Danger: Diabolik 4K (1968)

“Psychedelic 1960s Comic Book Caper”

Esteemed director Mario Bava’s much-loved comic book movie is getting a 4K restoration dual format release on UHD and Blu-ray from Eureka. The limited edition of 2000 also includes a 60 page book with new writing on the film from Roberto Curti, Jochen Ecke, Sergio Angelini and Troy Howarth all housed within a hardbound slipcase.

Brilliant and resourceful criminal Diabolik (John Phillip Law) has two loves in life: stealing things and Eva (Marisa Mell). The police, led by Inspector Ginko (Michel Piccoli) try to catch him by baiting him with a million dollars (which he steals), a fabulous emerald necklace (which he also steals) and an enormous bar of gold (guess what happens to that). All this contributes to the Diabolik Enormous Flamboyant Underground Lair where, when he’s not plotting amazing crimes he’s either asleep or being tickled by Eva and her enormous feather. But have the police finally managed to outwit him?

A big budget comic book movie from the Dino De Laurentiis studios, if you’ve seen Roger Vadim’s BARBARELLA (1967) or Mike Hodges’ FLASH GORDON (1980) you’ll have an idea what you’re in for here: glossy, brightly coloured, ultra-cool mayhem with sleek cars, amazing sets, and costumes that range from the extremely desirable (I’ve never wanted to own so many of the ties worn in a movie) to the ludicrous. Indeed, so colourful and over the top are parts of this that some may find it hard not to think of Mike Myers’ AUSTIN POWERS: INTERNATIONAL MAN OF MYSTERY series of films, which seem to draw at least as much from this as they do James Bond. 

Eureka’s 4K transfer is delicious and the ideal way to appreciate not just all that colour, but also Bava’s intricate compositions, matte paintings and model work which we, sophisticated viewers that we are, will all be looking out for now but which back in the day would have wowed cinema audiences. Sound options include the two different English dubs (one of which is in both mono and 5.1 surround) and an Italian mono track.

Eureka’s disc comes with three commentary tracks. Tim Lucas is the acknowledged expert of Mario Bava’s cinema and his commentary track will have you rewinding the film to look more closely at the cleverest bits of Bava's camera trickery which Mr Lucas superbly deconstructs for us. Tim returns for another commentary, this time with star John Phillip Law where obviously more time is spent on Mr Law’s recollections. Finally we get Troy Howarth and Nathaniel Thompson who still find a lot to say that hasn’t already been covered.

Other extras include Leon Hunt who gives us an excellent 22 minute guide to Diabolik the comic book and the character’s screen incarnations. Rachael Nisbet provides a 27 minute academic look at the ‘pop art politics’ of the film in a video essay (27 minutes) and there’s an archival piece ‘From Fumetti to Film’ (20 minutes) to which Stephen R Bissette, Adam Yauch of the Beastie Boys, De Laurentiis, composer Ennio Morricone and others all contribute. Mr Yauch returns to provide a commentary track for the DIABOLIK-themed video to the Beastie Boys song Body Movin’. There are also a couple of trailers.

Mario Bava’s DANGER: DIABOLIK is getting a dual disc UHD and Blu-ray 4K release in a limited edition of 2000 on Monday 20th April 2026

Swamp Thing (1982)

        Wes Craven's DC comics adaptation from his GODZILLA GOES TO PARIS phase (the period when he was so desperate for a movie he would have directed that if offered it, or so he told Fangoria) gets an uncut Blu-ray release in the UK from 88 Films.

And why, you may ask if you weren't around at the time, should something as innocuous as SWAMP THING have ever been cut? Well there are a few scenes of female toplessness that the US censors felt their audiences had to be protected from back in the early 1980s. Those of us living in Europe were considered hardier to such things and so it's the 93 minute European version you get here.

Made well before comic book movies became in and huge and had massive budgets thrown at them, SWAMP THING heralds from those dark days when comic book movies were treated with a fair amount of disdain and a frequently slapdash approach to their production. SWAMP THING suffers from a poor script that's basically: here's our hero, here's our villain, oh no the hero's been turned into a monster, the woman he loves is placed in peril three times by the same villain & he has to save her. 

This sounds rather better than it is. Some of the acting is extremely ropey because again, SWAMP THING is from the days where as long as you had secured a couple of good actors for the leads the bit parts seemed to be made up of friends, relatives and whoever was hanging around. Adrienne Barbeau is good as the put upon heroine, and this is probably the best role she ever had not having to play terrible jazz in a lighthouse while being besieged by ghost pirates. Louis Jourdan looks as if he's not quite sure why he's in this but gives every line his all. Ray Wise, as the pre-swamp thing Dr Alec Holland is the only one who really gets the comic book feel spot on in his performance but he's understandably not around for very long. Oh, and Harry Manfredini did the music so it's only appropriate that someone wields a machete during a chase at one point as it does all sound a bit FRIDAY THE 13TH.

88 Films' Blu-ray looks very good with some slight drops in quality occasionally (and not in the scenes that were cut, curiously). There's a Wes Craven commentary track, an interview with production designer Robb Wilson King, and Kim Newman provides an overview of Craven's career. If you get in early the limited edition comes with a slipcase, an A3 fold out version of the movie poster and a nice little booklet filled with stills, lobby card reproductions and poster art.

Wes Craven's SWAMP THING is out on Blu-ray from 88 Films on Monday 25th March 2019