Somehow, I’ve never seen this movie before. Sure, it was featured by other writers on the site before and I’ve owned it for some time, but somehow I’ve never found the reason to watch it. Luckily, Arrow Video released several new versions of the film on blu ray and 4K UHD, which gave me the opportunity.

What was I waiting for?

True Romance was a script Quentin Tarantino sold after Reservoir Dogs and unlike so many of his written work, it was directed by someone else: Tony Scott (ironic, as Tarantino went off on Scott’s best-known film Top Gun in the 1994 movie Sleep With Me).

I kind of love that this started with Roger Avery unable to finish a script, so he turned it over to Tarantino, who gave him a stack of pages back which were Natural Born Killers and this movie, which starts after the prison riot and features Mickey and Mallory Knox tracking down the writer who made the cash-in film about their lives. As that writer hides out, he writes True Romance.

Tarantino has said that it’s his most autobiographical film and by and large, he was happy with the way it turned out. It’s pretty faithful to his screenplay, other than changing the story to a linear structure and not the all-over-the-place narrative that Tarantino would use for Pulp Fiction. He also took much of the film’s first act from his 1987 effort My Best Friend’s Birthday.

I have to say, as a man obsessed with movies that married a short-haired blonde from Detroit, this movie has a lot to say to me.

As Clarence Worley (Christian Slater) sits alone in a theater watching a Sonny Chiba triple feature, Alabama Whitman (Patricia Arquette) — named from Pam Grier’s character in The Big Bird Cage — spills her popcorn all over him, leading to an evening where the two bond over cinema, Elvis, diner food and sex.

The next day, she tells him that she was hired to give him a good time by his boss. He doesn’t care; they’re both in love. They get married and moments later, Elvis (Val Kilmer) himself appears to Clarence and tells him that he has to set Alabama free from her pimp Drexl (Gary Oldman, perfect for the too-brief time he’s on-screen). All Clarence wants is her to be free, Drexl attempts to kill him, but misjudges just how strong Alabama’s love makes the young man. Running into the night with two dead bodies left behind, the young couple learns that they have a briefcase packed with cocaine.

As we follow the couple to Hollywood, where Dick Ritchie (Michael Rappaport) and Elliot Blitzer (Bronson Pinchot) broker a deal with movie producer Lee Donowitz (Elliot Blitzer; this character produced Bounty Law in Once Upon a Time…In Hollywood, is the son of Donny Donowitz from Inglorious Bastards; the movie that he produced that Clarence speaks so highly of, Coming Home In a Body Bag stars Rick Dalton, who is the hero of Once Upon a Time…In Hollywood; he’s also pretty much Joel Silver).

This drug deal is complicated by the fact that Drexl had stolen the cocaine from Blue Lou Boyle, which sends Vincenzo Coccotti (Christopher Walken) and an army of killers on the trail of Clarence and Alabama. Meanwhile, a cocaine and oral sex aided and abetted arrest leads to the cops wiring Elliot for the big drug deal, an event that leads to a Mexican standoff between our happy couple, the Hollywood elite, organized crime and the police, led by detectives Nicky Dimes (Chris Penn) and Cody Nicholson (Tom Sizemore).

There’s so much that happens in this movie and so much to discuss, but I think it’s perhaps best experienced by the viewer. That said, there’s an astounding scene between Clarence’s father (Dennis Hopper) and Coccotti, as well as Alabama remaining resilient in the face and fists of a hired killer (James Gandolfini). Oh — and Brad Pitt pretty much inventing the movie Pineapple Express with his scene with the mob interrogating him.

The original ending had Clarence dying and the widowed Alabama eventually turning to crime. Evidence of that is in Reservoir Dogs and Mr. White (Harvey Keitel) talking about working with Alabama.

The Arrow Video release of True Romance has 4K restorations of both the Theatrical Cut and the Director’s Cut from the original camera negatives, as well as limited edition packaging with a reversible sleeve featuring newly commissioned artwork by Sara Deck (which also is featured as a poster in this impressive set).

There’s so much in this package, including a 60-page perfect-bound collectors’ booklet featuring new writing on the film by Kim Morgan and Nicholas Clement, a 2008 Maxim oral history featuring interviews with cast and crew and Edgar Wright’s 2012 eulogy for Tony Scott, as well as six double-sided, postcard-sized lobby card reproductions

There are multiple audio commentaries, with options from director Tony Scott, writer Quentin Tarantino, stars Christian Slater and Patricia Arquette, and critic Tim Lucas, Plus, you also get select scene commentaries by stars Dennis Hopper, Val Kilmer, Brad Pitt, Michael Rapaport, Bronson Pinchot and Saul Rubinek.

As if that wasn’t enough, there are interviews with costume designer Susan Becker, co-editor Michael Tronick, co-composers Mark Mancina and John Van Tongeren, and Larry Taylor, author of Tony Scott: A Filmmaker on Fire.

Most interesting to me were the deleted scenes with optional commentary by Scott and the two different endings of the movie with commentaries by Scott and Tarantino that really add so much to this movie, as Tarantino discusses how the ending in the film is the right ending for the movie Scott made.

There’s also an electronic press kit featurettes, behind-the-scenes footage and interviews with Tony Scott, Christian Slater, Patricia Arquette, Dennis Hopper and Gary Oldman, trailers and TV spots, and an image gallery.

You can get the following versions from MVD:

• Limited edition blu ray
• Limited edition UHD
• Dual format steelbook
• Dual format deluxe steelbook

Cecilia (Mariana Anghileri) has had a car accident — colliding with Enrique (Gerardo Romano) who is delivering a mysterious package — and even three days afterward, she finds herself wandering a lonely road seeking her son, who disappeared in the aftermath. She soon learns that she’s being accused of kidnapping her child and another accident that evening by her ex-husband Fernando (Diego Cremonesi) and Inspector Ventura (Osvaldo Santoro). Meanwhile, Dr. Hernán (Lautaro Delgado) tries to use hypnosis to help her remember exactly what happened that night.

Coming from Argentina — the home of films like Terrified and The Curious Dr. Humpp — and filmmaker Daniel de la Vega, this film is full of moody dread and palpable loss. Helping it along the way are the score by Luciano Onetti (who is part of the Onetti Brothers who made Francesca and Abrakadabra) as well as cinematographer Mariano Suárez’s (Daemonium: Soldier of the Underworld) eye guiding the camera.

As Cecelia tries to piece together the last three days, Enrique the priest who she was in the accident with is still looking for the ancient Catholic relic that was lost in the wreckage and will do anything to get it back.

It starts off slow, but stick with it. There’s something here, even if it isn’t perfect. Daniel de la Vega seems like someone who is going to keep putting out interesting horror, so I’ll keep watching his film.

You can watch this exclusively on Shudder.

Alfredo Zacarías made Demonoid and we should thank him for years for that. He also took advantage of the sheer terror that ensured when the Africanized honey bee was on its way to America. Originally used in Brazil to increase honey production, 26 swarms escaped quarantine in 1957 and spread throughout South America, incredibly defensive and angry bees that supposedly can chase a person for a mile. These bees have killed a thousand people with many of their victims being stung over and over again. Just imagine six-year-old me watching this on the news every single night as we were told again and again just how close these bees were to us and how doomed we all were.

I also blame the exploitation film industry who seized upon this and made so many killer bee movies, as they had all the news doing their advertising work for them. There was the 1974 TV movie Killer Bees, The Swarm and this movie, ads filled with just bee after bee and I’d watch when I was outside sure today was the day I’d be stung to death.

Jack Hill went uncredited on this as a writer, as he was supposed to direct it, but life didn’t work out that way. It’s the story of South American killer bees who haven’t just been smuggled into the country for experiments, but have also mutated into even smarter than your average bee and use that to kill humans.

It all happens when Dr. Miller (Claudio Brook) is trying to crossbreed the aggressive bees with a much calmer species so that more honey can be made. A local tries to break in and steal the bees, which leads to his angry family and friends burning down Miller’s house and the bees escaping. Meanwhile, Miller’s wife Sandra (Angel Tompkins) takes the queen to her uncle Dr. Sigmund Hummel (John Carradine, of course) and Dr. John Norman (John Saxon), who have the same goals as her husband, except there’s a honey spy ring trying to make more money off the bees and that means murder.

There’s a scene where Carradine falls to his doom and I won’t lie, I watched it nine times and with each rewatch I loved this movie even more. Also: John Saxon speaks to stock footage of the UN.

Released in the U.S. as Uncaged, this movie was directed and written by Dick Maas, the man behind The Lift, Amsterdamned and Sint. Taking place in the architecture of Amsterdam, Prey unleashes a gigantic lion that takes no prisoners.

On the trail of this 450-pound mountain lion are Detective Olaf Brinkers (Rienus Krul) and forensic veterinarian Lizzy (Sophie van Winden), all while a reporter named Maarten (Pieter Derks) and Dave the cameraman (Julian Looman) follow them, with Dave having just as much interest in winning over Lizzy as he does catching the cat. Maybe he’s more interested in the girl, to be perfectly honest.

After police chief Zalmberg (Theo Pont) has his cousin die spectacular trying to capture the lion, he hires famous hunter Jack DelaRue (Mark Frost) who just so happens to be Lizzy’s ex.

There was no way that this could be filmed with a real lion as wildlife is prohibited in the Amsterdam city area. There’s a mix of an animatronic lion in the close ups and a CGI one in the rest of the movie. It’s not perfect, but there are some thrilling scenes, as the ending with the lion trying to claw through a windshield to get to Lizzy is really intense.

Also, if you’re expecting a non-gory animal attack movie, you may have not seen any of Maas’ movies.

You can watch this on Shudder.

More remake than sequel, Alligator II starts with rich villain Vincent Brown (Steve Railsback) dumps some of the Future Chemicals into the sewers which goes right to the baby alligator from the end of Alligator.

Detective David Hodges (Joseph Bologna) and his wife Chris (Dee Wallace, forever battling against eco horror) realize that all the parts of people are coming from an alligator and try to get a big party at Brown’s casino on the lake cancelled, but you know how it goes. When your mayor is Major Healey from I Dream of Jeannie (Bill Dailey), these things happen. Actually, watching movies where small minded governments ignore ecological terror and shout down people and ruin lives really feels on topic. Maybe a bit too much.

With Hodges and Officer Rich Harmon (Woody Brown) on one side and alligator hunter “Hawk” Hawkins (Richard Lynch!) and his team, which includes his brother Billy (Kane Hodder!) on the other, you know that there’s going to be a lot of people torn apart and wolfed down.

What I did not expect was the lengthy pro wrestling scene which is filled with movie and wrestling crossover actors, like Professor Toru Tanaka, Alexis Smirnoff, Chavo Guerrero, Count Billy Varga, Gene LeBell and Bill Anderson. The man who would be the next Hulk Hogan, Tom Magee, is also here as a strongman that gets launched by the alligator’s tail.

Director Jon Hess made Watchers, while writer Curt Allen wrote Bloodstone. This movie is pure junk in the best of ways, just scene and people chewing, Richard Lynch breaking down over the loss of his crew and rocket launches against a monstrous alligator. Watch it in the pool.