Bruno Mattei's ROBOWAR finally... FINALLY... on Blu-ray!!!

They may not be in the porn business but even so the good people over at SEVERIN are trying their best to give fans of action cinema a throbbing hard-on! And they're succeeding!! I mean what other reaction would anybody get (at least if they're an action flick aficionado) when they learn that Severin are putting out Bruno Mattei's 300% entertaining remake of PREDATOR entitled ROBOWAR (Italy/Philippines 1988) on Blu-ray!!!

Street date June 25. There's various different versions (and prices). Go here for the stand-alone Blu-ray. There's a dvd release as well (but get the blu-ray, cabron!). John Dulaney posted about the release on one of my old posts about the film (from 2010!). John was in the film and in 2011 he posted links to behind-the-scenes videos that he and Catherine Hickland did. Incidentally, those very same videos are now being included on this Blu-ray. You saw them here first! (I just had to say that, haha). This is certainly an old dream come true. Thanks, Severin! (Please put out heaps more Mattei stuff!). 



WE'RE ALL USED TO THE OLD SUBTITLED TRAILER FROM JAPANESE VHS SO HERE'S THE NEW ONE FROM SEVERIN [EDIT 2.5.26: The old Severin YouTube channel is gone and ditto is the embedded trailer, but I found this other better copy of the original trailer]





INFO FROM SEVERIN'S SITE:

A year before their jaw-dropper SHOCKING DARK, director Bruno Mattei (VIOLENCE IN A WOMEN’S PRISON) and co-writers Claudio Fragasso & Rossella Drudi (NIGHT KILLER, ZOMBIE 4) first collaborated on this brain-melting mash-up of PREDATOR, ROBOCOP and Philippines war movie mayhem: When a team of badass commandos is hired for a jungle rescue mission, they’ll instead find them hunted by a kill-crazed creature that is part man, part machine and all glorious ‘80s ItaloSleaze. Reb Brown (UNCOMMON VALOR), Catherine Hickland (ONE LIFE TO LIVE), Massimo Vanni (RATS: NIGHT OF TERROR) and Jim Gaines (ISLAND OF THE LIVING DEAD) star in this “freaking awesome must-watch for any action fan” (BMovieCitadel.com), now scanned in 4k from the original negative and loaded with all-new Special Features.  

Special Features:

• Robo Predator: Interview with Co-Director/Co-Writer Claudio Fragasso
• Italian Rip Off: Interview with Co-Writer Rossella Drudi
• Violence She Wrote: Career Interview with Screenwriter Rossella Drudi
• Robo-Lady: Interview with Actress Catherine Hickland
• Papa Doc’s War: Interview with Actor John P. Dulaney
• The Robowarrior: Interview with Actor Jim Gaines Jr.
• War in the Phillipines: Interview with Actor/Stuntman Massimo Vanni
• Catherine Hickland’s Behind The Scenes Home Movies
• Trailer

VINEGAR SYNDROME to issue director's cut of mysterious CIRIO H. SANTIAGO film!

The info I have on this is more insufficient than insufficient but... it's just been posted on AVManiacs film forum that the new video label VINEGAR SYNDROME will be releasing *a* CIRIO H. SANTIAGO film and the version they have is a long director's cut version.

No hint at which film it is. Could this be the unrated version of NAKED VENGEANCE???


This is the exact text from AVManiacs:

VINEGAR SYNDROME's Drive-In Collection!

Was wondering when Jack J would make the scene ;-)

Feast your eyes on this...

"We have a few [Cirio films], including an ultra, ultra long version of one of his less seen epics [. . .] we'll be issuing it in its original director's cut and under its original title!"

New cool stuff from CODE RED

Check this rad shit out!! The new release from CODE RED is here and it's a cool Spanish horror double bill; THE VAMPIRES NIGHT ORGY and DR. JEKYLL VS. THE WEREWOLF both by Leon Klimovsky. And if that wasn't enough... I'm told that they are the UNCLOTHED versions!!! The versions that came out from the folks at Mondo Macabro a few years back were the clothed versions!! This is great news. JEKYLL is taken from a 16mm print and carries the English dub (if I remember correctly the MM dvd is in Spanish with subs) and NIGHT ORGY is from a 35mm print (I don't know what the old dvd is as I only have an old vhs). The dvd is up for grabs at the Code Red store now.

Trailer for ORGY (I couldn't find one for JEKYLL):

VIRGIN APOCALYPSE to be released on dvd - fully uncut from 35mm print

aka Angels with Golden Guns / Terror in a Woman's Prison / Anger

Back in 2009 (almost to the date!) well known HK film aficionado Spannick mentioned on Cinehound forum that the German label he's working for, CINECLUB, was planning a DVD release of the rare VIRGIN APOCALYPSE. Now, 4 years later, it seems it's finally on its way! Yay! Spiffy!!

Spannick's info from today says the upcoming DVD is from a 35mm print and the film is presented in 2.35 anamorphic!! That's very good news indeed. It's well known that Joseph Lai's IFD company can't provide proper prints for most of their films. In fact, according to Spannick the print for VIRGIN APOCALYPSE was, "the IFD Master delivered was in Fullscreen and horribly framecut".

And Spannick adds the IFD master was also 4 (four!) minutes shorter than the uncut print. Although not quite as butchered as IFD's fullscreen master the 35mm is missing about a minute's worth of footage. On the DVD the missing footage has been replaced by a few inserts from a German VHS (also presented in widescreen). Fortunately there's no need to worry about English friendliness! The DVD will contain both a German and an English dub!

In the extras department we find the English language trailer and an entire extra movie: COMMANDO FURY! This film is included (in the extras) as it's sourced from a Japanese video tape (2.35 widescreen). Spannick's label wanted to release the film on its own but the master from Joseph Lai was "unwatchable Fullscreen".

This is certainly great news! VIRGIN APOCALYPSE is very difficult to find. The cover scan here is from the UK label 4-BIDDEN ASIA who released it in Holland (most likely cos they weren't allowed to release it uncut in the UK due to harsh censorshit regulations there at the time) many years ago. I don't know how many different VHS releases that exist but they are indeed all very rare.

The web isn't exactly spilling over with reviews. The one I did manage to find says about the plot: "Sound's pretty simple right? Well, it took me two sober viewings to figure this thing out."

No final release date has been published yet.

SHOUT! FACTORY to cancel last three Filipino movies

Unfortunately, SHOUT! have just announced via their Facebook page that they're not going to release the last three Filipino co-productions that we've been patiently waiting for; SAVAGE, THE HOT BOX and THE WOMAN HUNT are not going to be release! Boo-hoo!!! I've been looking forward to those for what seems like ages (because it is actually ages!!).

All three films are released on VHS but it would have been pretty spiffy to get proper releases off the original negatives and in their original ratio aspect. Hopefully another company will pick them up and give them the same fine treatment that SHOUT! gave the other films. And maybe monkeys will fly out my butt. :(


THE TEN THAT MADE IT
Throughout the last couple of years SHOUT! Factory have released a whole range of ROGER CORMAN produced films in their "Roger Corman's Cult Classics" series. A few of those are of interest to this blog as they were filmed in the Philippines and have a number of regular Filipino actors in them.

So far SHOUT! have released...

THE BIG BIRD CAGE
BIG DOLL HOUSE
WOMEN IN CAGES
FLY ME
FIRECRACKER
TNT JACKSON
TOO HOT TO HANDLE
COVER GIRL MODELS
UP FROM THE DEPTHS
DEMON OF PARADISE.

Ten movies in total! And all of them in great shape and form (well, okay maybe except FLY ME which came off an old worn print but it was either that or no print at all so that's perfectly alright).

As a fan of these films I can't thank SHOUT! enough for finally give them their day in the sun. No longer do we have to settle for fullscreen reg. 1 public domain dvd's or old worn video tapes. So a big round of applause fly out to Cliff Mac and SHOUT for releasing these 10 films. I wish the last three could have been released as well but big kudos to SHOUT for the ones we did get. xD

 THE WOMAN HUNT on vhs from Denmark


If you wish to check the old posts about SHOUT!'s releases just click the "Shout factory releases" label at the bottom of this post.

Ellery Queen Mysteries - complete series finally on DVD

I've just discovered that the complete Ellery Queen Mysteries series has recently been been released as a 6 disc DVD box set! The box contains all 22 episodes plus the pilot "Too Many Suspects".

I used to watch this as a kid in the mid 70s but have never had a chance for a re-visit so this is pretty cool. I have no idea if the show holds water or if I'll still like it but I'm definitely gonna order it.

Someone on Amazon.com wrote an informative review, you can check it here.

More zombies from Another World

AWE are releasing Andrea Bianchi's Italian masterpiece BURIAL GROUND (Le Notti del Terrore, 1981) in October. The new Danish title is Zombie Nattens Terror. "New" because usually when AWE use Danish titles they're old cinema or video titles. This one is an AWE creation. If you haven't watched the film before then... well... what can I tell you; BURIAL GROUND is kinda on the same level as ZOMBI 3 but not quite as good as HELL OF THE LIVING DEAD!!! As usually with these films from AWE the disc is only going to carry the English dub. I wish they would include the original Italian audio for these films as well! But if nothing else, it's an awesome front cover me thinks. xD

TNT JACKSON finally getting a proper dvd release!

[click cover scan for full size]

Brilliant news!! The last couple of days I've been asking around to see if there's a proper DVD release of Cirio H. Santiago's TNT JACKSON from 1974 available anywhere. The film is a Filipino/American co-production with Roger Corman's company, and it stars renowned Oxford trained character actress Jeannie Bell in the lead (alright-alright, her training was from being a Playboy Playmate but that's even better, lol).

Santiago liked the film so much that he later remade it not once but twice (as Firecracker aka Naked Fist in 1981, and Angelfist in '92)! There are about (at least) 10 different DVD releases of the film in the US but they're all public domain releases and they certainly look like public domain. They look like ass. My old Danish ex-rental VHS looks heaps better. The cover on this page is from the sell-thru release but they're almost identical.

Anyway, the news from today is that Cliff Mac and his cool Shout label are putting TNT JACKSON out next year on DVD with another Cirio H. Santiago film called SAVAGE!!! Great news or what! I have no idea if there's any DVD releases of SAVAGE but I wouldn't be surprised if there's only similar multo crappy public shit domain releases. Obviously, I have the film on Danish ex-rental VHS, haha (thanks heaps to Diabolik/Hans-Jørgen!).

I couldn't find a trailer on YouTube so here's a bit from the film. You don't need to watch it all just check a couple of minutes. The entire film is on YouTube's film upload channel but it's the same crappy DVD version that probably would make any grindhouse proud. Awful picture, awful sound, jumpy print at reel ends, the lot. Wait for the new DVD or get a copy of (or off) a video tape.

Jeannie Bell was also in Santiago's THE MUTHERS and a few more film and TV things like "Ironside" and ""Kolchak: The Night Stalker". I have no idea what she's up to these days.

Death of a Snowman - dvd

Arrrgh! Don May and his Synapse label are going to release the South African movie DEATH OF A SNOWMAN in November. They call it a "South African exploitation classic", haha. Oh man, I've had this film lying around on a Danish ex-rental tape for at least 7 or 8 years WITHOUT watching it because I thought it looked totally boring, haha. I think I checked the first 5 minutes and then chucked it back into the pile where it's been ever since. Hahaha. Maybe it's time to give it a proper chance. :D

SLITHIS on DVD from Code Red!

SLITHIS
1978 Fabtrak
PRODUCERS: Stephen Traxler, Paul Fabian
DIRECTOR/SCREENWRITER: Stephen Traxler
ALSO RELEASED AS: Spawn of the Slithis
A '50s-style scaly monster, a product of nuclear pollution, attacks people in Venice, California. A good independent project with a fun publicity campaign. Free Slithis survival kits were given out at theaters and you could sign up for the Slithis fan club and receive a free photo.
Michael Weldon (The Psychotronic Encyclopedia of Film, 1983)

The old monster flick SLITHIS which until yesterday was only available on much deleted old VHS has finally been granted a release on one of those shiny wee discs! It's now out from Code Red but so far only available from Amazon US, not from Amazon UK. Hopefully it will be soon so I can save the 10 bucks I'd have to pay extra for ordering from Amazon US. It's almost robbery by daylight!

Lorna the Exorcist on DVD

Check this multo cool'o cover for Mondo Macabro's release of Jess/Jesus Franco's LORNA THE EXORCIST. Release date 29th of June. :D