DIGGING UP THE MARROW (Blu-ray Review) - Image/RLJ

USA/2014
Directed By: Adam Green
Written By: Adam Green
Starring: Ray Wise, Adam Green, Will Barratt
Color/88 Minutes/Not Rated
Region A
Release Date: March 24, 2015

The Film
DIGGIN UP THE MARROW is presented as a documentary in the making, following real life film makers Adam Green and Will Barratt as they follow a man named William Dekker (Ray Wise) who believes he has found entrances to "The Marrow" an underground system of cities where real life monsters live.

Just last month I reviewed the film itself, which I loved and there's nothing I can say here that I didn't already say at length previously. So check out THIS review to find out more about the film itself. I will add that DIGGING UP THE MARROW movie absolutely holds up to a second viewing.

The Audio & Video
Image/RLJ have done a stellar job releasing DIGGING UP THE MARROW on Blu-ray. The image on the anamorphic widescreen 1.78:1 is sharp and clear. Detail level is high with flesh tones looking healthy and natural. The numerous dark scenes handle the black levels beautifully with no blocking or compression issues. The DTS-HD audio track is crystal clear though there's not a ton in the way of sound design that just shows how nicely recorded and mixed the audio is.

The Extras
-Audio commentary with Adam Green, Ray Wise, Will Barratt and Alex Pardee
-Deleted and extended scenes with introduction from Adam Green
-Monsters Of The Marrow - a half hour featurette about bringing the art of Alex Pardee to life for the movie
-Trailer

The Bottom Line
DIGGING UP THE MARROW is one of my favorite genre movies of the last few years and I can already tell you that I fully expect it to be a strong contender for my "best of 2015" list at the end of the year.

DIGGING UP THE MARROW is available HERE

THE MUTHERS (DVD Review) - Vinegar Syndrome

Philippines/1976
Directed By: Cirio H. Santiago
Written By: Cirio H. Santiago, Cyril St. James
Starring: Jeannie Bell, Rosanne Katon, Trina Parks
Color/83 Minutes/Not Rated
Region FREE
Release Date: March 10, 2015

The Film
Kelly and Anggie head up a band of pirates known as The Muthers where they live in seclusion with their gang and rob rich cruise liners for their goods and money while battling the rival pirate gang lead by Turko. Kelly and Anggie throw themselves into the clutches of a slave farmer when they find out Kelly's sixteen year old sister has been kidnapped by the group and fight to find their sister along with their own escape and survival.

The king of Philippino exploitation, Cirio Santiago, delivers another piece of greatness. Part pirate movie, part jungle action/adventure movie but mostly a women in prison film, THE MUTHERS does a great job of taking a group that commit unsavory acts as their means of existence but making them extremely likable and having the audience root for them, even if it is simply by pairing them up against foes that are less likable. The performances in exploitation fare such as this can be all over the place but the cast lead by Jeannie Bell (TNT Jackson herself!) and with veterans of exploitation classics such as Ms. 45, Ebony Ivory & Jade and Stryker, the acting definitely doesn't disappoint.

The screenplay is action packed with plenty of shootouts, fist fights, explosions and torture scenes. THE MUTHERS is a blast, pun absolutely intended. No, THE MUTHERS might not be for everyone, and it really isn't the best at any of the areas it explores but for fans of women in prison or blaxploitation films you'll hardly find yourself scoffing at THE MUTHERS. As for the rest of you -Get lost!

The Audio & Video
Vinegar Syndrome gives THE MUTHERS a DVD release that maintains the film's original 1.85:1 aspect ratio with a quality anamorphic widescreen transfer. Colors are vibrant and lively while skin tones are healthy and natural. The film has been restored from the original negative and shows just a bit of speckling and scratching from age related damage, otherwise it is a great looking disc. The English audio track is clear and free of annoying background noise or damage. The mix in levels between dialogue and score is well done and nothing more can be asked of this A/V presentation!

The Extras
The lone extra is a theatrical trailer

The Bottom Line
Give me all your women in prison and blaxploitation films and I'll eat them up, especially when they're as fun as THE MUTHERS! Highly recommended!

THE MUTHERS is available HERE

MY NAME IS A BY ANONYMOUS (DVD Review) - Wild Eye Releasing

USA/2012
Directed By: Shane Ryan
Written By: Shane Ryan
Starring: Katie Marsh, Demi Baumann,
Color/90 Minutes/Not Rated
Region FREE
Release Date: September 23, 2014

The Film
Based on the true crime case of the murder of nine year old Elizabeth Olten by her fifteen year old neighbor Alyssa Bustamante, MY NAME IS A takes a raw and graphic look at growing up alienated and left to your own devices while not knowing how to deal with your own emotions.

Small on straight forward narrative, MY NAME IS A is more of a test of patience while dealing with angsty teens who are a near perfect personification of the "emo" label and stereotype. How long can you stick with this movie watching the girls binge and purge, cut their wrists or cry so that mascara is running down their face? I finished it, but just barely.

What could have been a powerful film touching on the struggles of growing into your own shell and dealing with the hand you've been dealt and showing the consequences of thinking there are none or that there's nobody outside of your own little world ends up looking like a music video from a band like The Used or My Chemical Romance.

The Audio & Video
MY NAME IS A was made with little in the way of professional equipment it seems and the DVD from Wild Eye Releasing looks as such. The picture quality looks like it was shot with low end consumer grade cameras and gives a soft and grainy look. This style does work for the film itself in ways that HD might not. The audio is similar in that it works but it is no frills and is adequate.

The Extras
Wild Eye has assembled a nice collection of extras for their release of the film...

-"The Columbine Effect" - an alternate edit of MY NAME IS A
-"I Hate Me, Myself and Us" - An hour long cut of MY NAME IS A
-Deleted and alternate scenes
-Music video
-Teona Dolnikova music video spotlight
-"Isolation" - a short film
-"Oni-Gokko" - a short film
-Trailers

The Bottom Line
Big fans of films based on true crimes may want to take a look but otherwise know what you're in for.

MY NAME IS A BY ANONYMOUS is available HERE

HOUSE OF LAST THINGS (DVD Review) - Revolver Entertainment

USA/2013
Directed By: Michael Bartlett
Written By: Michael Bartlett
Starring: Lindsey Haun, Blake Berris, RJ Mitte
Color/110 Minutes/Not Rated
Region 1
Release Date: February 10, 2015

The Film
HOUSE OF LAST THINGS centers around a couple who leave their home in the hands of a young girl as the caretaker while they visit Italy in an effort to save their marriage. The girl allows her boyfriend and her brother to stay at the house with her when all sorts of weird things start happening such as pictures changing their image, ghostly apparitions, and perhaps most of all, her boyfriend kidnapping a boy in a harebrained ransom plot. The house is pushing them towards the brink of insanity while exposing a nasty truth.

From the start, HOUSE OF LAST THINGS throws so many different tones at the viewer that I have no clue if they knew what kind of movie they wanted to make. There's moments of comedy that are along the lines of Three Stooges slapstick style thrown in on psychological horror and supernatural horror along with moments that make your daily soaps look good. There's plenty of loose ends that are so messily tied up its like they didn't bother tying their shoe, they just stuffed the laces in the sides.

With moments that harken back to The Shining, Asian horror films of the early 2000s, and maybe even some David Lynch films HOUSE OF LAST THINGS really doesn't manage to hit any of the right notes. There's some interesting visuals and some scenes are directed pretty decently but the movie runs too long, is way too worried about being weird instead of crafting a tighter film and simply does not manage to pull itself together.

The Audio & Video
Revolver Entertainment's DVD release of HOUSE OF LAST THINGS features a 16x9 anamorphic widescreen transfer that looks quite good. The picture is sharp and features vibrant colors with strong detail levels. The Dolby Digital audio is equally as nice with great clarity and an excellent mix job between dialogue and soundtrack. There's no background noise or damage.

The Extras
None.

The Bottom Line
HOUSE OF LAST THINGS is an effort that shows potential in multiple areas but ends up being a muddy mess of ideas that never come to fruition.

HOUSE OF LAST THINGS is available HERE

RABID GRANNIES (Blu-ray Review) - Troma

Belgium/1988
Directed By: Emmanuel Kervyn
Written By: Emmanuel Kervyn
Starring: Catherine Aymerie, Caroline Braeckman, Richard Cotica
Color/89 Minutes/Not Rated
Region FREE
Release Date: March 10, 2015

Forgive me in advance, this review will be a little different than most disc reviews due to the truly bizarre nature of this release.

Let me begin with the film itself as I know it to be. RABID GRANNIES centers around a dinner party held by two elderly aunts for their relatives. When the aunts open gift from the black sheep of the family which happens to be some sort of demonic box they're transformed into mutating monstrous demons and begin killing off the rest of the family in disgustingly gory and bloody fashion. In the vein of cheesy horror classics such as Lamberto Bava's Demons or the great Night Of The Demons starring Linnea Quigley, RABID GRANNIES definitely holds it own among similar and more well known titles of the decade. There's some fantastic creature and gore effects along with some incredibly silly and hilarious dialogue. It deserves a bigger following and reputation than it has as it is really never talked about when campy classics of the 80s are being discussed.

I first saw RABID GRANNIES years ago via Youtube. It wasn't the prettiest presentation but it was mostly complete, at least as far available releases in the states were concerned. I understand that there's no true uncut release of this movie available and that the most complete version is a German DVD release. Troma has previously released a DVD back in 1999. This release ran about 89 minutes and I believe to be the source of the video I watched when I was first exposed to the movie. There are other cuts floating around with heavier cuts to the blood and guts but the Troma DVD didn't seem too badly butchered. The movie had a nice flow and was still pretty gory.

Now Troma has released RABID GRANNIES on Blu-ray (the package also includes the 1999 DVD) and I was pretty excited when I heard the news. Then I read an early report that brought my excitement level down a bit but I thought maybe that report was being overly harsh. And then I received the disc in the mail to cover here so when I got the chance to pop it in and view an underrated gem that I was long overdue to watch again you'll only imagine the devastation and anger that came over me when I first laid eyes upon the utter shit I was looking at. The Blu-ray of RABID GRANNIES featured 2 cuts, one being labeled as a "producer's cut". I decided to watch the regular version first. This cut clocked in at about 69 minutes, a severely edited cut of the film compared to Troma's own DVD release of the movie that is a full 20 minutes longer. I've never heard of a version of the film this short. The only thing I can guess is that the Blu-ray was sourced from a PAL version of one of the edited versions of the movie that run in the 75 minute range and suffered from the 4% speed up due to converting from PAL to NTSC? This is a personal theory and one I admittedly have no evidence to back up but maybe? Either way, it really doesn't make sense to use that cut of the movie when you've previously released the movie in a far more complete version!

So we're dealing with a heavily cut version of the movie, at least it'll look great in HD, right? Right? Well, no. It doesn't look great. It doesn't even look good or okay. In fact it looks like this transfer was sourced from an old shitty VHS that has been duped a few times. The color palette for a big percentage of the film is just way off compared to the DVD. There are scenes that have a sepia tone look to them that look nothing like that on previous releases. There's scenes with a blue hue to them that shouldn't. There's no fucking sharpness to the picture at all and there's issues with artifacts and blocking in the image's background. The movie is cut to shit as well. Where the movie starts on Blu-ray is a good 10 minutes into the movie on DVD and explicit effects scenes are noticeably shortened. This is the daytime TV version of RABID GRANNIES if there was one and if the TV station spilled coffee all over the print and then ran it over with a truck a few times.

Maybe the Producer's Cut will be better... after all it is the PRODUCERS CUT! I'd love to know the history behind this cut and if anyone involved with the movie in any way, let alone a producer, actually had something to do with it because it's the exact same version of the movie but with 90 seconds of black screen before the movie starts. Yes, that's it. You get to sit through a minute and a half of fucking nothing before the same shitty version, with the same shitty quality starts. Maybe that's the producer giving you time to rethink your decision to watch this version and pop in the DVD instead!

There's a bit of irony in the whole thing as the only improvement the Blu-ray has over the DVD is that it finally gives us the movie in a widescreen format. The old Troma DVD looks decent enough for an early DVD but it is cropped to a full screen presentation. So now we at least get the movie in its proper aspect ratio! Well not so fast. The Blu-ray is framed to a Scope 2.35:1 aspect ratio that simply looks too wide at times. Framing just looks a little off and head's are chopped off at times. I think, and if the information provided at IMDB is correct, the aspect ratio should be 1.85:1. What a fuck job of a release this is.

Troma has been pretty fucking good with their Blu-ray game so far. They've taken a while to get stuff out but everything they've put out has been quality. I don't know what the fuck happened with RABID GRANNIES but whoever is responsible for this thing should never be allowed near a BD release again. This is quite possibly the worst Blu-ray transfer I've ever seen. There's some special features including deleted scenes, and trailers and things like that but it doesn't really matter when the movie itself looks like total fucking shit.

I'm going to recommend this release with great hesitation and only with the giant asterisk of buy it for the DVD and get some special features alongside it on the Blu-ray. If you already have the DVD stick with that.

 I love Troma and I hope this is just a single misstep along the way to more great releases on Blu-ray.

RABID GRANNIES is available HERE

THE WALKING DECEASED (2015)

USA/2015
Directed By: Scott Down
Written By: Tim Ogeltree
Starring: Tim Ogeltree, Dave Sheridan, Troy Ogeltree
In Theaters and On Demand: March 20, 2015

Zombies are the hot thing right now for better or worse. The only thing that has infiltrated all corners of pop culture like zombies have in recent years is bacon. I'm a fan of both of those things but it has gotten out of hand and is really annoying at times. Bacon this, zombie that. Part of the mainstream popularity of zombies, a large part, is thanks to The Walking Dead television show based on the comic books. The Walking Dead has found its way from prime time television, to merchandise all over mega chain store shelves and moms bringing their little children to horror conventions to spend tons of dough meeting the cast of the television series while putting their noses up at real horror fans. It was only a matter of time before it was spoofed.

THE WALKING DECEASED follows a rough track and timeline of The Walking Dead from Sheriff Rick waking up from a coma in the hospital to find the world in the midst of a zombie apocalypse. He finds his son and bans together with a group of other survivors and make their way to a farm for refuge hoping to survive long enough for a cure to be found.

THE WALKING DECEASED plays out as a giant pop culture reference filled with internet meme humor. Besides the AMC series other zombie references include Zombieland, Shaun Of The Dead and George Romero's classics. The pacing is fine with some genuinely funny moments but too often there's lulls in the action and moments where the humor falls flat. Some jokes are repeated too many times but overall the cast is capable of carrying the movie to be more entertaining than not and there is a pretty good chemistry between them to keep an organic feeling when it is necessary.

THE WALKING DECEASED likely won't become a cult classic of zombie comedy but it isn't all bad. It's a breezy watch clocking in at under 90 minutes and there's enough to like about the whole thing to get you passed the less funny moments.

HALO: NIGHTFALL (Blu-ray Review) - Microsoft Studios

USA/2014
Starring: Mike Colter, Steven Waddington, Christina Chong
Color/98 Minutes/TV-14
Region A
Release Date: March 17, 2015

The Film
Agent Jameson Locke (Mike Colter) of the Office Of Naval Intelligence is investigating terroist activity on the planet of Sedra when his team of ONI agents and the innocent occupants of the colony fall under a biological attack that only affects humans. Locke must team up with Randall Aiken, a military commander and their squads must try to cooperate enough to stop a growing alien threat in a supposed time of peace on a highly dangerous alien planet.

I'm not a Halo fanboy by any means. I guess you could call me a very casual fan of the franchise. I've played some of the games and enjoyed them but never got caught up with the stories, expanded content or various series that spun off from the games. I actually didn't even realize HALO: NIGHTFALL was a series until after I watched it. This is a collection of five episodes that has been edited into a feature length film. With only a passing knowledge of Halo I can say I mostly enjoyed the movie for that military driven science fiction film it is. The acting is solid and the locations are quite attractive and interesting to look at.

The writing is a bit cookie cutter with generic characters and plot devices that aren't uncommon in the genre but they are executed well enough that the movie doesn't suffer too much. NIGHTFALL will fill in the gap of events between the Halo 4 and Halo 5 video games and for that fact alone is worth checking out for more serious fans.

The Audio & Video
Microsoft Studios gives HALO: NIGHTFALL a gorgeous 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen transfer. Detail level is quite high and everything has a natural look to it without excessive DNR. Colors pop with a wonderful vividness and skin tones look fleshy and healthy. The 7.1 DTS-HD English audio track sounds brilliant with a perfect mix of tracks. It's boisterous when it needs to be and crystal clear when things are a bit more subtle. There's no background noise or annoyances.

The Extras
This disc has a nice selection of extras.

The Bottom Line
Halo fans will definitely want to check out HALO: NIGHTFALL and it will also appeal to a broader audience of Sci-fi fans.

HALO: NIGHTFALL is available HERE