DRIVE-IN ASYLUM 1980 YEARBOOK IS ON SALE!

At last, total terror — in the year 1980, that is! Journey back in time to this crucial year in horror and exploitation history and experience the visual nostalgia of newsprint ads, as well as reviews and commentary on films that were released and/or popularized in 1980. From major releases such as Friday the 13th and Fade to Black, to cult items like Windows and Battle Beyond the Stars, contributors spill their guts about their favorite 1980 screamers, shockers and space operas.

This 72-page fanzine is 8.5″ x 5.5″ in black and white, with some pages printed on colored paper, and has a full-color cover. You can get it on Etsy.

In this issue, I wrote “Beaches, Death, Sex and Baby Eating: Joe D’Amato’s 1980,” getting into all of the many movies he made in that wonderful year.

Plus you get pages of ads for some of your favorite movies. There’s nothing else like Drive-In Asylum! Get your issue right now!

Scala recap

Over the last few weeks, I’ve been writing about the Severin release of Scala!!! Or, the Incredibly Strange Rise and Fall of the World’s Wildest Cinema and How It Influenced a Mixed-up Generation of Weirdos and Misfits and the movies that played there.

Here’s a recap of everything that was on the site.

The Severin set comes with several shorts and documentaries. You can read all about them in our breakdown part one and two.

In addition, I covered several of the movies that played at Scala. You can see the Letterboxd list of these films or click on any of the following links:

You can buy Scala!!! Or, the Incredibly Strange Rise and Fall of the World’s Wildest Cinema and How It Influenced a Mixed-up Generation of Weirdos and Misfits from Severin.

Plus, you can also get two other releases of films that played Scala from Severin.

The Severin blu ray release of The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living And Became Mixed-up Zombies!!? has three hours of bonus features, including an introduction by Joe Bob Briggs, two commentaries (one by Ray Dennis Steckler and the other by Joe Bob), an interbiew with Carolyn Brandt, deleted scenes, a VHS trailer and a re-release trailer and a radio ad for Teenage Psycho Meets Bloody Mary. You can get this from Severin.

Satan’s Sadists and Angels’ Wild Women are available on one blu ray. Extras include commentary on both movies by producer/distributor Samuel M. Sherman, outtakes, trailers and TV and radio commercials. You can get this from Severin.

CALULDRON FILMS BOX SET RELEASE: Brivido Giallo

The Brivido Giallo Collection collects the four film series directed by Lamberto Bava. Each film in this set is a standalone fully featured production that was completed between 1987 – 1989. The films stories are not connected, but were collected together for Italian television near the end of the 80s. 

Cauldron Films is collecting all four movies — Until Death, Graveyard Disturbance, Dinner with a Vampire, and The Ogre — on blu ray for the first time in a limited edition five disc set with each movie fully uncut and restored from 4K scans of the 35mm film negatives, loaded with brand new cast and crew featurettes by Eugenio Ercolani (including 4 with Lamberto Bava himself) and an exclusive new interview with composer Simon Boswell, all housed in a rigid outer box with four folded posters featuring new artwork by Eric Adrian Lee.

You can get this set from Cauldron Films and Diabolik DVD.

Here’s an overview of what’s in the set:

Graveyard Disturbance (1987): I used to have a complicated relationship with Lamberto Bava. And by that, I mean that for every Demons, there’s a Devilfish. But then I realize that I kind of like Blastfighter, love Macabre and even kind of dig Delirium. I always giae him another chance and finally, one day, I came around to liking what Lamberto directed.

In July of 1986, Lamberto was hired to create five TV movies under the title Brivido Giallo (Yellow Thrill). Of course, none of these were giallo and only four got made: Until DeathThe OgreDinner with a Vampire and this film.

Originally titled Dentro il cimitero (Inside the Cemetery), this spoof of Italian horror is about five twentysomething teenagers who make a bet with an entire town — which is literally referred to as the kind of place from An American Werewolf In London — to see if they can survive one evening inside a series of catacombs. Not only are there zombies and vampires in there, there’s also death itself.

It all starts off with plenty of promise, as our gang of young punks has the most 80s van ever, complete with an image from Heavy Metal, U2 and Madonna. After the crew shoplifts, they go on the run and straight into supernatural trouble.

The person they’re stealing from? Lamberto. Which is only fair, as he uses this movie to rip off everything from — sorry, spoof or pay homage to — Carnival of Souls and Phenomena to his father’s Black Sunday and any number of zombie movies.

So where does the eating come in? Well, there’s one great scene in here where an entire family of multiple eyed creatures all dine on rotten food. This moment had to have inspired Pan’s Labyrinth.

The Cauldron release of Graveyard Disturbance includes commentary by Eugenio Ercolani and Nanni Cobretti; interviews with Bava, Gianlorenzo Battaglia, Karl Zinny, Massimo Antonello Geleng and Roberto Ricci; a trailer; a poster with artwork by Eric Adrian Lee and a reverse blu ray wrap with the original artwork.

Until Death (1988): As I mentioned above, I felt like I had never given Lamberto a fair chance. Then again, whenever I say that, people always remark that I’m always mentioning that I like his movies. Demons is a near-perfect movie but I’ve always qualified that by saying that he had Argento, Franco Ferrin and Dardano Sacchetti on board along with Michele Soavi as assistant director. And then I think, well, you know, I kind of really like Macabre and it has some really grimy stuff in it. A Blade In the DarkBlastfighterDinner with a Vampire, Graveyard Disturbance, The OgreDemons 2 and Midnight Ripper all have charms. I’ve even come around to liking Delirium e foto di Gioia, Maybe not Monster Shark. But the more I think about it, I really do like Lamberto Bava.

This is the movie that put me over the edge into perhaps even love.

In July of 1986, Lamberto was hired to create five TV movies under the title Brivido Giallo (Yellow Thrill). Of course, none of these were giallo and only four got made: The Ogre, Dinner with a Vampire, Graveyard Disturbance and Until Death.

There were some hurt feelings about this movie when it was made. It was based on an older script by Dardano Sacchetti, but Lucio Fulci went on record saying that he was planning on making an adaption of The Postman Always Rings Twice with the title Evil Comes Back. Fulci said that Sacchetti wrote it up and sent it to several producers and later found out that when Luciano Martino bought it, his name wasn’t on it. Fulci said, “…because of our friendship I decided not to sue Sacchetti, but I did break off all relations with him.” Sacchetti responded, “The producer of Evil Comes Back didn’t have the budget required, and he gave up to do the film. That’s it. Years later, as the screenplay was mine, I sold it to another producer who used it for a b-movie with Lamberto Bava.”

Gioia Scola really could have been a remembered giallo queen if she’d come along 15 years early. As it is, she was in some of my favorite late 80s films in the genre, including Obsession: A Taste for FearToo Beautiful to DieSuggestionata and Evil Senses.

In this film, she plays Linda, a woman whose husband Luca (Roberto Pedicini) left her eight years ago. All the men of the small village wondered why he’d leave behind such a stunning woman. In fact, this movie could have been called Ogni uomo vuole scopare Linda. She gave birth to Luca’s son and unknown to the town, has since become the wife of the man who helped kill her husband, Carlo (David Brandon).

Together, they run a small hotel near the lake. During one rainy night, Marco (Urbano Barberini) arrives to stay. And it seems like he knows way too much about what’s going on. Her son Alex (Marco Vivio) may as well, as he wakes up every night screaming, dreaming of his father clawing his way out of a muddy grave. She hires Marco as the handyman, but Carlo thinks they’re sleeping together. In no way can this turn out well.

How does Marco know where all the old clothes are kept? How does he already know the family recipes? And why is he so close so quickly with Alex?

What’s intriguing is how close this is in story and tone, yet goes off on its own path, to Bava’s father’s film Shock. The difference is where the father would use camera tricks and tone to create a mood of dread, his son will put you directly into the middle of the muck and grue with comic book lighting and great looking effects from Angelo Mattei. And keeping the family tradition going, Lamberto’s son Fabrizio was the assistant director. How wild that Mario’s grandson was AD on movies like Zoolander 2 and Argento’s Giallo and The Card Player, using the name Roy Bava for those last two movies.

My favorite fact about this movie is that it was released on VHS as The Changeling 2: The Revenge. Trust me, it has nothing to do with The Changeling.

The Cauldron release of Until Death includes commentary by Eugenio Ercolani and Troy Howarth; interviews with Bava, Battaglia, David Brandon and Massimo Antonello Geleng; a trailer; a poster with artwork by Eric Adrian Lee and a reverse blu ray wrap with the original artwork.

The Ogre (1989): Following the success of the film Demons and Demons 2, this film was announced as part of Bava’s TV movie series. The script, written by Dardano Sacchetti, is pretty much the original script for The House By the Cemetery before Lucio Fulci added to the tale. Seeing as how it was a TV movie, there was some self-censorship, as Bava said that were this a real movie, the ogre would have eaten children.

Cheryl (Virginia Bryant, Demons 2The Barbarians) is a sexually confused American writer of horror novels who traves to Italy with her husband Tom (Paolo Malco, The New York RipperThunder) and son Bobby — yep, little Bob, but not Giovanni Frezza — to work on her next book.

She begins to have nightmares of childhood memories of being stalked by an ogre and becomes convinced that the house has a curse on it that is bringing her past memories into our reality.

Alex Serra, who was the blind man from the original Demons, also shows up. Speaking of Demons, this movie was released outside of Italy as the third film in that series. As you’ll soon learn from the Demoni sequels, it has nothing to do with the first two films. Even more confusing, this was released on DVD in Germany as Ghosthouse II, the sequel to the Umberto Lenzi’s Ghosthouse/La Casa 3. That movie is confusing, too, as it’s the third movie in the La Casa series, which translates to house in Italian, but has nothing to do with the movie House. Instead, Evil Dead is known as La Casa in Italy.

Want more info on how all that works? Check this article out on La Casa and this article about the Demons movies.

The Cauldron release of The Ogre includes commentary by Rachel Nisbet; interviews with Bava, Geleng and Ricci; a trailer; a poster with artwork by Eric Adrian Lee and a reverse blu ray wrap with the original artwork.

Dinner With a Vampire (1989): Four actors — Gianni (Riccardo Rossi, the Italian voice of Simba in The Lion King), Rita (Patrizia Pellegrino), Monica (Yvonne Sciò, who was in the Tal Bachman video for “She’s So High”) and Sasha (Valeria Milillo) have won their audition to appear in a new horror movie. As they’re on the way to meet Jurek the director (George Hilton, All the Colors of the DarkThe Case of the Bloody Iris) — who lives in a large castle — they learn that he’s a vampire and has a challenge: he believes that they can kill him.

There are movies within a movie. There’s a hunchbacked assistant named Giles (Daniele Aldrovandi). And there’s lots of gore, particularly at the end. Written by Bava with Dardano Sacchetti, this comedy isn’t going to change your world, but it will entertain you unless you have a major issue with goofy humor.

The Cauldron release of Dinner With a Vampire includes commentary by Eugenio Ercolani, Nathaniel Thompson and Troy Howarth; interviews with Bava, George Hilton, Geleng and Boswell; a trailer; a poster with artwork by Eric Adrian Lee and a reverse blu ray wrap with the original artwork.

The set also comes with a soundtrack compilation CD featuring tracks from each Brivido Giallo film curated and supplied by composer Simon Boswell.

This is an incredibly exciting set! Here’s to more Italian TV movies making their way here.

RETURN OF KAIJU DAY RECAP!

We made it!

Here are the kaiju and monster related movies the site shared today:

Here are the movies shared in 2023 for THAN-KAIJU-GIVING:

In 2022, the follow kaiju films were shared as part of THANKSGIVING TERROR:

2021’s SON OF KAIJU DAY featured:

The original KAIJU DAY had these movies:

Want to see even more? There’s a B and S About Kaiju list on Letterboxd.

Furious coming from Visual Vengeance!

Simon, a fierce Kung Fu master, ventures into the city’s gritty underbelly for answers to his sister’s death. There, a cunning spiritual master deceives him, plotting to snatch his piece of an ancient amulet he shared with her. Unraveling the scheme, Simon plunges fists and feet first into a bone-crushing battle for the fate of the world against an alien army of karate wizards, dragons, a new wave clone band, talking pigs and mystical chickens!

One of the most bizarre domestic martial arts movies ever made, Furious throws the 1980s home video chopsocky craze in a blender with elements of the supernatural, horror and superhero genres, by way of an improvised MTV video. Featuring Hollywood martial arts legends Simon and Phillip Rhee (Best of the Best, The Matrix, Inception) in their first ever starring roles, and also the choreographers for all the non-stop action on display in the film.

This cult martial arts classic is available for the first time ever on Blu-ray with hours of new interviews and bonus features:

  • Limited Edition slipcase by The Dude and a limited edition throwing star key tag
  • New director-approved SD master from original tape elements
  • Archival commentary with co-director Tim Everitt
  • Commentary with Justin Decloux of The Important Cinema Club and Peter Kuplowsky of the Toronto International Film Festival
  • High Kicking In Hollywood: Tom Sartori interview
  • The Kung Fu Kid: Tim Everitt interview
  • North American No-Budget Martial Arts Cinema Primer – video essay by Justin Decloux
  • Rhee Brothers Career Overview – Justin Decloux video essay
  • Archival Scarecrow Video Podcast with Tim Everitt (2013)
  • Furious New Wave Band – behind the scenes Super 8 footage
  • Scorched Earth Policy: full six song EP (1987)
  • Cinema Face: live in concert (1986)
  • Tom Sartori 1980s music video reel
  • Tom Sartori Super 8 short films reel
  • Original trailers
  • Visual Vengeance trailers
  • “Stick Your Own” VHS sticker set
  • Reversible sleeve featuring original VHS art
  • Folded mini-poster reproduction of original Furious one sheet
  • 2-sided insert with alternate art

Pre-order information will be added when it’s announced.

Dinosaur Valley Girls coming from Visual Vengeance!

Chain-smoking Hollywood action movie star Tony Markham is zapped back in time via a magic artifact to a prehistoric world of flesh-hungry dinosaurs, angry cavemen and a tribe of exotic, love-starved cavegirls. He must use his modern-day machismo and best karate moves to survive the onslaught of Jurassic terrors while wooing the literal cavegirl of his dreams, Hea-Thor.

Produced, written and directed by fan film pioneer, Marvel Comics scribe and Star Wars novelist Don Glut, Dinosaur Valley Girls playfully and skillfully dives headfirst into the subject matter, including creating a completely new language for the titular tarts. What could have easily been just a typical late-night slot-filler on Skinemax becomes an epic world-building adventure, complete with stop motion dinosaurs, original music numbers, off-the-wall cameos and more dad jokes than you can shake an Allosaurus bone at.

Extras on the Visual Vengeance blu ray release — the first blu ray ever of this movie — include:

  • Limited Edition slipcase by Rick Melton and Dinosaur Valley Girls logo sticker
  • Remastered SD master from original tape elements
  • New 2023 commentary and an archival commentary with director Don Glut and C. Courtney Joyner
  • Dinosaur Valley Guy: interview with director Don Glut
  • Don Glut: The Collection – A look inside Don’s legendary dinosaur home museum
  • The Making of Dinosaur Valley Girls
  • PG-13 cut
  • Deleted and alternate scenes
  • Actress auditions reel
  • Dinosaur Tracks, Jurassic Punk and Dinosaur Valley Girls music videos
  • Original storyboards
  • Production image galleries
  • Mu Wang in Mu-Seum and Danse Prehistoric
  • Original promotional trailer
  • Visual Vengeance trailers
  • Reversible sleeve featuring original home video art
  • 2-sided insert with alternate art
  • Folded mini-poster
  • “Stick Your Own” VHS sticker set

Preorders will be announced soon. I can’t wait!

Severin’s VIRUS: HELL OF THE LIVING DEAD and RATS: NIGHT OF TERROR Novelizations!

Severin Films and Encyclopocalypse Publications today announced two new novelizations from author Brad Carter based on director Bruno Mattei’s ‘80s Italian genre classics Hell of the Living Dead (aka Virus) and Rats: Night of Terror. Carter consulted with screenwriters Claudio Fragasso and Rossella Drudi about their original big-budget visions for both films, which were unable to be realized for the eventual productions. Carter, whose previous Severin novelizations include Mardi Gras Massacre, Night of the Demon and Mattei’s Cruel Jaws then utilized Fragasso and Drudi’s ambitious initial concepts to craft two gore-soaked sagas that redefine modern novelizations.

“Brad Carter is a mad genius of movie novelizations,” says Severin co-founder/president David Gregory. “The scope and scale of Virus: Hell of the Living Dead is nothing less than James Michener with zombie carnage. Rats: Night of Terror combines post-apocalypse insanity with “nature amok” depravity for a monumental new sci-fi thriller. Both Bruno Mattei classics are now elevated from the Italo-Gore gutter to the loftiest of bookshelves.”

“Brad Carter is a master of his craft, transforming cult classics into immersive, expansive horror epics that fans of the genre will absolutely devour,” says Encyclopocalypse Publications president Mark Alan Miller. “These novelizations are like director’s cuts on the page – bold, inventive and endlessly entertaining. We are proud to share these books with the world.”

“Getting to be an official part of the Mattei/Fragasso/Drudi cinematic universe is a dream come true,” says author Brad Carter. “These books were written by a fan of Italian horror for fans of Italian horror, and I really wanted to deliver the gory goods. Hopefully, I succeeded.”

Virus: Hell of the Living DeadDeep within the African jungle nation of Daroka, Marsh Industries’ biochemical research facility is developing a classified serum known as the HOPE Project. But in the lab’s Antares Module, where human test subjects are kept in locked cells, something has gone horrifically wrong. The dead are alive. Aggressive. Hungry for flesh. And the infection is spreading. Now a team of heavily armed American mercenaries, a French female journalist and a group of unsuspecting missionaries have all entered the plague zone. In a third world hellhole already engulfed by political unrest and corporate greed, can anyone survive a rapidly decomposing nightmare of uncontainable viral carnage? From Brad Carter – whose shark chomping, dick ripping, whore gore and vermin mating novelizations include Mardi Gras Massacre, Night of the Demon, Cruel Jaws and Rats: NIght of Terror – comes this guts-splattered apocalypse epic inspired by the original mega-budget screenplay vision of Claudio Fragasso & Rossella Drudi that eventually became the low-budget basis for Bruno Mattei’s zombie trash classic Hell of the Living Dead.

Rats: Night of Terror: Nobody knows exactly how many generations have passed since the catastrophic Event, leaving most of North America a wasteland roamed by the deformed, the doomed and the damned. But far beneath the poisoned terrain, an inhuman species of subterranean colonists has a plan to repopulate the planet. Their oily black fur glistens in the darkness. Their telepathic communication argues the details. Their long thick tails and razor-sharp incisors twitch with anticipation. And for a roughneck salvage team who has accepted a warlord’s lucrative offer to raid an abandoned city, what appeared to be an easy score is now a gore-spattered battle for survival that may breed the ultimate horror. From Brad Carter – whose killer shark, horny Bigfoot, butchered hooker and zombie apocalypse novelizations include Cruel Jaws, Night of the Demon, Mardi Gras Massacre and Virus: Hell of the Living Dead – comes this viscera-sprayed saga inspired by an original screenplay by Claudio Fragasso, Rossella Drudi and Bruno Mattei that became the basis for Mattei’s notorious trash classic Rats: Night of Terror.

Virus: Hell of the Living Dead and Rats: Night of Terror will initially be available during Severin Film’s annual Black Friday Webstore Event, which takes place on 11/29 from 12:01am EST to 11:59pm PST on 12/2 at www.SeverinFilms.com.

VINEGAR SYNDROME’S LOST CITY OF BLACK FRIDAY SALE

The countdown is on! Black Friday 2024 is close. It will kick off at exactly 12:01 AM EST on Friday, November 29 and end at 11:59 PM EST on Monday, December 2 on Vinegar Syndrome’s site.

Here’s what to look forward to:

  • Secret titles will be revealed!
  • New releases from: VSA, VSL and Cinématographe
  • Three brand new catalog slipcovers
  • Two Degausser VHS
  • Loads of new merchandise
  • 50-75% off hundreds of titles and going extinct discounts
  • VSMC’s Lost Treasures Sweepstakes!

Here’s what’s already been announced:

  • The VSU release of Congo
  • The U.S. blu ray debut of Cannibal! The Musical
  • The world UHD and blu ray debut of Looking for Mr. Goodbar
  • The world blu ray debut of Blood Tracks
  • The home video debut of Vinegar Syndrome’s latest original production, Black Eyed Susan
  • Ron Sullivan: The Early Years from Distribpix

Get ready! Friday is close!

MVD BLACK FRIDAY SALE!

MVD’s annual Black Friday and Cyber Week Sale is live!

  • Prices start at just 99¢!
  • Over 250 titles on sale!
  • Slipcovers are not guaranteed
  • $7.99 flat rate shipping on U.S. orders or FREE shipping on US orders of $75+ (Intl. shipping options available)
  • Sale ends 12/9/2024 12 noon Eastern Time.

There are some AMAZING prices on movies, so if you’re on a budget — or not and just love to get films like I do — head over now!

You can find the sale at this link!

SEVERIN BLACK FRIDAY SALE!

Severin Films has their annual Black Friday Sale coming this Friday, November 29, led by the North American UHD premieres of the now-restored Delicatessen and Antiviral.

The weekend webstore event also features the North American Blu-ray premiere of Lamberto Bava’s long-unseen The Mask of Satan; a pair of worldwide UHD premieres from director Bruno Mattei and screenwriters Claudio Fragasso and Rossella Drudi with Rats: Night of Terror and Hell of the Living Dead, both with bonus soundtrack CDs and all-new novelizations; the worldwide UHD premieres of the landmark cannibal shockers Eaten Alive, directed by Umberto Lenzi, and Slave of the Cannibal God directed by Sergio Martino; the North American UHD premiere of Ruggero Deodato’s grisly Last Cannibal World; the worldwide UHD premiere Aldo Lado’s controversial Night TRain Murders with 5 hours of special features and bonus Ennio Morricone soundtrack CD; and the worldwide disc Premiere of Jess Franco’s sexy Altman-esque mosaic Thong Girls.

The Severin webstore will also be offering exclusive bundles, all-new Severin merch, a Saturday-only box set sale and 50% off most Severin/Intervision library titles. The sale will take place from 12:01am EST on 11/29 to 11:59pm PST on 12/2 at Severin’s site.

Read any of the linked titles to see a full article.

Delicatessen: In UHD for the first time ever in North America, co-writers/directors Jean-Pierre Jeunet and Marc Caro’s film about odd jobs and strange neighbors, circus stars and troglodytes, fresh meat and true love is now available from Severin, restored in 4K from the original camera negative by StudioCanal under the supervision of Jeunet.

The North American UHD premiere will be released as a 3 disc collection with an incredible 6 hours of new and archival Special Features curated exclusively for this edition, including commentary from Jean-Pierre Jeunet, interviews with the co-directors and producer Terry Gilliam, short films and an exclusive booklet by Claire Donner of The Miskatonic Institute Of Horror Studies.

Eaten AliveThe UHD of Umberto Lenzi’s film has so many extras, including commentary by Nathaniel Thompson and Troy Howarth; an interview with Lenzi; a Deodato Meats Lenzi featurette; the documentary Me Me Lai Bites Back; interviews; newly discovered alternate footage; a trailer and an exclusive booklet by Claire Donner Of The Miskatonic Institute Of Horror Studies.

Rats: Night of Terror: Director Bruno Mattei and screenwriters Claudio Fragasso and Rossella Drudi take us to 225 A.B. (After The Bomb), as a gang of scavengers discover a seemingly abandoned city – including sets originally built for Once Upon a Time In America – only to become prey for millions of flesh-hungry rats. This has been scanned in 4K from the original camera negative for the first time ever and has 3 hours of new and archival special features and a bonus CD of the recently discovered/remastered soundtrack, plus”Under The Black Sky” by Pornographie Exclusive, a Severin produced music video with Geretta Geretta.

Slave of the Cannibal GodAfter creating some of the best gialli of the ‘70s, director Sergio Martino entered the cannibal cycle here. When a British scientist disappears in the jungles of New Guinea, his wife hires an American anthropologist lead her deep into a green inferno of graphic violence, steamy nudity and several of the most notorious scenes in the entire genre. Scanned in 4K from the original camera negative with over 3 hours of special features, this has a new interview with Martino, audio commentary by Claire Donner of the Miskatonic Institute Of Horror Studies and more.

Hell of the Living Dead: It’s no accident that Severin used our review for sales copy for this, reminding viewers that this movie is “absolutely insane.” What began as the epic global zombie apocalypse screenplay by Claudio Fragasso and Rossella Drudi became – via the inimitable vision of director Bruno Mattei and a fraction of the original budget – this wild effort, now on UHD and scanned in 4K from the original camera negative for the first time in America, complete with a CD of its soundtrack.

Last Cannibal WorldFor the first film in his unofficial Cannibal Trilogy, director Ruggero Deodato created this film, which is presented in UHD for the first time ever in North America, now scanned in 4K from the original negative with over 2½ hours of special features and a webstore exclusive blu ray disc containing the alternate U.S. version of the film, as well as commentary by Deodato, moderated by Freak-O-Rama’s Federico Caddeo.

Thong GirlsThis 1983 production from writer/director Jess Franco can finally be experienced as one of his most surprising and heartfelt offerings of the decade. It’s summer’s end in the resort city of Benidorm, where seductive foreigners, conniving hustlers, gullible tourists and insatiable celebrities all come together in a barbed confection that’s part sunny comedy, part Nashville-style satire and totally, unmistakably, sexy Franco fun. It’s scanned in 2K from the original camera negative with over 2 hours of new special features, such as Francomania’s John Dixon and William Morris and more of Stephen Thrower’s journeys in the land of Franco.

Night Train MurdersFor far too long, this 1974 shocker directed by Aldo Lado has been dismissed as a Last House On the Left knockoff. Now it can be experienced as it should be, on its own merit, in UHD for the first time ever. Scanned in 4K from the original camera negative with over 5 hours of special features — such as commentary by Aldo Lado, moderated by Freak-O-Rama’s Federico Caddeo, and a soundtrack CD — this is why Severin remains one of the best physical media labels.

AntiviralThe award-winning debut feature by writer/director Brandon Cronenberg has been scanned in 4K from the 35mm protection internegative supervised by Brandon Cronenberg and cinematographer Karim Hussain with 3 hours of new and archival special features.

The Mask of Satan: From writer/director Lamberto Bava comes a modern-day reimagining of his father’s classic Black Sunday! also known as Demons 5: The Devil’s Veil, this is scanned in 2K from the original camera negative for the first time ever in North America and has an interview with Bava.

Plus! The first ever release of the Rats: Night of Terror soundtrack, as well as Morricone’s Night Train Murders score and the Goblin’s Hell of the Living Dead soundtrack including a bonus track by OG UK punk band Peter & The Test Tube Babies “Zombie Creeping Flesh” among others.

Plus! Two brand new, epic novelizations by Brad Carter, co-produced by Encyclopocalypse: Virus: Hell of the Living Dead and Rats: Night of Terror! Carter consulted with original screenwriters Claudio Fragasso and Rossella Drudi about their original visions and has penned two ultimate publications in the fine tradition of splatter-filled pulp novels.

There’s also a Saturday box set sale with 50% off the following movies:

  • All The Haunts Be Ours: A Compendium Of Folk Horror Vol. 1
  • The Complete Lenzi/Baker Giallo Collection
  • Cushing Curiosities
  • Danza Macabra Vol. One: The Italian Gothic Collection
  • Danza Macabra Vol. Two: The Italian Gothic Collection
  • The Dungeon of Andy Milligan Collection
  • The Eurocrypt of Christopher Lee Collection Vol 1
  • The Eurocrypt of Christopher Lee Collection Vol 2
  • House of Psychotic Women Rarities Collection
  • The Incredibly Strange Films of Ray Dennis Steckler
  • Nasty Habits: The Nunsploitation Collection
  • Violent Streets: The Umberto Lenzi/Tomas Milian Collection
  • The Sensual World of Black Emanuelle
These movies will be half-off for the first time!

New merchandise includes a Severin 2024 tour shirt; a Slave of the Cannibal God shirt; a Last Cannibal World shirt; a Rats: Night of Terror long sleeve; a Medusa Video/Severin logo shirt, hoodie and sticker; a Merlin Video/Severin shirt; a Zombie Creeping Flesh button; a directed by Vincent Dawn sticker and a Severin Zippo lighter.

Bundles include:

  • The Everything Bundle: Just like the name says, everything in the sale for $540.
  • Just the Discs: $340
  • Tanto/Mattei Bundle: Hell of the Living Dead, Rats: Night of Terror, Rats book, Medusa sticker, Virus book, Merlin Video shirt, Zombie Creeping Flesh button, directed by Vincent Dawn sticker, Medusa Video shirt of hoodie. $235 for the hoodie bundle or $205 for the t-shirt bundle.
  • Cannibale Bundle: Eaten AliveLast Cannibal World and shirt,  Slave of the Cannibal God and shirt: $165

Learn the rules of the sale here and be at Severin’s site right after Thanksgiving. I know I will!