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EVIL’s Duality May Be More Than What Meets the Eye. “The Ugly” reviewed! (Unearthed Classics / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

“The Ugly” Limited Edition Blu-ray Now Available!

A famed female psychologist is requested to work the possible acquittal case of a serial killer named Simon Cartwright and understand his possible motive for slashing his victim’s throats at seemingly random.  Unscrupulously tormented by a pair of odd orderlies, Simon Cartwright calmly carries himself as a humble, articulate, and friendly conversationalist and confessed killer with a darker side, an ugly side that drives him to kill at will.  Cartwright gives her the anecdotal trappings of his kills that prove to be unprovoked and unsystematic from a side of him he can’t ignore.  Confounded by this, the psychologist pushes him to brink for an exact reason, one Cartwright keeps buried deep inside his subconscious that may or may not be supernaturally driven.  As Cartwright’s past continues to haunt him and with the psychologist assertive herself into his psyche, the dangerous method of analyzing criminal behavior won’t stop a plagued killer from killing again as his next victim might just be sitting across from him in the cross-examination room.  

Themes of split personality, past abuse and trauma, and the limited authority of control course through “The Ugly’s” veins like acid, sweltering with tension and ready to burn a hole through the safety of custody and storytelling once the twisted truth is told.  New Zealand filmmaker Scott Reynolds debuted with his feature length film back in 1997. Reynolds also wrote the script that kept an intimate approach between killer and doctor, kept audiences guessing the supernatural aspect, and made taut the lead-up moments filled with human tenderness that went into subsequent violence that painted a portrait of a conflicted killer afflicted by derangement that might not be his own.  Shot in Auckland, New Zealand, “The Ugly” is a production of Essential Films with funds from the New Zealand Film Commission and is produced by “Jack be Nimble” producer Jonathan Dowling.

In a vague mirroring of Dr. Hannibal Lector and FBI Clarice Starling from “Silence of the Lambs,” there’s still the intention to understand the mind of a serial killer.  In the Clarice-like role is a civilian, a psychologist to be more precise, one that has received recognition to get the most dangerous criminals released from incarceration, is Dr. Karen Schumaker, played by Rebecca Hobbs (“Lost Souls”) that would be her biggest lead role in the New Zealand film market.  Opposite her, across the table mostly and chained to a chair, is Paolo Rotondo with a cold stare and a handsome face that doesn’t exactly say I’m a serial killer.  When graced with a prosthetic that makes half his face appear melted or scared in fleeting glimmers or reflections, scenes that often felt needed more attention or a longer say, that’s when Rotondo could exact his intimidation upon the viewer as the true monster, as Cartwright has referred to himself in more words.  Instead, Cartwright’s a clean shaven, well-dressed, and respectable Patrick Batman type without the three-piece suit and the Huey Lewis and the News obsession and not as King’s British and as quirky in his demeanor as Anthony Hopkins as Lector.  Both characters fall and fail hard to the supporting case of the two orderlies and their employing resident psychologist.  Sporting dreads and walking with confidence like a WWE wrestling being introduced, Paul Glover (“The Locals”) has more flavor in his mostly stoic intimidating orderly performance alongside his more animated and ragdoll movement buddy in Chris Graham (“Moby Dick”) as the two mistreat the Cartwright with disdain.  Their employer, Dr. Marlowe, has a snooty creepiness about him that’s akin to being a mad scientist-type that’s fits into the goon orderly dynamic with Roy Ward (“Perfect Creature”) at the helm.  Darien Takle and Vanessa Byrnes costar as chief supports. 

‘The Ugly” is certainly a child of the 1990s with that glossy gleam without it a lens flare spark of digital anamorphic.  The aesthetic matches the subject matter with dreary, cold, and gloomy nu metal nuisances, teetering on the edge of being also grungy.  Editor Wayne Cook’s transitions and cuts are indicative of the era in filmmaking with whooshing transitions and flashes of disorienting cuts, such as white outs or seamless segues.  This techniques also translates into Simon Cartwright’s headspace with acute and fleeting glimpses of his mental state visualized into the real word, or it’s the real world sheathed by a layer from beyond the grave, but either way his perspective quickly provides a glimpse into his reason for killing, his duplicitous degradation into insanity, and that it can be projected to others outside the exclusive rights of his person.  Most of the story is told anecdotally through Cartwright’s perspective and as storyteller, his events are muddled by his own struggle with killing that becomes more evident as the story progresses.  What’s most interesting about Reynold’s film is it’s reality bending to keep the audience engaged as he puts the psychologist character, Dr. Karen Schumaker for those who forgot, right into the frame of his story as a third party speaking directly to Cartwright and only Cartwright can see and hear, but she’s implemented naturally as if sitting at the table with the storied characters or being a part of a three-way conversation that but not truly.  Between these style characteristics and the narrative’s odd macabre, along with the deep black, sour crude oil shaded blood, “The Ugly” is grimly beautiful with visuals and stimulating to watch. 

Unearthed Films, under their Unearthed Classics sublabel, provide a new Collector’s Edition Blu-ray release to the table.  The AVC encoded, 1080p high-definition resolution, BD50 has stored on it a 4K restoration from the film’s original 35mm interpositive and looks neat as a pin presented in it’s 1.77:1 widescreen aspect ratio, rendered with a well-diffused color palette of a lighter blues and grays that contrast starkly with the deeper black blood in a semblance of a dystopian or alternate reality in circa late 90s to early 2000s films.  Saturation is copious with all colors and the details are sharp mostly in the peripheral setting with the focal objects having be defined nicely but there is some textural loss on the skin and clothing under its higher contrast.  The audio formats within are an uncompressed LPCM 2.0 Stereo of the original theatrical audio and a relatively uncommon 4.0 DTS-HD MA that caters to the side and back channels rather than a central output and a LFE subwoofer, so the track is not as deep and resonating and it discerns as such with more range and less punchy impact that encompasses at the dialogue, ambience, Foley, and soundtrack excellently considering.  Dialogue is clean and clear without obstruction or touchups to the original audio files.  English SHD and Subtitles are available for selection.  The collector’s edition contents include an isolated score from composer Victoria Kelly (“Black Sheep,” “The Locals”), a 1997 radio interview from New Zealand with writer-director Scott Reynolds, an audio commentary with chief principal actors Paolo Rotondo and Rebecca Hobbs, Reynolds’ early 90’s short films “A Game With No Rules” and “The M1nute,” “The Ugly Visual Essay” compares “The Ugly” to true crime serial killers of reality, a photo gallery, and the original theatrical trailer.  The physical presence of “The Ugly” is anything but with it’s beautiful packaged design, beginning with the commissioned Slipcover cover art that wholly embodies the essence of the story, rather than being an exploitative mislead, by Scott Jackson of Monsterman Graphic.  The clear Blu-ray Amaray case has a reversible sleeve with the same Jackson art with the reverse containing the film’s original one-sheet artwork.  Inside is a 6-page booklet a pair of essays by Jason Jenkins along with monochrome and colored stills.  The disc is also pressed with a tense hunting scene as well.  The 18th Blu-ray title for the Unearthed Films’ sublabel is region A locked, not rated, and has a runtime of 93 minutes.

Last Rites: As far as understanding the mind of a New Zealand serial killer, Scott Reynold’s “The Ugly” depth charges reality with not only a promising supernatural layer but also a strange world these characters live and act against that invigorates a rather talkative and anecdotal story with eccentric and uncomfortable personalities that rival the killer himself.

“The Ugly” Limited Edition Blu-ray Now Available!

Bring Those EVILLY Responsible to US! “Garden of Love” reviewed! (Unearthed Films / Collector’s Limited Edition Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

“Garden of Love” on Blu-ray from Unearthed Films!

Rebecca Verlaine is the sole surviving child of a brutal massacre of her family and fellow amity commune by masked killer.  Years later, attending university and in a relationship with a professor named David, Rebecca has not been affected by the tragedy because of her post-traumatic amnesia induced response, a protective reaction by her mind.  When Rebecca begins to see grotesque images and corpses talk to her through the television, to the point of being frozen in fear, her adopted Uncle and Aunt, acting in the role of her real parents, along with David divulge the horrible truth about her father’s slaying.  Unable to shake the feeling she must visit the site of the massacre; Rebecca is escorted by police to the building where the ghosts of the television physically manifest and will slaughter all those Rebecca brings to them in retribution of their unpleasant death.  Rebecca must somehow unearth and bring to post-humorous justice their killer, but little does she know those responsible are already closely intertwined into her life.   

Director and special effects artist Olaf Ittenbach is one of the few kings of independent splatter horror between mid-1990s to present.  The German-born, “Premutos:  The Fallen Angel” and “Dard Divorce” filmmaker has accumulated gorehounds over last two and half decades with outrageous gore effects to the likes of early days Sam Raimi and Peter Jackson and subtle comedic gags inside the ghastliness of bodies being literally ripped to shreds.  The 2003 released “Garden of Love,” aka “The Haunting of Rebecca Verlaine,” is a pure example of Ittenbach never letting loose the reins of cathartic, blood-soaked chaos with a simple tale of supernatural revenge.  Ittenbach cowrites the script with Thomas Reitmair, the third writer-director collaboration behind “Riverplay” and “Beyond the Limits,” and the director has total control over his production by serving as the executive producer financier under his studio company IMAS Filmproduktion in association with Benfeghoul Goldberg Filmproduktion and producers Yazid Benfeghoul (“Sky Sharks”) and Ricky Golderg (“Beyond the Limits”). 

Natacza Boon, the English actress behind acting in a parallel Ittanbach production “Beyond the Limits” the same year, stars the adult version of Rebecca Verlaine bewildered by the truth be told after learning of her amnesia and once ghastly ghosts begin to talk to her through television sets.  Boon does a good job selling the initial fear and then transitioning into acceptance that was she’s visioning is real, real enough to absolute slaughter anyone in a spray of blood spatter when crossing its path.  While Boon is English born, the rest of the cast also includes more Ittenbach entourage American with Daryl Jackson (“Beyond the Limits,” “Dard Divorce”) playing Rebecca’s secret-holding lover David and the German native James Matthews-Pyecka (“Beyond the Limits,” “Legend of Hell”) as the initial inspector on the Verlaine massacre returning to the cold case to assist Rebecca’s need to explore her forgotten history.  Through the differing nationalities and styles each performer brings to the this splatter film, their dynamics have synergy having worked in tandem with another and despite their difference languages there is no language barrier to be broken as the film is written and shot in English with Mattehws-Pyecka, and the rest of the living principal cast of Rebecca’s adopted parents in Uncle Don and Aunt Barbara (Donald Stewart and Alexandra Thom-Heinrich), communicating with clear pronunciation.  German musician and actor, Bela B., a stage name as the punk rock drummer and vocalist for Die Ärzte, has an equally primary role that opposites Boon in portraying her murdered father’s vengeful spirit.  Real name Dirk Albert Felsenheimer, he’s depicted mostly in gruesome face-wounded makeup and ghostly milky white eyes that haunt his onscreen daughter Rebecca from beyond the grave and manifest only in the building where he died (much like that BBC show “Ghosts” but Ittenbach did it first).  Felsenhaimer’s unique facial contours make for good prosthetic balefulness and frightful fear being the head ghost who doesn’t necessarily go for the throat right away like the others.

“Garden of Love” is a cut-and-dry revenge film from the other side with not just a touch of but a full five-finger death punch of gory exaggerated explosion from Olaf Ittenbach.  Gabe Verlaine, his daughter, and his commune of bohemians have their harmony violently stolen from them, creating disharmony in the afterlife.  Their unrest is stretched outward into the corporeal world as love and peace is replaced with hate and spite in stark contrast.  Yet, and this where the little things become lost to the ridiculously entertaining blood splatter, the reason why their group returns to take vengeance is far from being elucidated.  Apparently, Gabe is also sitting on a fortune for his…well…we don’t know.  He plays the guitar but there are hints of him being a talented musician, but it’s never explained on why he’s sitting on a nest egg that’s the overarching theme of greed ingrained into the “Garden of Love” story.  What’s not ambiguous is the practical effects done with complete care in all fields from Olaf Ittenbach and Tommy Opatz (“BloodRayne,” “Black Death”) special makeup and prosthetic effects to the flawless editing work of Eckart Zeraway to piece the components of a sequence together for seamless quality and relayed purpose, such as pulling out comedy from the slapstick splatter of bodies literally being torn apart.  Let’s not forget to mention Holger Fleig’s cinematography as he captures eldritch supernaturality to emphasize the undead commune in an European, specifically Italian, way with a glowingly colorful, backlit haze that’s denotes an otherworldly tone, a tinged musing of Michael Müller’s work in “Premutos, compared to the modernist and contemporary arrangements of a clean and minimalism look with the living done without specialized lighting.

Unearthed Films delivers more Olaf Ittenbach to a 1080p high definition transfer, AVC encoded, Collector’s Limited-Edition Blu-ray, a BD50 disc.  Plenty of storage capacity to handle Fleig’s aura lighting aesthetic that’s show pristine saturation inside the 35mm stock, a format departure for Ittenbach who regularly use of video was an antithesis to pinnacle quality.  With an aspect ratio of 1.77.1 widescreen, “Garden of Love’s” imagery looks good albeit some of its sterile mise-en-scene layering of a production set, colors are touched up nicely to provide a supernatural backlit of purple and blue gel lighting, diffused through a smoke machine that greatly cues the in-and-outs of Gabe Verlaine’s crew of the vengeful dead with an accompanying gore with a stark tone of red and black, and the compression coding is easily digestible on the extended capacity disc with no signs of artefact interference to note and no interruption from a preserved early 2000’s print.  Aforementioned, this German product is entirely shot in English, recorded during principal photography, and can be presented in either an uncompressed PCM 2.0 or an uncompressed DTS-HD 5.1 surround mix depending on your setup.  Dialogue can be a bit boxy, leans little toward overexertion within the scope of the production setup, and is not the native language of a few actors but through the release encoding the mix comes out nicely balanced and clear without any distortion.  Same can be said for the milieu and the action Foley, especially during the carnage of spirits versus the coppers that highlights the perforation of body, the squish and thwack from pulverizing, and the spray of the blood, resulting in a range of onomatopoeia that too includes gun shots and atmospheric reverberate. English subtitles are available.  Extras include a making-of featurette that provides raw footage from behind-the-scene of principal photography and the special effects gags, a second behind-the-scenes featurette with cast-and-crew clipped interviews, an Unearthed Films exclusive outtake reel that runs without audio for much of it, a new photo gallery, and the original trailer.  The first Blu-ray pressings include a limited O-slip cover with a new illustrated composition artwork on the front cover of the slip and inside the Amaray sleeve that showcases exactly what you’re getting – gore, ghosts, and an otherworldly glow – presented in a dark and soul peering artistic rendition.  I did find the slipcover to be annoying too tight around the case, making it difficult to remove the Blu-ray to the point of damaging the product.  The disc is pressed to resemble a vinyl, like the one used in the film to signal the arrival of the spirits’ malevolence.  The region A locked Blu-ray comes not rated and has a runtime of 89 minutes. 

Last Rites: Fans of absurd violence and gore need to see Olaf Ittenbach’s “Garden of Love” that’s not colorfully rich in all its limbs and viscera, as well as an ethereal lighting, on a new Blu-ray release from Unearthed Films!

“Garden of Love” on Blu-ray from Unearthed Films!

This Casting Couch Has Something Far More EVIL Planned Than Some Sleazy Fetish Videos! “Maskhead” reviewed! (Unearthed Films /Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

“Maskhead” on Blu-ray from Unearthed Films!

Syl and Maddie are lesbian lovers and producers of adult fetish films.  Always seeking new talent and models, they continuously invite potential performers to their casting couch for a little background interview and test the waters of their willingness to be humiliated or dominating on camera.  When the camera rolls, the plot is about as normal as any fetish produced adult feature can be to get a viewer’s rocks off but when the imposing, metal face gear-wearing Maskhead enters frame, the change of perversion goes from sexualized fetishes to snuff material as Maskhead torments, tortures, and kills the models as Syl and Maddie enthusiastically continue to capture it all on camera with great relish in their pain and suffering.  At the bidding of the sociopathic lesbians, their associate named Cowboy purveys potential performers with his southern charm and witty storytelling as well as supplying them with jet fuel-infused weed.  With shoots lined up, Syl and Maddie are extremely tickled for the soon-to-be tortured talent ahead of them. 

After his stint of SOV sickness and violence with the August Underground trilogy, writer-director Fred Vogel continues his expedition through videotape exploitation with a codirector effort in the 2009 extreme horror “Maskhead.”  Written-and-codirected with Scott Swan, who has since transitioned into a transgendered woman Rebecca Swan, the “Extremity” and “Big Junior” filmmaker Swan folds into Vogel’s guerilla-esque scripted joy for the juggler through a nihilistic lens.  “Maskhead” is hot-rodding sadism at its nastiest in the underground world of ultra-violent and extreme horror, produced by Vogel under his Toe Tag Pictures alongside wife and costar Shelby Lyn Vogel and once frequent collaborator and special effects guru Jerami Cruise whose gruesome squibs and bloody prosthetics of August Underground’s “Mordum” and “Penance” opened the door for specialty costuming for Hollywood blockbusters, especially in the MCU with “Avengers:  Infinity War,” “Captain Marvel” and “Black Panther.”  “Maskhead” might not be a morally just superhero but can be definitely feared as superhuman with his nail protruding through a plank strap-on! 

Maskhead is essentially the executioner you don’t want to meet on an isolated porn set, caught vulnerable in your unmentionables.  The titular character is played voicelessly Michael Witherel having just come off the set of Vogel’s “Murder Collection Volume 1” released the same year.  Wrapped in bloody bandages around his upper torso, chest and head, encased with a strapped metal mask with spikes around the mouth area, Maskhead is virtually a ghost without background, without a wound explanation, and we don’t know what makes the grunting brute tick to do the cruelties he does in the unexplained relationship with Syl and Maddie who rely on Maskhead to splatter their stars into full potential.  Syl and Maddie have a little more breadth:  they’re lovers, fetish smut producers, and total sociopaths.  The women speak romantically about their auditioners coupled with immense torture-kill innuendo as a preponderance of their relationship foreplay.  Shelby Lyn Vogel and Danielle Kings have certifiable chemistry between them as lovers and portray crisp killers of apathetic character as they lap up laughter, love, and the loose morals in the face of someone’s life in their hands or behind their camera.  Shelby Lyn Vogel has worked around Vogel’s catalogue for the most of his career with roles in “The Redsin Tower” and “The Final Interview” while Danielle Inks (“My Uncle John is a Zombie!”) inaugurates herself into extreme film, and film altogether in her debut, without missing beat being the dress-wearing famine next to Vogel’s more butch lesbian.  While Vogel and Inks make an interesting pair of murderers, the more fascinating character Daniel V. Klien’s Cowboy, a charming supplier of casting couch talent with the gift of gab and the occasional backdoor fisting.  Klein (“Murder Collection V.1,” “The Final Interview”) adds to Cowboy’s mysteriousness debonair with a great twang, bearish mustache, and slightly portly figure in cowboy boats, black vest, and tight underpants when getting his kink on.  Cowboy’s persuasive manner and false promises build the character who’s to meet Syl and Maddie’s wishes.  Now, whether the couple plays Cowboy or not is not elucidated, one thing is clear the character does the Cowboy way when it comes to fetish desires and traversal wandering.  “Maskhead” is fairly carte blanche in casting their onscreen kill list with actors John Ross, Chris Krzysik, Mary Shore, Nicole Divley, David P. Croushore, Janelle Marie Szczypinski, Donna MacDonald, Lacey Fleming, and Damien A. Maruscak breaking more than a leg in their character acts. 

Suitable for those with bloodlust eyes, “Maskhead” meets niche criteria as an extreme gore and shock feature that’s all exploitational style and no narrative substance.  This type of film is very much similar to Fred Vogel’s “August Underground” series of randomized bits and pieces of not only the poor unfortunate’s filleted flesh and exposed bones but also with the disconnected scenes compiled together to meet at most the full-length feature runtime requirements.  The bare plotline to “Maskhead” are lesbian lovers Syl and Maddie signing unsuspecting actors to their doom for the sake of their snuff movies, that’s the extent and stoppage point of “Maskhead” to move forward with any sort of three act narrative. The rest intends to shock with one-sided, visceral violence that is the epitome of torture porn with bound people being merciless put in the wrath of “Maskhead” and other extreme moments of provocativeness, including Syl and Maddie’s footsy foreplay under a public restaurant table or Cowboy’s elbow deep fisting of a local gay bar tweaker.  While ultra violence and deviancy doesn’t go without merit, everyone knows I enjoy a good uncensored bloodsplatter and sexpot debauchery scene, the film is just a continuous string of nothing but that can be utterly monotonous, especially in the length of 89-minutes as it is with “Maskhead.” 

“Maskhead” is a course in sexual deviancy, a killer perversion that’ll speak to few but be repugnant by many.  You can test your ethic caliber by owning a copy of “Maskhead” on the new Unearthed Films’ Blu-ray.  The AVC encoded, 1080p high-definition, BD50 is packed with extras and presents the feature in the original aspect ratio 1.77:1 widescreen.  Vogel and Swan use polar quality to convey their narrative with a downgraded resolution, around a true 480p, with Syl’s perspective, capturing every gruesome event on her camcorder, much the same as found footage, while the rest of the film is shot in a higher, digital resolution with a third person perspective.  There’s certainly no singular picture quality approach as even third picture rollercoasters with an inconsistent, and slightly unstable, look under low-lit scenes, such as with the Syl and Maddie restaurant scene, and this unfavored condition is not a compression issue but rather a result of equipment and poor lighting, hence gore-and-shock’s conventional bantam budget.  Depth is not really a thing with the quality and a maximization of extreme closeups to get all the uncomfortableness of personal bubble space and grisly slaughter into the frame.  Color grading is also pretty much nonexistent with a raw and natural flat aesthetic palette, adding to the strived realism aspect extreme horror usually attempts to achieve.  The only audio option available is an uncompressed English PCM 2.0 that services these types of films well enough as dialogue comes over cleanly and relatively clear when on-board and commercial on-board mics are placed appropriately.  No hissing, crackling, or popping to note.  If screaming bloody hell is a high-frequency vocal modulation that gets you off than, of course, there’s plenty from the “Maskhead” track to go around.  Again, not much depth or range because of the near proximity of most of the scenes.  English subtitles are optionally available.  Much like Unearth Films’  “August Underground”  release, “Maskhead” comes packed with plenty of new and a few returning special features.  There are two new feature length commentary tracks with 1) directors Fred Vogel and Scott Swan and 2) with Vogel again with wife Shelby Lyn Vogel, special effects artist Jerami Cruise, and Ultra Violent Magazine’s Art Ettinger.  A third 2009 commentary precedes and seeks to replace the first new commentary with Vogel and Swan.  An exclusive Unearthed Films introduction by Toe Tag’s Fred Vogel provides a little gratitude from Vogel about the new release.  Swan also has his own feature cut of the film which may be more favorable for those looking for a story as the codirector’s cut seeks to build more context through editing and pacing toward the story rather than Vogel’s emphasis on the torture/gore.  Interviews with Vogel Frankenstein’s Maskhead, the titular character himself Behind the Mask, and the Cowboy Below the Brim offers that slither of realism and behind-the-scenes bibelots that makes “Maskhead” tick.  There’s also a plethora of new featurettes of raw behind-the-scenes footage:  the first test footage for “Maskhead,” the creation of the titular character, an extended death scene of Food Girl (Janelle Marie Szczypinsk), as well as on set with Food Girl, fun with special effects at Toe Tag Studios, moments from the recording room to flesh out those sound details, such as Cowboy’s whistling and some growling, grunting, and groaning techniques, I Will Break Your Fucking Arm takes you behind the scenes of the arm rack’s special effects and setup, the infamous rape scene with a 2×4 is more raw footage of preparation with a little more skin time from both Mary Shore and Michael Witherel, The Room ganders the old hotel room where Cowboy gets fisty, the character elements – mask, gauze, and 2×4 – that make Maskhead Maskhead, and an extended photo gallery.  Archive extras round out the massive list with the Jerami Cruise commentated short “Dildo:  The Creation of Maskhead,” a blooper reel, Cowboy’s Whistling Clinic to be the best professional whistler as you can be, and the trailer.  Physical elements of Unearthed Films’ latest has a cardboard O-slip featuring green graded image composition of the primary cast of characters.  The same image is displayed on the one-sided cover art of the conventional Blu-ray Amaray case.  I’m curious about one thing though, did Unearthed Films get permission from Rebecca Swan to use her then biological male name Scott Swan for credit?  I assume so with the rational of that was who created the film back in 2009.  The region A locked release and is not listed as not rated but is not rated. 

Last Rites: Most will consider “Maskhead” senseless depiction of pseudo-torture but I’m glad Unearthed Films and Fred Vogel were able to supply and add supplemental raw footage on this upgraded release. Hours upon hours of reel that shows careful preparation and setup and the dedicated cast and crew examining every shot and listening to cast suggestions that humanizes the film a little more on a relatable level and demonize it less as just junk food for gorehounds.

“Maskhead” on Blu-ray from Unearthed Films!

A Talking Black Lab with EVIL Red Eyes Target Children. “Where the Dead Go to Die” reviewed! (Mountain Oddities Home Video / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

“Where the Dead Go To Die” Now Lives on Blu-ray!

The first story in a disturbing 3-part omnibus tale concerns a little boy named Tommy.  Constantly at each other’s throats, Tommy’s troubled  parents don’t burden him down in their mini bickering wars and abusive verbal tirades where he becomes the passive aggressive fodder for each of them to shell the other with, but when Labby, a talking, red-eye dog proclaiming to be a messenger of God’s word, tells Tommy to kill unborn brother because he’s the antichrist, Tommy’s world is turned upside down when Labby murders both parents and the unborn child in the name of God.  In another story, a man steals liquid memories by killing people and extracting an intoxicating substance from their memory glands to inject them into his own body.  One particular liquid memory of a dying prostitute sends him through a warped nightmare of the underworld, one where he may never return to normal.  The last story focuses on a mask-wearing deformed boy named Ralphie, whose Siamese twin brother’s face protrudes out of the side of his face, and his infatuation with schoolmate and neighbor Sophia.  When trying to impress Sophia by relating to her father, Ralphie learns the father records VHS tapes of Sophia being molested by older men and is coerced to partake in an act Sophia is an unwilling participant.  At the behest of Labby, what Ralphie does next will put a fatal stop to the madness that surrounds him and his soulmate crush. 

In the same clunky spirit of crude early 1990’s computer generated imagery or in the early days of the original Playstation graphics, Jimmy ScreamerClauz’s “Where the Dead Go to Die” fully embraces the ungainly graphics in a 3D world of unimaginable horror where kids and demons intersect with wretched results.  The 2012 omnibus reflects three short narratives from ScreamerClauz and combined into one seriously screwed up tale, orchestrated by deal brokered wit Unearthed Films’s Stephen Biro who was sent two of ScreamerClauz’s short films – “Tainted Milk” and “Liquid Memories” – and challenged, or maybe even championed, ScreamerClauz for a third to build toward, and the eventual release of, a feature length product.  With the challenge accepted, the full-time musician and 3D animation artist succeeded with an unforgettable story that’s pure evil at heart and a surreal kaleidoscope of ghastly phantasmagoria.  ScreamerClauz not only writes, directs, and composes the film he also produces under the Draconian Films and Chainsaw Kiss production companies.  

As it has been already established Jimmy ScreamerClauz wears many hats in his production, we can add another with his voice acting of the demonic, fireball-eyed dog, Labby and along with the director’s voiceover participation, other genre actors and filmmakers are casted to voice one, or possibly more than one, of the crudely animated, disturbingly souled characters.  “Subject 87” director, “Reality Bleed-Through” actor Brandon Slagle tackles a double voiceover with the memory addicted man as well as Sophia’s sleazy abusive father.  As Sophia, the once upon a time softcore horror actress Ruby Larocca (“Witchbabe:  The Erotic Witch Project 3,” “Dr. Jekyll & Mistress Hyde”) has real innocent palpability up against Slagle’s aggressively toned, VHS-recording, and peeping perve that is her in character daddy.  Larocca also voices the mysterious advice-giver with the Lady in the Well and as the dying Hooker in the arms of the serial killer-for-liquid memories Man.  Another multi-voice player in the film and who also had a stint in the sex and violence category is Joey Smack with a string of strangler themed films (“Vampire Strangler,” “The Masked Strangler,” “The Bizarre Case of the Electric Cord Strangler, etc.,”).  Smack extends himself into a child and parent performance as the deformed Ralphie in “The Masks That the Monsters Wears” and Tommy’s dad in “Tainted Milk” that gives provides range albeit the quintessential grown man mimicking a child’s voice unmistakableness in the cracking high voice.  Much like Larocca, there’s something pleasant in seeing names like Linnea Quigley (“Return of the Living Dead,” “Night of the Demons”) and Devanny Pinn (“Nude Nuns with Big Guns,” “Bloodstruck”) be credited to voice because that takes the focus on their physical appearances and gives them a chance to actually be seen, or rather heard, with their dialogue performance.  In this instance, Quigley and Pinn embody the rancid maternity of Sophia and Ralphies’ mothers respectively.  “Where the Dead Go to Die” rounds out the cast with more B-movie actors in Trent Haaga (“Terror Firmer,” “Killjoy 2:  Deliverance from Evil”) as Ralph’s ashamed dad as well as Carlos Bonilla, Victor Bonacore, and Joshua Michael Greene. 

How a filmmaker chooses and utilizes his brand of CGI landscape is how that filmmaker’s film should be judged in the gelling of those areas, in my opinion.  “Where the Dead Go to Die’s” crude 3D animation is the intended result from Jimmy ScreamerClauz’s choice in conveying his short story narrative, but that intention won’t stop audiences and critics from browbeating and disparaging the film.  Yet, if accepting the former viewpoint and watch with understanding eyes through that recognition lens, “Where the Dead Go to Die” is one messed up and horrifying dystopia accentuated by the animation that gives each chapter more weight toward wretchedness and wrongdoing, gelling with tremendous intent to scramble the proverbial innocence with demonic forces and human perversions.  Some of the ideas and concepts swirling around ScreamerClauz’s head and make it into the three tales were just images he thought were visually neat but that speaks loudly on the dark mindset of creativity and many of those images are now temporally seared, scarred permanently into our long-term memory lobes.  Granted, tale transitions and recycling back to their sole connection with each other route into choppy territory at best, creating a windy, bumpy road in braiding the three chapters together under a single umbrella of animation style and storytelling, but “Where the Dead Go to Die” is a poignant and throbbing like touching a raw, exposed nerve through gouged muscle and tissue.  Every inch of surreal, sawtooth imagery is like a knife twisted into our virtuous side because upon closer look at Jimmy ScreamerClauz’s story containing children being hurt is only separated by the mere stylistic choice of cinematography. 

Out from the distribution shadows of Unearthed Films and in the hands of adult animation distributor Mountain Oddities Home Video, also in partnership with MVDVisual, for a new Blu-ray release, one we haven’t seen since Unearthed Films released the DVD and Blu-ray in 2012.  The first of two initial releases from Mountain Oddities Home Video, the Blu-ray comes AVC encoded, 1080p high-definition release, on a BD50 packed with extras.  Being mostly rudimentary 3D animation installed into a complexity of kaleidoscopic imagery, critiquing the quality is beyond our control but the compression is amply successful with no artefacts to note and the colorful saturation and grading levels provide an enriched, amalgamated dough of diabolic devil-bread, presented in a 1.78:1 widescreen aspect ratio that’s more compromised to its now out of print Unearthed Films counterpart from more than decade earlier.  Two English audio options are available:  a DTS-HD 5.1 surround sound and a DTS-HD 2.0.  At home audio recordings outside the sound barrier studio boxes are not as refined, capturing mic interference and hissing as well as the differences in varying audio volumes that don’t match between interacting characters in the same scene, creating that unshared space and gap.  Dialogue is unimpeded and clear and ScreamerClauz’s original gloomy-looming score fuels the deep morosity and malevolent themes.  English subtitles are option available.  Extras include a director’s commentary track with Jimmy ScreamerClauz, deleted scenes, an online video-conference interview with ScreamerClauz hosted by Quality Violent Cinema, behind-the-scenes featurettes of snipped dialogue recordings and interviews, including Linnea Quigley, Youtuber Diamanda Hagan’s video review of ScreamerClauz’s animated shorts “The Scuzzies,” and the director’s short film catalogue with “The Scuzzies” (that includes commentary), “Labby vs Mr. Pickles Rap Battle,” “Clinical Sodomy,” “Affection,” “Mutwa,” “Reality Bleed-Through Remix.”   Mountain Oddities Home Video’s Not Rated release is listed as the uncut version with a 95-minute runtime available with region free playback. 

Last Rites: An adult animation pushing the envelope with taboo themes involving kids and when you mess with kids, the public taste goes sour, but “Where the Dead Go to Die” swirls surrealism with poignant acting and strange fever dreaming amongst the basic, albeit creepy, animation.

“Where the Dead Go To Die” Now Lives on Blu-ray!

Are You Ready for EVILLLLL! “Visceral: Between the Ropes of Madness” reviewed! (Unearthed Films / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Step Into the Ring with “Visceral: Between the Ropes of Madness” On Blu-ray!

A low-ranking boxer is set up with a match of a lifetime.  Quiet but confident, his manager doesn’t exactly have a faith in the underdog, constantly questioning his training with gambled money on the line.  When the boxer is beaten to a pulp in the ring, he’s immediately disowned by the unsympathetic manager and spirals out of his training and into darkness, finding murdering young women to be more pleasurable than the pain of loss and rejection.   His darkness in death incites a demon, perhaps even the Prince of Darkness himself, if the form of a half-naked woman with a distorted face and places him under her ward, forcing him into submission of pain and suffering while also commanding him to collect souls for her through his own tasting menu of torture.  The boxer’s life is told in three different stages of time on how he becomes evil’s most prized champion.

Accurately titular described, “Visceral:  Between the Ropes of Madness” pushes deviant instinct over everything else, a formidable urge to listen and adhere to those intrusive thoughts, especially after one’s lifelong goal, their most prized position, is creamed and squashed for good and forever in a humiliating way.  Writer-director Felipe Eluti uses hopelessness as pure evil’s plaything, turning a dedicated fighter being managed by Hell for the sake of not only revenge but also to fill the emptiness of the Netherworld with tortured souls.  The Chilean born and film schooled Eluti debut feature also enacts him to star as the demented boxer in a gore-soaked, ringside performance that moderately excites and intensifies with rope bondage as one of his character’s key motifs.  The extreme exploitation thriller is under the producing team of Sebastián Amenábar, Cristóbal Rivera, Andres Palma, and Daniel Vivanco.

Felipe Eluti is a one-man steamroller as the unnamed boxer leaving a laid-to-waste corpse trial in his wake.  Going virtually pantomime through the entire quasi-plotted narrative, Eluti conveys an apathy through blood and body language as well as utilizing his unsettling glare underneath different stages of head and facial hair growth from his time as a slimmed down, smooth-shaven boxer to a Curly-do’d, five o’clock shadowed, and expressionless shell of a human being.  From an outsider’s characteristic perspective, the boxer can be considered pathetic by preying down upon and torturing to kill smaller women in what is almost a result of retaliatory motivation after his brutal loss and he literally uses their bodies as his personal punching bags of stoic anger and hate.  The demon also presents itself in the form of a woman named Judas (Carolina Salles), cladded in bondage ropes, speaks in a whispery, omnipotent voice and visits him with a twisted face to represent the evil, or even the ugliness, she embodies, or the boxer sees in all his feminine victims.  Personified as a woman who tortures, beats, and verbally belittles him into a pacifistic submission only amplifies his dark crusade of soul collection.  Other than the boxer’s manager, a porn addicted, condescending loudmouth by José Manuel García, the remaining cast is filled with fleetingly visited torture victims, mostly women who are also voiceless and have little-to-no fight in them until the boxer works up to courage near the end for revenge which he can call his own, and Gabriela Aranchibia, Valentina Varela, Tamara Zuñega, Daniela Pardo, Pia Cardenas, Claudia Mena, Carolina Palacios, and Felipe Ruiz fill in those fated roles. 

While Felipe Eluti’s boxing themed gory shocker and exploitation rope-a-dope is definitely not a Rocky Balboa prime time fight film, “Visceral:  Between the Ropes of Madness” favors severe mental deterioration over an underdog beating the odds with glorifying the ultra-violence.  The strange-faced Judas pertains only to the Boxer’s vision or presence, conjured by feeding off the fighter’s anguish and indoctrinating him through pain, suffering, abuse, torture, and the most horrible like to do the demon’s bidding without resistance or fear.  The boxer’s kidnap and slasher traits shows a motif dominance over women that could possibly stem from most of the Freudian theorized root of a lot of evil doing, mother issues.  Supporting this scenario is the boxer’s visit to his mother.  Face never shown within the thicket of a deep shadow and directed toward a glowing television set, the avoided boxer seeks self-satisfaction approval and support from presumably his one and only blood relation on this planet, but the attentive mother denounces him, rejects him, and belittles his existence as the worst thing to ever happen to her just before his big match.  Eluti’s arthouse direction focuses on the boxer’s lack of love, support, and concern for his wellbeing and uses that the-world-vs-me detestation as a fuel and resupplied by his submission to Juda’s verbal and physical abuse to carry on his hate-filled and apathetic tear of women.  

Unearthed Films, a leader in producing and distributor extreme, ultra-violent and gory movie content brings “Visceral:  Between the Ropes of Madness” into the squared circle with a new Blu-ray release of Chilean production.  The single layered BD25 is AVC encoded and presented in a high-definition, 1080p resolution, with a widescreen 1.77:1 aspect ratio.  Cinematographer Tomas Smith’s approach to the content serves up stark and severe drab with a lifeless parallel to the apathy spree of the Boxer’s dark undertaking.  Heavy on grays and browns, there’s hardly any pop of aesthetic style or color but is counterbalanced by some interesting just obscure or to the side framing that ignite more imagination than having the scene spelled out for you.  There are also other interesting visuals with Judas and inside the Boxer’s mental state that don’t allow much in the way if finer details but allure to and speak of motivation and context.  The divided darkness through provides plenty of opportunities for compressions issues on a lower capacity disc compression but there’s not a whole lot to speak in way of artefacts.  The Spanish PCM 2.0 mix plays the familiar tones of an arthouse gore film by giving more stock to the soundtrack than to the dialogue.  While the dialogue is apparent despite the Boxer saying very little and Judas’s voice done in post, composer René Roco has free reign to be industrially glum above the whimpers, cries, and screams of the Boxer’s tortured women.  Ambient action is perceived post-product separation as the sounds don’t necessary match or synch in frame with the carnage and the environmental ambience is reduced to near nothing with low levels murmurs of city life stock sounds in the exterior scenes.  The English subtitles appear accurate and match well with in-scene prattle.  Extras include a commentary with director Felipe Eluti, a post-showing speech at the Cineteca Nacional’s Massacre in Xoco, Mexico City circa 2013, a behind-the-scenes gallery, and a teaser trailer.  The reverse cover liner art inside the clear Amaray case has barely safe for work primary of the mad Boxer and a bloodied woman bound in rope and a not safe for work cover that focuses on a bare-chested and rope bound Judas, both in contrasted to a deep inky void background.  There are no insert liner supplements and the disc is pressed with the same NSFW cover art image.  The not rated, region A encoded release has a runtime of 76 minutes.

Last Rites: Glorifying hopelessness through violence, “Visceral: Between the Ropes of Madness” is a round-for-round degression from failure through the dreary lens of director Felipe Eluti and his kink for rope bondage that sets forth an unstable champion amongst the maidenly defeated.

Step Into the Ring with “Visceral: Between the Ropes of Madness” On Blu-ray!