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BEHIND THE MASK: THE RISE OF LESLIE VERNON - Cultcuts review

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Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon (2006)

It just doesn’t happen enough, but every once in awhile you come across a DVD release you aren’t too familiar with and when the final credits roll, you actually say out loud, “Brilliant.” This is the case with BEHIND THE MASK. A satirical take on the slasher genre while poking fun at the horror spun mockumentary that has permeated rental shelves since THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT. It also manages to succeed and blend in as a horror themed thriller while never losing any of its biting sense of dark humor. These are rare, but think of it as what SHAUN OF THE DEAD did for zombie cinema, this manages to do to the hack and slash so fondly hated and lovely remembered from the early 1980’s. Of course it doesn’t hurt with a supporting cast including Robert Englund (Freddy Krueger himself), Scott Wilson (IN COLD BLOOD, THE NINTH CONFIGURATION) and Zelda Rubinstein (POLTERGEIST).

Taylor Gentry (Angela Goethals) and her two cameramen are making a low budget documentary on the life of an upcoming killer in training. Their focus is none other than Leslie Vernon (Nathan Baesel), a young man with the right past and modern proper training to become the next legend alongside the all too real killers Jason Voorhees and Michael Meyers. He also happens to have a mentor, a retired slasher legend who got away with it, Eugene (Scott Wilson). The crew spends countless hours following Vernon around watching him prepare for his first big slaughter and reminiscing with Eugene about his past and how things have changed from the good old days. All of this while eating dinner with Eugene’s wife as the crew films quietly in shock. They go over the plans, the protocol, the rules, yes, there are rules, otherwise you’re just some sort of whack job, not an artist with a craft. By the time the killing starts, you’ve graduated Legendary Killers 101.

While the entire proceedings sound gimmicky, and it has a sort of kitsch to it, BEHIND THE MASK manages to pull in the viewer into its own strange world where movie legends are all real, but it is smart enough to play with the characters. None of the crew really believes they will be witness to any kind of carnage, and when they start to think it might become true, it is still so unbelievable to their characters, they seem more in awe with Vernon than frightened. That is, until it becomes all too real and they are finally confronted with Vernon’s instability and the violence begins. Director Scott Glosserman wisely shuts down the entire mockumentary style and runs with the twist that shocks behind the camera that is in front of the real one. Beyond that, we get an even better twist turning the final act into a well executed horror film that would stand well on its own. I wish I could say more, but half the fun of a slasher movie is not knowing if the killer lives on for a sequel, even if he was killed 8 times prior to the final cut. So you’ll just have to check it out for yourself and have the same fun time I had with this smart film that celebrates the genre while poking fun of it and never demeans its forefathers. Even references to Freddy Krueger while good old Robert Englund shows up himself as Doc Halloran, Leslie Vernon’s psychiatrist add to this odd cinematic world.

With the pacing perfect, enough atmosphere and more than ample amounts of humor, a low budget indy film such as this can easily be destroyed by horrid acting. They say humor is tougher than serious acting, but I have always felt while that may be true, satire makes other styles of humor look easy in comparison. To be able to dramatic portray your humor without falling into tongue and cheek or slapstick mode isn’t an easy task. Everyone handles their roles perfectly letting the smart script work the humor while everyone plays it straight. Without it, this would have been a painful film to sit through. I’m glad to report otherwise.

Anchor Bay/Starz Entertainment does another excellent job with this DVD release. The print is excellent with proper sound and colors. Extras include a commentary with Angela Goethals, Britain Spellings and Ben Pace. Also included are two featurettes, one the usual making of and the other focusing on the casting. Several deleted and extended scenes along with trailers and the original screenplay are also included. Even without the extras, BEHIND THE MASK is a cut above most modern slashers. It may be heralded as a comedy and compared to SCREAM, but don’t let that deter you from a brilliant satire that also works as a great horror film. It’s too good to be thought of as something that simple. BEHIND THE MASK: THE RISE OF LESLIE VERNON is highly recommended.

Posted Thursday, August 07, 2008 12:22 PM by digitalconquest | with 0 comments

EXORCISM - Cultcuts Review

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Exorcismo (1974)

Paul Naschy shreds off the dark facial hair and the brooding persona to don a priest’s robe and become a good guy in EXORCISM, a much underrated Eurohorror film. According to Naschy, his screenplay was penned years before THE EXORCIST became an international success, but he could never get funding until Linda Blair starred in her box office smash. And while both films share some similar themes, I wouldn’t go so far as to say there’s much to compare between them. But then again, just about any possession film gets thrown under the EXORCIST or ROSEMARY’S BABY umbrella. Despite the fact that much of the film was shot in England, EXORCISM has that unique Spanish Gothic horror flavor that most fans enjoy in a good Naschy flick. Being that I'm a huge fan of the man’s horror films and the added excitement of Spanish horror, this may not be much of a surprise, but I find EXORCISM to be one of Naschy’s most accomplished pieces of cinema outside of his Waldemar Daninsky Werewolf sagas (granted, I hold his gialli up a tad higher).

Some Paul Naschy fans may be disappointed, since he is the good guy here and his screen time is somewhat limited, despite being a central character. Much of the movie is centered around Leila (Grace Mills) as one of the youngest of the Gibson family. Her boyfriend Richard has introduced her to the art of devil worship and partying. After partaking in some LSD parties, involving the celebration of Satan and orgiastic behavior, she starts to show more than just a few signs of rebellion. The family starts to get a little concerned, what with mother still dealing with the death of her husband, Leila’s stepbrother being more than a tad reclusive and paranoid, and the sister jumping right onto the possession believing bandwagon. When boyfriend Richard and brother John end up dead, Father Adrian Dunning (Naschy) starts to believe that something more than the usual case of teenage rebellion may be at hand.

Much of the story is character based, meaning most of the more extreme possession scenes show up in the final act. Until then, Leila talks mean, gets into a cat fight with the younger maid, and even comes on to the priest. When the full blown evil hits the screen, her make up is a doozy, sporting some of the coolest looking devil eyes and nasty flesh wounds I've ever seen on screen. Because so little shows up beforehand, the murders almost seem reminiscent to other gialli films from the same time period, with ALL THE COLORS OF THE DARK coming immediately to mind due to the involvement of a Satanic cult. There are plenty of red herrings at hand, including several servants working at the house and, of course, both Richard and John, until they end up dead. There is also Udo, the handyman/driver, a huge lug with a penchant for taking nudie snapshots of Leila while she undresses in her bedroom. If you have never seen EXORCISM before, you may even think a certain twist is around the corner regarding Naschy as a possible suspect. I’m not telling, but it is all played off really well. Since the murders are not necessarily committed by Leila or any possessive demon, the unfolding mystery becomes an added bonus and keeps the plot running at a brisk pace.

BCI Eclipse’s Special Edition of EXORCISM is simply gorgeous. Uncut and beautifully transferred, the movie has never looked better. As for extras, I wish we could get a Naschy commentary, since he’s so personable when reminiscing about his earlier works. We get a fun spirited intro by the man himself, but the true gold is the half hour interview with Naschy talking about the Spanish horror industry and re-visiting several of his earlier films one at a time. It’s endearing, informative and entertaining. Also included are the alternate clothed scenes (there’s tons of beautiful naked ladies in the uncut version) and the original Spanish credit sequences. Rounding out the extras is the original U.S. theatrical trailer, liner notes, a photo gallery, and a very nice poster gallery with 19 original theatrical posters and lobby cards. Being a Naschy fan, I’m very happy to recommend this version of EXORCISM to other fans. If you haven’t seen many of his films outside of his werewolf movies, this one is an excellent place to start. Highly recommended.

Posted Thursday, August 07, 2008 12:12 PM by digitalconquest | with 0 comments

CARVED - Cultcuts review

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Carved Production Year

I’ll be the first to admit that putting CARVED into my DVD player felt like a chore. The cover, the name, it all sounded like another clichéd Japanese ghost story with a gimmick. Don’t get me wrong, I love a lot of Asian Cinema from the Akira Kurosawa classics to early horror like KWAIDEN to Godzilla. But given this new wave of horror (though almost two decades old), another ghost story just didn’t seem to be the ticket I’ve been waiting for. That said, I must admit, CARVED is just different and brutal enough that I actually enjoyed it. It isn’t nearly as predictable as the “woman possessing some electric gadget” stories that seem to permeate the only things coming overseas these days. It also doesn’t shy away from the brutality either. We’re talking pure terror child abuse. It isn’t gory, but some of the bloodshed is nasty and it isn’t all cheap-looking CGI. Despite it being another “back from the past” tale, everything else I’ve mentioned are all pluses in my book.

Well, child abuse obviously isn’t a plus in my book, but director Shiraishi manages to handle the unspeakable with a sure and mature hand. With some serious storytelling and unflinching violence and guilt all mixed together, every scene involving a child being beaten, cut, tortured and so on never seems exploitative. It’s very in your face, but it plays like a recoiled reaction to layers of dementia and parental frustration. It isn’t easy stuff to sit through, especially if you’re a parent like myself, but at the same time, I couldn’t take my eyes off the proceedings either. Never excused, how could it? But you get the insight into the madness.

Most of the film centers around the legend of the Slit-Mouthed Woman, a specter that supposedly kidnaps children and tortures them. She then cuts their mouth open from cheek to cheek, making a horrible looking smile, and then she kills them. After 20 or so years, it’s become such a myth that parents and teachers use it to keep children in line, from talking to strangers and going to bed at a proper time. Unfortunately, after an earthquake lets her loose from her unearthly grave, the myth becomes reality as the real Slit-Mouthed Woman’s ghost shows up to wreak havoc the second time around. The first time was on two of her own children, thus the rumors and birth of such a myth was born. Her third child is alive and not doing so well in his 30's. When new kidnappings happen, he teams up with a fellow school teacher who feels responsible for the disappearance of one her own students, hoping to stop the evil before the child is killed and any more disappear. As he gets closer to the truth, so does the psychic link with his dead mother, but this also creates a more horrific pattern when several children disappear.

There’s a lot more going on than the tale of a mischievous ghost (thankfully, it involves possession rather than a specter climbing out of something yet again). The main kidnapped girl has parallel elements with both teachers, which makes their search that much more important. She was an abused kid who was just about to let her teachers know what was happening in her own home life. Her teacher also isn’t allowed to see her own little girl because of her own bouts of violence, and the Slit Mouthed Woman’s son, well, that’s obvious when you see the hell he went through as a little tyke. The screenplay also plays on the guilt of the girl’s mother. At first she seems to be as much of a monster as the horror icon. However, also explored in the story is her range of guilt over her own anger, as it's compounded by her self blame over the kidnapping of her daughter. There are no true heroes in CARVED. Only human beings making horrible mistakes, their deep and painful regret, and finally the innocence lost by battered children who grow up to begin the cycle all over again. Like I stated, it isn’t always easy to sit through, but powerful thought-provoking stuff indeed, and that sets this particular ghost story a step above many of the others in the last two decades.

Before going into disc and extras details, I would also have to mention the child actors. They are simply amazing. Most look to be about 8 to 10 years old and come across extremely believable in what must have been some very uncomfortable scenes to shoot. I flinched every time one was struck, instead of the usual grown I emit with most terrible tyke actors. Anyway, Tartan’s release is as to be expected. It’s a very nice transfer with great sound and picture quality all the way around. Extras include some interesting interviews with the actors, the original theatrical trailer, a couple of TV spots, and a making-of featurette. Rounding out the extras are the usual slew of trailers for other Tartan releases. Watching those reminded me of how tired I was of several of them, but also made me realize that CARVED is just different enough and handled so well that the creepy ghost story works. The main horror is with the multi-layered characters, so I have no problem recommending it to most genre fans. Those who are so tired of these movies probably won’t even be reading this review, but if you are, then I urge you to give this one a chance.

Posted Thursday, August 07, 2008 11:53 AM by digitalconquest | with 0 comments

RISE: THE BLOOD HUNTER - Cultcuts review

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Rise: Blood Hunter (2007)

Lucy Liu made an impression on U.S. audiences back in 1999 with her breakout role as a no-holds barred assassin in Mel Gibson’s PAYBACK. Since then, she’s enjoyed a lot of Hollywood “star” success in the CHARLIE’S ANGELS franchise and Quentin Tarantino’s KILL BILL among others. I carefully use the word “star” rather than actress/actor for a good reason. RISE is definite proof that while one has a lot of success, it doesn’t necessarily mean one carries a film all on one’s own. It takes charisma, talent, a good script and direction. Something that this vampire tale doesn’t have a lot of, but it does have Liu in the buff (a lot) and the casting director was smart enough to surround their star with some solid character actors.

Lucy Liu plays Sadie Blake, a reporter who gets too close to the wrong people in her expose on the Goth underground. Given a clue to something more dangerous than your average poser, she discovers a feeding ground in an abandoned house, where the basement is filled with blood and plastic tarps. When her friend at the office is killed, Liu is kidnapped by the lead vampire. The vampires make her their next meal, but she refuses to die during their ceremony of blood sucking and necrophilia. She wakes up in the morgue with a big slash on her neck, not much of a pulse, and not much clothing either. After an unsuccessful suicide attempt and some help from a fellow vampire, she gets her bearings and it’s time for revenge on those who destroyed her life.

As Liu works her way up the chain by killing one vampire after another, an ex-officer Michael Chiklis (Ben Grimm aka The Thing from FANTASTIC FOUR) gets hot on her trail, looking for vengeance of his own. The same group of bloodsuckers killed his daughter, leaving him an alcoholic mess who was kicked off the force, though he's still receiving help from his friends. He soon catches up with her and joins forces to destroy the bad guys. Sounds very cliché and it is, but despite the fact that his character has been done to death in so many other movies, he’s still more fun to watch than Lucy Liu. Another highlight is Mako, in his last screen appearance as the human servant to our lead baddie. Unfortunately, again, he makes a better bad guy than the vamp he swears to protect. This all leads to a very unsatisfying ending when our lackluster leading lady finally meets up with her nemesis in a boring final death scene.

That’s not to say it is all bad. While I’m not a fan and in no way did this win me over, some genre fans love just about any vampire film. If you can get past the non-traditional set up of the lore in this particular tale, then bloodsucking fans (think Emo/Goth) might have enough to enjoy. They can walk in daylight, they kill with blades, there’s no sharp teeth and, for whatever reason, even though they cannot die in any traditional human manner, they seem to have no problem being knocked unconscious or suffocated (in a fight scene with Mako, he wraps a plastic shower curtain over Liu’s head, almost choking her). On the plus note, there’s lots of blood, a decapitation, nude bodies (either victims hanging upside down or Liu walking around), and one very nasty bite scene involving Liu and a homeless man’s arm. Lucy Liu isn’t terrible. She just can’t carry it off, despite a few good scenes (the morgue, with her mother, etc). Everything is too slowly paced, despite the fact that the whole thing feels like the producers wanted another BLADE franchise. Wesley Snipes she isn’t and RISE just doesn’t fit the bill.

Sony’s DVD presentation is very good, sporting a nice transfer of the uncut version. The R-rated version ran only 94 minutes while this disc runs a too long 122 minutes. I'm not sure what the differences are, but one guess could be the omission of a lot of talking scenes, since there definitely isn’t almost 20 minutes worth of gore and sex to warrant those kinds of cuts. Extras include several trailers and a few featurettes, including behind-the-scenes and storyboards. Overall, despite a few decent scenes, Mako and Chiklis’ performances (and a fun cameo by Robert Forster), there isn’t much reason to recommend RISE: BLOOD HUNTER to anyone but those that feel the need to see and own every vampire film out there, and/or those who find Lucy Liu to be hot. For sexy I recommend VAMPYROS LESBOS, for a good modern vampire story seek out NEAR DARK instead. Dramatic tension, there’s George Romero’s MARTIN. For action and style re-watch BLADE and THE UNDERWORLD movies. I guess what I’m saying is there are better movies out there to suit one’s tastes as opposed to visiting this misfire

Posted Thursday, August 07, 2008 3:04 AM by digitalconquest | with 0 comments

THE NIGHT OF THE WEREWOLF - Cultcuts Review

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The Night of the Werewolf (1980)

My very first exposure to a Paul Naschy film was during the mid-80’s in a dark theater. At that time, I had no clue that I was seeing a Naschy movie or who Naschy was for that matter. I loved horror movies and a new werewolf movie called THE CRAVING was at my local theater. After my third time seeing the thing in one week, I still wasn’t sure what the plot was all about (the movie was seriously cut), but I did know I had seen something I loved, something special, something Hammer-esque yet more bloody, more risqué and more insane than I had seen the likes of before. Granted, we’ve come a long way from 22 years ago, but one can only imagine what it was like for me to pop this uncut version in and paste in all those continuity gaps from my memory. Well, THE NIGHT OF THE WEREWOLF does have more, but whether or not it makes much more sense, I’m still not quite sure. Despite that, I still love this insane tale continuing the Waldemar Daninsky saga of the torn werewolf who can only be killed by his true love.

This crazy plot goes something like this…Three female students venture off to a Spanish castle that supposedly contains the remains of Countess Bathory and her werewolf slave Waldemar Daninsky. One of the students wishes to resurrect the Countess in order to gain immortality and power, even if it means killing her professor to get the amulet she needs to do so. Once there, they discover Naschy, who is already resurrected by some grave robbers that plucked the silver blade from his chest. Our greedy women proceed to resurrect Bathory via a virgin blood sacrifice (a great scene I might add). Naschy and one of the girls fall in love, naturally, or this wouldn’t be a Daninsky tale. Now it’s up to Naschy as the werewolf to destroy Bathory and her new horde of female lesbian vampires before becoming enslaved by the powerful bloodsucker. Will he be able to escape her control? Will he be able to end his curse and save his girl? Being a Naschy fan, we’ve seen much of this in his earlier works, particularly WEREWOLF VS. VAMPIRE WOMAN with touches of CURSE OF THE DEVIL and NIGHT OF THE WALPURGIS. Only this time out, we’ve hit the 1980’s, which allowed a bigger budget, more exploitation and more Naschy insanity, making this a kitchen sink werewolf/vampire movie with everything we all grew up to love in a mix of Spanish flavored gothic horror and zaniness.

I’ll admit, Naschy’s outings are of a distinctive taste. Some fans find them campy, some don’t care for his output at all. Others, like myself, love every minute of it and NIGHT OF THE WEREWOLF definitely fits the bill as one of my personal favorites of his werewolf titles. Granted, it may be more nostalgia than actual delivery, but I don’t think so. There’s so much style that the entire proceedings drip with Gothic imagery and savagery. The Spanish locales definitely help and the women are beautiful. Naschy, of course, is great, despite hitting every mark that we’ve seen before, but he makes such a likable hero, you even root for him when he gets hairy and pissed, snarling those fangs and ripping out throats, with blood galore.

In the correct spirit, BCI Eclipse goes all out with a very beautiful anamorphic transfer, completely uncut, and loads on the extras (minus the interview that came with their release of EXORCISMO). You get the usual fun-spirited introduction by Naschy himself, some deleted scenes, the original U.S. theatrical trailer, Spanish credit sequences, tons of stills and promotional materials in the gallery. There is also an informative liner note section by Naschy.com alumni Mirek Lipinski, containing some more rare stills. In the end, this is Naschy doing Naschy. You either love it or can leave it. I, for one, have no problem recommending it to genre fans. If you haven’t discovered Naschy as of yet, maybe this is a good place to start. It was my first Naschy movie and it made me a lifelong fan of just about all of his films. I can’t think of a better recommendation than that. NIGHT OF THE WEREWOLF definitely gets a special Eurohorror spot on my DVD shelf alongside several of his other movies.

Posted Thursday, August 07, 2008 2:58 AM by digitalconquest | with 0 comments

AND NOW THE SCREAMING STARTS - Cultcuts Review

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And Now the Screaming Starts! (1973)

Along with the horror from Hammer Studios, I pretty much grew up watching many of the anthology and horror films from Amicus. It was a challenge for a ten year old to stay up until 2AM during a Friday night to watch the credits role after a horror flick. Then there was the birth of VHS and I quickly snapped up anything with Karloff, Price, Cushing or Lee (and the occasional gore movie if I could afford it, and face it, who could resist that ZOMBIE big box with the rotted living dead head on the cover!). But times have changed. Late night television hasn’t been the same for well over 20 years, and currently a massive onslaught of infomercials reign over the airwaves. So, for those of you that can relate to all of this reminiscing, you can probably understand my biased raving when a DVD comes along boasting that it is part of The AMICUS Collection on the cover. For you 20-something gorehounds who think of HALLOWEEN as an old outdated film, you may want to read a different review that complains about the bad CGI gore. This is Old School Horror looking its finest. Just enough gore and brief nudity (not to mention tons of cleavage, a personal fave of my puberty years) to get past the censors. And with a cast including Peter Cushing, Herbert Lom, Patrick Magee, Ian Ogilvy, and the luscious Stephanie Beacham, you won’t get many complaints from me.

Based on the Gothic horror novel FENGRIFFEN by David Case, the story follows the Fengriffen family and its curious estate. Charles (Ogilvy) is the last living heir to the estate and Catherine is his new bride. However, moving into the mansion immediately becomes a nightmare for Catherine. She’s instantly drawn towards an ancestral painting of Charles’ late grandfather and the hallucinations begin. An eyeless grinning corpse with an amputated hand comes lunging at her, and then she finds herself attacked by the missing hand, which seems to appear everywhere, whenever she is alone. Of course, none of this is seen by her husband, but he’s aware of an old family curse and neither he nor his servants are talking. If they do, they end up becoming the next victim of something that could be from her imagination. Of course, we all know better, in Gothic horror, most curses are real. Catherine thinks she is losing her mind, but since nobody is talking, she starts to suspect there is more going on than the fact that she is pregnant.

Her suspicions come to fruition when she runs into the woodsman Silas (Geoffrey Whitehead), who lives on the estate. He’s got a nasty large birthmark on his face and a smarmy disposition to boot. While that seems to frighten her to some extent, the true fear comes from the fact that he looks just like the gory, eyeless and amputated man that haunts her. She starts digging for information only to discover that he not only lives on the property of the estate and even owns the land, but lives in a hut just outside the Fengriffen family cemetery. Nobody will tell her why Charles’ grandfather gave him the land, causing her paranoia and haunting visions to get worse. Local family Dr. Whittle (Magee) knows but won’t let on for fear of his own death. Instead, he hopes bringing in specialist Dr. Pope (Cushing sporting a very effeminate hairdo) will help calm her down long enough to give birth to a happy and healthy baby, without going completely mad in the process.

While there is obviously a curse throughout AND NOW THE SCREAMING STARTS, I’m going to refrain from delving into details. The adaptation by screenwriter Roger Marshall (THEATER OF DEATH) keeps the mystery alive for well over an hour before indulging the viewer into an exciting and intriguing backstory of debauchery and mayhem. Director Roy Ward Baker (too many great movies in his credits to list here) keeps the thin premise hopping along at a quick pace, providing quite a few gimmicky death scenes and bizarre creepy moments, until the mystery is unfolded and becomes even more intriguing. In less capable hands, this plot device could have been a misguided and tedious attempt, but fortunately the talent in front and behind the camera is more than capable of pulling it off.

Cushing is incredible, as expected, but for fans desiring a star vehicle, you may be disappointed. The actor doesn’t show up until well after the halfway point (47 minutes to be exact), but when he’s on screen his command of the arts is a driving force. Surprisingly enough, the rest of the top notch cast is right up there with Cushing all the way, with Stephanie Beacham’s performance carrying most of the horror at a realistic pitch from beginning to end. Not to mention, she is simply a stunningly beautiful redhead years before her stint on DYNASTY. Also worthy of mention is Douglas (TALES FROM THE CRYPT, THE LAND THAT TIME FORGOT) Gamley’s wonderful musical score and the make up effects wizardry of Paul Rabiger (whose long credit list includes several James Bond titles). Most amputated appendages crawling along the ground long before Oliver Stone’s THE HAND simply looked awful, but here, while it sometimes looks a little stiff (not too mention the very paint-like bright blood that was standard for the time), it also looks pretty realistic.

In most cases, even with Anchor Bay who released several Hammer Horrors, we were lucky enough to get the original theatrical trailer and a very nice and uncut widescreen transfer. And for fans like myself, that’s already more than I ever came to expect after years of collecting VHS tapes. Dark Sky goes a step further and includes two commentaries, one with Baker and Beacham and a separate one with Ogilvy. There are plenty of stills in a very nice gallery and some decent biographies of several cast and crew members. Rounding out the extras are three original trailers, one for this release and two showcasing Dark Sky’s other Amicus titles, THE BEAST MUST DIE and ASYLUM. While not perfect, the anamorphic transfer was definitely better than I expected, with full Dolby 2.0 Mono sound and an appropriately framed picture at 1.85:1, boasting vivid colors and clear blacks. On a final nostalgic note to tie this up, I can finally say I’ve now seen AND NOW THE SCREAMING STARTS in its entirety. Seeing a dark scratchy full screen print on television over 30 years ago made me love the film, but now it’s uncut and has never looked better. I think the folks of Amicus studios would be proud, and I, for one, would love to recommend this disc to both fans of the studio and Gothic horror enthusiasts everywhere.

Posted Thursday, August 07, 2008 2:51 AM by digitalconquest | with 0 comments