded the trunk and is out for blood for jilted revenge, puts a snag into his plan of being with Marissa forever. 

Infamously known at one time for being the lowest grossing theatrically run film ever, only making a grand total of $30, “Zyzzyx Road” is an American mystery-thriller from “The Kindred” and “Return of the Living Dead III” writer and debut directorial of John Penney.  The 2006 independent feature, based off and intentionally mislabeled Zzyzx Road, a 4.5 mile-long road in the same name California town formerly known as Soda Springs, was mishandled during it’s limited release by showing in just one cinema during it’s theatrical stretch, being dethroned by “The Worst Movie Ever!” In 2011 with a total earning of $11, and rightfully so.  “Zyzzyx Road” did not justifiably garner such notoriety but isn’t totally faultless it’s misunderstood essence.  Shot in the Mojave Desert, the film’s principal star Leo Grillo funded the project under an LLC with Penny and casting director Valerie McCaffrey serving as co-producers.  

As tax accountant Grant, Leo Grillo has no issues stepping into a role that’s supposed to sound as vanilla as the character’s vocation.  Whether it’s Grillo’s limited expressive range or perhaps playing Grant to the very letter, Grant’s monotony doesn’t exude any kind of excitement, suspense, trepidation, or passion.  It short, Grant is about as plain as white bread.  Being in the embrace of a younger woman nor skirmishing with a violent man in the desert seems to get Grillo out of his austere shell, even when in the final, when Grant is supposed to be elevated as an unpredictable loose cannon, the Massachusetts-born, animal rescuer and sanctuary founder can’t muster a three out of ten on an intensity scale.  Opposite Grillo and a ten on the intensity scale, for any he’s ever made, is the late Tom Sizemore at what was perhaps the height of his drug-fueled career.  The “Relic” and “Saving Private Ryan” actor’s aggression is harnessed for Joey, Marissa’s out-of-control yet controlling ex-boyfriend.  Sizemore’s unusual hand movements, long wide-eyed stares, and sneering tone provide the fervor needed for the thriller as the two men mix it up all because of the sweet and innocent Marissa.  Or is she sweet and innocent?  Katherine Heigl (“Valentine,” “Bride of Chucky”) had not really blown up yet in her career but the then up-and-coming, mid-20 something Heigl is playing a seemingly odd choice for a late teen woman, but Heigl pulls off being a candy-coated frighten kitten for as long as the story says so as Marissa may not be as she appears.  Heigl’s performance grounds the two extremes within her male co-star counterparts, bringing with her a better operating perspective for “Zyzzyx Road’s” twisting, winding, out-in-the-middle of nowhere road. 

Within “Zyzzyx Road’s” framework, therein lies a good premise.  However, the story, as a whole, has a number a plot holes that notch out and negate earlier elements along its enigmatic journey of a couple heading to desert without a game plan to bury a human corpse.  The rewound flashbacks that hark to the catalytic incident work to an extent to setup visuals and circumstances audiences are thrusted into right after the opening credits roll and this structural design is a cognitive tell, a non-linear, trope device used to say that everything is not initially laid out.  Crucial pieces of the puzzle are omitted for something that is more inconspicuously afoot that will explain the whole ordeal in an epiphanic ah-ha moment.  Penney ten breaks the film in two with a sharp snap, presenting “Zyzzyx Road” now with more than one perspective that changes the game from one thriller genus to another thriller genus. 

Brian Yuzna and John Penney are quickly making a name for themselves in the boutique label department. Penney’s own “Zyzzyx Road” receives the ultra high-definition treatment with a Collector’s Edition, 2-Disc 4K UHD and Blu-ray combo set with the restoration supervised by Penney and presented in HDR 10 and the original widescreen 1.85:1 aspect ratio. The 4K is HVEC encoded, 2160p resolution, with a BD66 capacity while the Blu-ray is AVC encoded, 1080p resolution, BD50. The UHD provides a cleaner look with intrinsic detailing mostly around daylit exteriors while both formats instill finesse with the fathomable. Where not fathomable are the nighttime interiors and exteriors that trade shadow and depth delineation for lineless and dark atmospherics under an interesting choice of garage grading until multi-perspectives emerge, dichotomizing the grading between a super flat and natural, desert sunlight to shed light. No signs of compression issues during these scenes which would be more than half of the runtime, biding its time with the cat-and-mouse ménage à trois in the desert. Practical effects mixed with visual effects endure the early 2000s variety of inorganic movement and off-texturing. Another interesting aspect of this collector’s set is the audio contains a lossless and a lossy surround sound mix with an English DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio and a Dolby Digital 5.1. Not sure why there’s a need for both on both formats as most cine- and audiophiles would prefer more fidelity over compressed, reproduced audio any day of the week; yet, both files render a clean presentation with forward and prominent dialogue. Being in the desert where space is abundant, depth appears deeply snubbed by the initial recording and sound design, but the added ambience of critter chirping, heavy winds, and rustling of the brush diffuse nicely into the whole that barely isolates and recognizes the unique distances. English subtitles are available on both discs. UHD special features is quite compact to the Blu-ray because of the limited capacity with 4K’s size but does come with a new commentary track with actor-producer Leo Grillo and a new commentary with producer-writer-director John Penney. The commentaries, along with a new feature introduction by Grillo and Penney, are also included on the Blu-ray disc, plus The Legacy of Zyzzyx Road, feature-length discussion between Johny Penney, Leo Grillo, and co-producer and casting director Valerie McCaffrey going down memory lane covering everything from the film’s genesis to the box office bomb. Also encoded is 11 archival behind-the-scenes featurettes, an older interview with John Penney, a then & now shooting location revisitation, storyboard to live shots, a storyboard slideshow, the music video The Mystery of Zyzzyx Road, and the trailer. Outside from the inside, Dark Arts Entertainment’s physical presentation comes with a cardboard O-slipcover that speaks to the story’s puzzling mystery in a compositional layout with actual puzzle pieces with the flipside displaying no technical or credit information but rather a series of scattered photographs of certain scenes. The black 4K UHD Amaray case has the original one sheet artwork with the backside filling in the technical and credit information; however, there’s a noticeable error in the listing of both formats where the back cover doesn’t list the Blu-ray. Instead, 4K UHD is listed twice and the corresponding supplements representing the 4K UHD and the Blu-ray. At the bottom, under cast and crew acknowledgments, you’ll see both formats separated for A/V specifics. On the inside, each disc is kept in separately, one on each side, and pressed with arid Leo Grillo with a shotgun in hand. Both formats are hardcoded region A playback and have a runtime of 81 minutes in it’s not rated tale.

Last Rites: Though spelled differently from the actual road Zzyzx, “Zyzzyx Road” isn’t a long, dull stretch of unattractive landscape the box office numbers had suggested. Yes, “Zyzzyx Road” has potholes, or rather plot holes, that need to be addressed and filled and some minor tweaking with its cast, but the tangling, tangoing trio of Heigl, Grillo, and Sizemore is an amusing 81 minutes of cerebral-damage cat-and-mouse.

“Zyzzyx Road” Collector’s Edition Now Available on Amazon.com!

EVIL Doesn’t Want You to Be All That You Can Be! “Despiser” reviewed! (Visual Vengeance / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

The “Despiser” Collector Edition Blu-ray Is a Must Own!

Gordon Hauge is an inspirating artist with little motivation.  Having just lost his contract work, being evicted from his home, and his wife leaving him, Gordon is left with virtually nothing, even no purpose.  While speeding home late a night, Gordon swerves to avoid pedestrians in the road and crashes his car, waking up in a nightmare-scape purgatory reigned by a malevolent monster known only as The Despiser.  The Despiser’s ragmen minions, governed by The Shadow Men, wreak havoc on the land by stealing nuclear warheads with the objective to rip a dimensional, absconding hole in their world that’ll lead into Gordon’s.  The Despiser’s only obstacle is a ragtag group of pious, historical fighters stuck too in purgatory after sacrificing their lives for a greater good and now are missioned to release everyone from The Despiser’s malicious hold over the Ragmen souls, as well as escape limbo themselves.  When The Despiser threatens his wife, Gordon joins the fight against evil and takes the battle head on.

Unlike anything you’ve ever seen before in the movie category, “Despiser” is the dark fantasy, action-thriller from 2003.  “Beyond the Rising Moon” and “Invader” Philip J. Cook’s own written-and-directed sci-fi odysseys distill the genre game by challenging the visual inside a unique story on a low-budget.  “Despiser” is no different digging into the horror building blocks of a soul-swallowing netherworld with a goliath creature having dominion.  Testing the waters with computer generated scenes still in their infancy and shot on the stringent, temperamental, and ever quality fluctuating video tape, the pre-millennium feature was shot in Cooke’s own home and makeshift production studio in Virginia of 1998, running against the wind and against the odds of coming out top with a promising product that audiences will like.  Cooke’s Eagle Film’s serves as the production company that naturally puts the filmmaker in the producer’s chair. 

In the role of the disoriented artist down on his luck Gordon Hague is Mark Redfield (“Dark and Stormy Night,” “Chainsaw Sally,” and the producer of the Redfield Arts Audio Podcast “The Midnight Matinee”).  Brassy and cocky, Gordon Hague feels very much like a classic character browbeaten into being cheap ground coffee, diluted by his own lack of ambition with a flavorless future.  That is until Gordon dies unexpectedly and becomes the prophesized champion of gung-ho, gun-toting good doers at the edge of oblivion and obliteration.  Guided by Carl Nimbus, an early 1900s cavalry soldier played rather convincingly cool by Doug Brown, the group is contrived with different era, different walks-of-life, and different skillset individuals fighting the good fight against a soul-damning manipulator, whom in itself is alien to the purgatory topography of fire, brimstone, lave, and apparently littered with nuclear missiles.  Fumie Tomasawa (Frank Smith), Charlie Roadtrap (Tara Bilkins), and Jake Tulley (Michael Weitz) form what’s left of the crusading squad, and each have their own personalities, backgrounds, and views toward eliminating the threat of otherworldly damnation. On the opposite side of the spectrum are the Shadow Men, the Despiser’s right hands overseeing the mindless henchmen known as the Ragmen. Shadow Men inhabit corporeal bodies and are a wild bunch of frenzy determination. In the story, there are only two individualized Shadow Man but one of those goonish souls sees three embodiments in a variety of acting styles by Dan Poole, Richard Dorton, and Mark Hyde with Jeff Rathner giving us first taste for the Shadow Men’s near indestructibility. Gage Sheridan, Mike Diesel, Chris Hahn, and Brian Neary fill in the supporting cast.

Early PlayStation graphics interlaced and spliced with live action shots of a doom and gloom purgatorial world is great way to surmise “Despiser.”  Just on the precipice of fine tuning the gaming-changing visual effects at the turn of the century, movie worlds go from tangible mattes, practical backgrounds, and hand-painted compositions to simply a green or, in “Despiser’s” case, a blue backdrop screen that allows actors to do their thespian work without anything around them to interact with or bounce off a certain emotion or reaction and visual effects artists will add-in and blend worlds, creatures, and effects in post-production.  Cook, along with Cory Collins, chiefly constructed an anhedonia embodied layer in between the plane of existence and the eternal beyond without losing a step with a seamless live actor application.  The whole film feels like the introduction prologue short in the first “Resident Evil” game, a mix exchanging edit of virtual and physical, but Cook doesn’t just switch frames between the two formats to tell the story, the imaginative animator and filmmaker adds life into his virtual landscape without being terribly clunky or be an ostentatious show his stitchwork.  Naturally with early VFX graphics, not every computer modeling element is forgiving and much of that expression lies with the antagonist, the Despiser himself.  The water-dwelling, dungeon being with limited movements and remains mostly in the shadows and for good reason with a scale that likely couldn’t be conceived or achieved in a technology that hasn’t yet be refined for the desired quality and public acceptance, and while the limited scope of the Despiser is bothersome, especially having to sit through it’s same motions over and over, Cook’s engaging story eases the pain tremendously with a suicide mission enlisted with likeable characters you really don’t want to see perish in purgatory. 

Evil Dam Trolls, holy light ammunitions, and nuclear missiles are only the tip of the iceberg in the new Visual Vengeance Blu-ray release of “Despiser.”  The Wild Eye Releasing subsidiary label prologues with the usual A/V disclaiming but the director-supervised transfer from the standard definition master of the original tape element holds up remarkably well on an AVC encoded, 1080p, BD50.  Perhaps a little radiantly effervescence, the frothy-rimmed and delicate in detail final product enhances the presentational submerged in sardonic storyline.  Besides, much of the early computer-generated imagery is smooth anyway and, in contrast, the palpable pieces often standout with deeper, textured nuances.  Bood spurts and muzzle flashes are, too, fashioned neatly into the frames.  Presented in a pillarbox full screen 1.33:1 aspect ratio, Cook balances the coloring and lighting inside the CGI world to roughly match the out-of-the-CGI-box steely tones of blue, green, and silver tints under softer shadows.   The lossless LPCM stereo mix offers up a pretty true to self fidelity that could, one day, receive an extensive channel and refining upgrade.  Machine gun fire, and there’s a ton of it, spatters off with an ingrained rat-a-tat force that’s more polished than your typical indie production whose discharges sound more like cap guns.  Dialogue plays to the makeshift setting strengths, providing echoes where needed in more cavernous locales to the muffled notes of long-range speak.  Optional English subtitles are available.  With a Visual Vengeance release you know you’re getting topnotch exclusive special features and packaging as well as archival goodies encoded onto the larger capacity disc, including two commentary tracks with director Philip J. Cook and actors Gage Sheridan and Mark Redfield on one and cult movie enthusiasts Sam Panico and Bill Van Ryn on the other, a making of “Despiser” featurette with Cook and Mark Hyde that goes deep within the nuts and bolts of it all, a handful of deleted scenes with title cards, a running blooper reel, outtakes, a storyboard to animation, the original lava-road DVD animated intro menu, a behind-the-scenes and art gallery, “Despiser” trailers, the Visual Vengeance advert trailer, and Cook’s “Outerworld” and “Invader” film trailers just beyond the fluid, cardboard cutout animated menu. But wait, that’s not all! Andrei Bouzikov’s illustrated compositional machine guns, mushroom clouds, and the four-armed Despiser, nearing Ghana-poster level but keeps in line with the filmic material, is a sight to behold on the cardboard O-slipcover. Inside, on the primary cover of the clear Blu-ray Amaray case, you get even more new art from Stefan “STEMO” Motmans that’s less tapestry art and more iconic as it is epic. The reverse side holds “Despiser'” original poster arrangement that’s simple yet effective. The disc is whimsically labeled with encircling blue, purple, green, and red evil trolls while the opposite, insert side has a folded mini poster of Bouzikov’s art, a colorful, dual-sided synopsis and Blu-ray acknowledgement sheet, and no release would be complete without the retro VHS sticker sheet. The 16th Visual Vengeance release is region free, unrated, and has a runtime of 105 minutes.

Last Rites: The soul wants what the soul wants and that is “Despiser” on a Visual Vengeance, collector’s edition Blu-ray. An out of pocket, retro-modeled, and portentous hell on Earth from beyond the stars movie too good to skip the bad parts.

The “Despiser” Collector Edition Blu-ray Is a Must Own!

EVIL Doesn’t Take Rejection Well. “Village of Doom” reviewed! (Unearthed Films / Collector’s Edition Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

“Village of Doom” now on Unearthed Film’s Collector’s Edition Blu-ray!

Tsugio Inumaru is considered the smartest young man in his village.  Illness took the life of his parents, and he raised by his grandmother and lives off her land’s income, looking after him and dreading the day Tsugio becomes drafted as a soldier in war service, which bestows great honor from the villagers.  While husbands are away serving their country, bored and lonely housewives and bachelorettes desire the carnal company of the men remaining and with Tsugio’s youth and his own sexual yearnings bubbling to the surface, he’s prime Kobe beef for the hungry village women.  When Tsugio’s health examination reveals a tuberculosis diagnosis, he’s acutely shunned by the villagers, drying up his sexual escapades, as well as potential betrotheds.  Rejection by his village, and even his country, sends the young man into plotting a massive killing spree, targeting all of those who’ve forsaken or scorned him to a life not worth living. 

In the Tsuyama outskirt village of Kamo of 1938, 21-year-old Mutsuo Toi cut the village’s electricity, strapped flashlights to the side of his head, and took a mini arsenal that included a Browning shotgun, a katana, and an axe to 30 villagers, including his grandmother, in an act to revenge killing for being rejected socially and sexually because of his tuberculosis diagnosis.  What is known as the Tsuyama Massacre, Mutsuo Toi’s cold and merciless act of carnage was the basis for Noboru Tanaka’s “Village of Doom.”  The pinkupsloitation director of “Rape and Death of a Housewife” and “Angel Guts:  Nami” helms the Japanese, semi-biographical tale, penned by Takuya Nishioka (“Tattoo,” “Female Teacher:  Chain and Bondage”), that follows closely the bullet point events of Mustuo Toi but with different named characters and a strong pink eiga touch.  “Village of Doom” is one of Kazuyoshi Okuyama’s (“R100,” “Self-Bondage:  All Tied Up with My Own Rope”) first produced ventures and is a production of the Fuji Eiga and Shochiku Eizo Companies. 

While Mutsuo Toi is not directly portrayed, his downward spiraling steps are indirectly followed by Tsugio Inumaru, played by the late Nikkatsu actor Masato Furuoya.  Furuoya’s relationship with director Noboru Tanaka is well established within their director-actor collaborating context with Furuoya having roles in Tanaka’s previous credits of “Rape and Death of a Housewife” and “Angel Guts:  Nami.”  There’s a blanket of comfortability within Furuoya who must treat his character as one-part pink paramour and one-part biographical massacrer, seducing with a tantamount tease of fantasy and authenticity.  Furuoya’s beleaguered performance is a jagged mountainous range of emotions from confidence and compassion to hormonal desires, to the stressed misgivings from cold shoulders and bad fortune mishandled by Tsugio’s own sense of worth to his himself and the village that has turned its back on him.  In keeping with the simulated practice of Yobai, the night crawling sexual escapades amongst young men and women, typically unmarried men and women, Tanaka portions heavily toward Tsugio’s internal grievances with the suddenly thrusted into the primitive and stimulated needs of a young man’s novice sex drive awaken with a morsel nude photograph.  Furuoya’s costars are the collective antagonist from the perspective of Tsugio with their geniality turned hostility of the TB diagnosis.  Sexualized warmth and freedom run rampant, peppered in between with subdued duty to village and country, that cradles an shy Tsugio’s into his manhood but when his manhood is threatened and the village neglects and rejects his contributions, Tsugio’s acute ostracization from within the only community circle he’s ever known disfigures his rationality into revenge.  The cast is surprisingly pink vet lite with the actors coming from other Japanese oriented popular subgenres like samurai films, erotic but tasteful comedies and romance, and horror with Misako Tanaka, Isao Natsuyagi (“Female Prisoner #701: Scorpion,” Kumiko Ôba (“Hausu”), Shino Ikenami (“Evil Dead Trap 2”), Midori Satsuki, Yashiro Arai, Renji Ishibashi, and Izumi Hara (“Island of the Evil Spirits”).

“Village of the Doom” is a two-toned down spiral to build up only to crash down the hopes of an impressionable young person.  Similarly seen in later works like Gus Van Sant’s “Elephant” where the visually intense, raw, and viscerally slicing culmination of enough-is-enough points back to the series of occurrences that significantly mile mark every step lead to the slaughter.  Set inside a valley surrounded by green mountains, the idyllic and rural riverside village impresses more backdrop tranquility than doom with slower pace and dutiful lifestyles but like most cutoff societies, the slow, insidious corruption of morality courses with infectious infidelity under the guise of Yobai, upends rightful justice and trades in for lynch mobs, and wanes promises for easy streets and exploitation run out dates that run its course for one but not the other.  All these aspects have relevant translatability to today’s cliques and inner circles that oust the unusual to where a sense of belonging feels hopelessly frustrating.  The isolation is so engrained that it highlights, in a very matter-of-fact way but does speak to it quite a bit, is the incestuous relationships between related villagers with the instances of Tsugio and cousin Kazuko’s flirtatious meetups and talk of marriage as well as Tsugio accidental arousal around his cousin’s aunt.  This adds to the tension and the corruption of that old idiom of don’t shit where you eat and the evident sourness spoils relationship ties when family is important to lessen the blows of life’s subsidiary problems.  For Tsugio, who is already dealt a bad hand with both parents deceased and his illness, the whole village rots what’s left of his innocence and ambitions and, in turn, aims to exterminate those who’ve foiled his purity.

A wicked, notorious true crime story now for the rest of the world to visual in “Village of Doom” on Blu-ray, courtesy of Unearthed Films on their Unearthed Classics sublabel.  The new Collector’s Edition Blu-ray is format encoded onto an AVC encoded, 1080p high-definition, BD50.  The picture is tempered with the muted colors, or rather the scaled grays, of an archaic Japanese village coupled by the browns and straw hued housing set amongst in and surrounded by a sea of green foliaged valley, and while objects are delineated nicely without any saturation bleeding or compression issues, the colors don’t necessary pop.  What does pop are the textures of the same articles mentioned above.  The groves of thatched wooden abodes are remarkable deep, the greens, though seamless, are nicely touched upon in the foreground, and skin consistencies vary person-be-person within idiosyncratic personal brackets with dynamic sweatiness and emotion-delivery contouring to accentuate.  The Japanese LPCM 1.0 mono has no problem discerning elements.  Though all funneling through a single channel, the dialogue and ambience works together thanks to the clean, more immersive ADR.  Mashanori Sasaji’s tests the soundscapes of traditional Japanese drum rhythms of Oo-daiko with then modernized synthesized notes to create a forebodingly, entrancing composition.  With any post-production voiceover work, dialogue is very robust, and the synchronized English subtitles offer an error-free and organic translation.  The original audio file is compressed cleanly with no issues with crackling, hissing, or any other damage for noting. Unearthed Film’s 17th spined Classics title supplements with an audio commentary by Asian film experts Arne Venema and Mike Leeder, a look at the Tsuyama Massacre in Dark Asia with Megan: Case #57 Japan’s Darkest Night, a promotional gallery, and the theatrical trailer. The Amary Blu-ray case is housed in a cardboard O-slipcover featuring Mutsuo’s iconic night-crawlin’ getup on Masato Furuoya’s Tsugio in colorless black-and-white. The case has the same image used for the cover with no reversible sleeve and the inside does not contain any tangible inserts or materials. The disc is pressed with not the same image but the same head flashlight Tsugio, this time looking right at you in unison with his shotgun barrel. The not rated feature has a runtime of 106 minutes and is region A locked.

Last Rites: “Village of Doom” depicts the same sad story that strikes the hearts of today’s mass shootings, spurred by the dispel from those in proximity, intimate, and friendly. “Village of Doom” is a true classic of casted out carnage relit by Unearthed Films to retell the notorious narrative of Japan’s deadliest mass killing ever.

“Village of Doom” now on Unearthed Film’s Collector’s Edition Blu-ray!

EVIL’s One Brush Stroke Away From Losing It! “Spiral” reviewed! (Ronin Flix / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

The New “Spiral” Now on Blu-ray!

Mason, a socially awkward painter and car insurance telemarketer, struggles to cope with a seemingly bad breakup that might have turned into a misdeed, but a quick call to his only, childhood friend Berkeley helps keep his anxious emotions from spiraling out of control into nightmarish allusions.  As Mason gradually works to purge his previously relationship, a woman who was also his inspiration for his artistic work, he suddenly meets Amber, a new amiable hire in his company, sitting with him on his lunchbreak outside bench.  Amber’s able to slowly break down Mason’s guarded wall of insecurity and two begin an innocent, romantic relationship as Mason continues to push his haunting past aside for Amber to fully step into being his modeling muse, but the further imbed she becomes into his life the more enigmatic secrets are revealed surrounding Mason’s life, even the darkness that slowly spreads and loops into it.

Actor Joel David Moore had established himself as an actor in early 2000s, usually portraying the lanky, awkward, if not ungainly trope in comedies most notably in “Dodgeball” and “Grandma’s Boy,” playing a supporting protagonist as well as lead antagonist.  Director Adam Green quickly became an overnight success amongst genre fans with his release of the Cajun miscreant slasher in “Hatchet” that would spawn a pair of sequels.  Having worked as actor and director respectively on “Hatchet,” Moore and Adam became good friends and decided to take a step further to not only expand upon an acting career and expand upon the objectivity of storytelling but also to co-direct their next project entitled “Spiral.”  The script, that orbits around the romantic-psychological thriller purview, is cowritten between Moore with debut feature writer Jeremy Boreing.  The 2007 film revolves around and enters the disconnected mind of an emotionally compromised individual and how he copes and handles everyday life while in constant fear.  “Spiral” is executively produced by Moore and costar Zachary Levi along with Boreing, David Muller, Kurt Schemper and Cory Neal producing under the Balcony 9 and ArieScope Pictures production flag.

If you haven’t gathered already, “Spiral” is Joel David Moore’s baby.  Moore’s idea natural earmarked him as the executive producer and the project is the first to land him a directorial and a writer credit, so unsurprisingly, the role of the socially recluse and mentally scarred Mason went to the Portland, Oregon born actor, likely a role he wrote with himself in mind.  As Mason, Moore breaks the mold that has trapped him in previous films that were relegated to what producers might have considered not leading man material, leaving much to be desired when stuck in a second of third string supporting role.  Then Adam Green puts Moore in “Hatchet” and in the principal protagonist role.  The opportunity proves Moore had more than just comic, sidekick relief and he really cements Mason’s depth with ticks, tantrums, and a taste for tenterhook romance.  Meeting Mason in the ambiguous opening stirs internal conflict for how we’re supposed to receive this hyperventilating wailer confessing to something vile we’re not privy too just yet.  From there, we meet the philandering, go-with-the-flow, and Mason’s best bud, only friend at that, Berkeley (Zachary Levi, “Shazam!) and the quirky cute and Mason-eyer Amber (“Amber Tamblyn, “The Ring”) that develop upon Mason’s home-work relationship that highlight his interests – painting and jazz – as well as his disinterests – basketball and speaking about his past.  The very opening scene compared to the heart of much of the story has stark contrast and, so much so, that audiences will tend to forget Mason’s late-night phone call ramblings and fear to his friend Berkeley, his wake-up screaming nightmares to wear he looks at his hands for blood, and his overall highly anxious persona when he’s talking shop and girls with Berkeley and breaking out of his shell of solitude with Amber in a lengthy string of normalacy.  Ryan Chase, David Muller, Annie Neal and Lori Yohe fill out the cast.

“Spiral” is all about the trauma, a fiercely common theme inside the heads of the mental thriller subgenre.  With deeply troubled lead character, an at interval switchboard that lights and darkens between the protagonist and ambiguous antihero storyline, watching Mason grow, fall, grow, fall, grow, and then finally collapse in a heap of his own trauma is terrifyingly satisfying, mostly to the thanks of Moore’s added plummeting nuances that spit his character back into abnormality.  Mason’s arc circulates in a circular pattern and the evidently timebomb is ticking away but in the middle of that circulation forms a bond, a friendship, an affair, hope, compassion, and every affirmative adjective you can think of to bring happiness to what shouldn’t be a happy trajectory because in the back of our minds, darkness lies.  That’s the sublayer of this trauma-laden yarn with a repressive factor and the key to unleash years of pent up unlocks a whole new side of Mason, one that isn’t completely illuminated upon until the shocking, device-destroying end.  

Ronin Flix rekindles Joel David Moore and Adam Green’s “Spiral” back to Blu-ray with an AVC encoded, 1080p resolution, BD50. Comparatively to the Anchor Bay 2010 Blu-ray release, which also presents the film in a widescreen 1.78:1 aspect ratio, Ronin Flix edges out the now decade previous release but not by much. The back cover only notes the label went through a film restoration with no other details or specifics to elaborate but from a spectator’s view, the 2024 restoration handles a sharper delineation that provides excellent depth that plays key to the various scenes of Amber and Mason’s painting sessions, Mason’s guilt-ridden obsession with the bathroom door, and Mason’s overhead cubicle viewpoint to name a few examples. Details are much more specific in brighter, ambient-lit scenes than the darker shades of key lighting or night sequences not only because of the innate lack of illumining exposure. Blacks tend to crush slightly, bleeding in the details and washing them out in blank of black. Skin and textures particularize better on Ronin Flix’s upgrade that uses a newer codec for compression, elevating the elaboration for this under-the-radar indie. The English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 manages the lossless mix much in the same was as Anchor Bay’s with greatly clear articulation on the forefront, a spacious and spatial ambient track, a patterned sound design dynamic to the progression, and a supporting soundtrack that while isn’t overly worthwhile does aid the varying moods, especially when Mason turns on a dime intertwined with jazz brass. Decent sound diffusion through the back and side channels to harness surrounding elements while the fronts tackle the predominant dialogue until an occasion acousmatic turns our heads and our attention. English subtitles are available for selection. The static menu offers special features that includes exclusive content, such as a newly put together making-of “Spiral” entitled Paint it Red, an audio commentary with Adam Green and Joel David Moore, director of photography Will Barrett, and editor Cory Livingston an a behind-the-scenes documentary featurette with interviews from Green, Moore, Livingston, Barrett and co-star and producer Zachary Levi. Archival content includes an audio commentary with the co-directors, director of photography, Levi, writer Jeremy Boreing, and actress Amber Tamblyn, and rounds out with the theatrical trailer. A cardboard O-slipcover sheathes the Blu-ray Amaray case and both contain the same more-gruesome-than-it-really-is cover art and David Levine package design. Inside the case is just the disc pressed with a third copy of the hand dripping blood, or paint. Ronin Flix release is rated PG-13 for disturbing behavior, violence, some partial nudity and language, has a runtime of 91 minutes, and also unlike the Anchor Bay release, this release has region free playback.

Last Rites: “Spiral” paints Joel David Moore in a whole new light, colored in vague tones that just nip at nerves, and slaps you square in the face just when things start to feel warm, cozy, and safe.

The New “Spiral” Now on Blu-ray!