Batshit Blu-rays Of The Month- 13 For June

            A treasure trove of Blu-ray restorations of some offbeat greats- from the twisty Italian thrillers director Umberto Lenzi made with the wonderful Carroll Baker; Vanessa Redgrave’s passionate performance as the fiercely iconoclastic dancer Isadora Duncan; restored shorts by comedy legends Laurel & Hardy and, finally, the three “Paula Dupree/Ape Woman” Universal horror films all in one glorious collection.

            The Queen (Kino Lorber) A fabulous documentary directed by Frank Simon about a drag competition at New York’s “Town Hall” in 1967 and wittily narrated by Flawless Sabrina, who served as master of ceremonies. Filmed when just being in drag was a criminal offense, this film charts the contestants organizing their drag in hotels rooms, gossiping and camping it up and then the live competition which included points for swimsuit, gown and make-up and hairdo. In the packed auditorium are artists like Andy Warhol and Larry Rivers, plus author Terry Southern. The furious tirade captured on camera by Crystal LaBeija (about the crowning of another contestant- “Harlow”) is fabulous. Long gone unseen, this Blu-ray comes with sensational interviews with Flawless Sabrina and almost an hour of outtakes.

            The Complete Lenzi/Baker Giallo Collection (Severin). Actress Carroll Baker (Baby Doll) found plenty of work in Italy in the 1970s and particularly with director Umberto Lenzi, where she starred in several sexy, terrific thrillers. In Paranoia (aka Orgasmo), Baker plays a rich widow who takes in stranger (Lou Castel) when he shows up at her villa asking for tools to fix his sports car. She falls for him and lets him live with her, and then his sister (Colette Descombes) shows up and joins in the sick fun. Knife Of Ice has Carroll playing a mute (traumatized after seeing the death of her parents in a train crash as a child). Her singer cousin visits her in the Pyrenees and a strange man begins stalking them. In So Sweet…So Perverse, Jean-Louis Trintignant plays a wealthy socialite living in Paris who unwisely falls for his terrified neighbor (Carroll Baker) who convinces him she is in fear of her violent boyfriend. But the plot thickens. A Quiet Place To Kill stars Baker as a celebrated race-car driver, who after an accident is invited to stay with her ex-husband Maurice (Jean Sorel) at his villa. She befriends her ex’s new wife (Anna Proclemer) and together they plot to kill Maurice. Only available before in terrible versions on home video, this Blu-ray collection restores the wonderfully twisty thrillers to their proper glory.

            Inside Daisy Clover (Warner Archive) Natalie Wood is Daisy, a young tomboy growing up with a kooky mom (Ruth Gordon) on a California amusement pier in the 1930s. She enters a movie talent contest and is catapulted to stardom in this dark comedy directed by Robert Mulligan (To Kill A Mockingbird) and produced by Alan J. Pakula (Klute). Robert Redford (great in a very early role) plays a movie star with a secret, who weds Daisy. The score was by Andre Previn with songs like “You’re Gonna Hear From Me!” I’ve always adored this poisonous valentine to Hollywood, and think it’s one of Wood’s finest performances.

            Let’s Kill Uncle (Kino Lorber) Director William Castle’s (The Tingler, 13 Ghosts) 1966 color black comedy about a wealthy man (Castle in a cameo) who dies in a car crash, leaving his 5-million-dollar estate to his young son Barnaby (Pat Cardi). Unfortunately, the money is held in a trust until he turns a certain age and will be managed by his uncle Kevin (Nigel Green). Sinister Uncle Kevin lives on an island and his one ally is a young girl (Mary Badham, who played Scout in To Kill A Mockingbird) and they begin to suspect his uncle is trying to bump him off for the inheritance. So, they decide- “Let’s Kill Uncle!” Several endings were shot for the film and actor Pat Cardi is convinced the worst one was chosen for this rare William Castle offering.

            Solid Metal Nightmares: The Films Of Tsukamoto (Arrow) Tetsuo: The Iron Man was director Shinya Tsukamoto’s ultimate heavy metal movie (literally). A surreal hour-long black and white feature about a man who inserts metal pieces into his body. After he is involved in a hit-and-run accident he discovers coming into contact with metal his body mutating into a twisted steel creation- even his penis transforms into a metallic rotating drill. A bizarre sex scene with his girlfriend gives new meaning to the phrase “a good screw.” Many of the fiercely original Tsukamoto’s films (including Tokyo Fist, A Snake Of June, Bullet Ballet and Tetsuo II: Body Hammer are included in this astonishing collection.

         Isadora (Kino Lorber) A 1968 biography of the acclaimed, controversial 1920s American dancer Isadora Duncan (played with luminous fire by Vanessa Redgrave). I’ve always preferred Vivian Pickles in Ken Russell’s haunting 1966 BBC production about Duncan’s tragic life, but Redgrave is extraordinary too. Duncan’s passionate free love and pro-Soviet politics; her ill-fated school of dance; and the tragic loss of her children make for great celluloid melodrama. Not to mention her wild love life- with the Singer fortune millionaire (Jason Robards); a tempestuous affair in Berlin (James Fox) and with a wild Russian poet (Zvonimir Crnko) who didn’t speak English. This has been impossible to see on home video, and the Blu-ray restores Karel Reisz’s full director’s cut of the film. Watching Vanessa Redgrave on screen in her prime is a thrilling experience.

            Murder By Decree (Kino Lorber) Director Bob Clark’s (Black Christmas/A Christmas Story) suspenseful, enjoyable tale of Sherlock Holmes (Christopher Plummer) and his devoted Dr. Watson (James Mason) who are called in to assist Scotland Yard with the savage and mysterious killings by Jack The Ripper. Different in style to the other Holmes/Ripper tale A Study In Terror, Christopher Plummer is sublime, and always said he wanted to make this Holmes more human and caring. Variety stated that this movie was possibly the best Sherlock Holmes since Basil Rathbone starred in Universal Studios series.

            Universal Horror Collection: Volume 5 (Shout! Factory) This is the collection I’ve been dreaming of. There’s the wonderfully oddball The Monster And The Girl– about a man whose brain is put into an ape (by mad scientist George Zucco) who escapes and seeks revenge by killing the men responsible for his sister’s slide into prostitution. The three “Paula, The Ape Woman” films was Universal Studios’ unsuccessful attempt to create a new monster brand. The dark-haired beauty Acquanetta, who the studio dubbed the “Venezuelan Volcano,” debuted in Captive Wild Woman where a mad scientist (John Carradine) fashions a woman out of an ape injecting the beast with sex hormones. Jungle Woman picks up where Captive Wild Woman left off with a new doctor (J. Carrol Nash) who brings the ape woman back to life in the form of “Paula Dupree” only to have her stalk some poor schmuck and his fiancée. The Jungle Captive was the last gasp for the series with Vicki Lane replacing Acquanetta as Paula. Otto Kruger plays the mad biochemist who sends his deformed servant, Moloch (Rondo Hatton) to steal the Ape Woman’s body from the morgue. The doc them attempts to transplant the brain of his secretary into the creature just for fun. 

            Laurel & Hardy: The Definitive Restorations (Kit Parker Films) There are comedians and then there’s Laurel & Hardy. This legendary comic duo shines in this amazing collection of their shorts with 4k restorations from 35mm nitrate. Stan Laurel was the skinny one with the rubber face and a bowler hat. Oliver Hardy was the corpulent, mustached master of the slow burn. Included are their riotous turns as out-of-control children in Brats, or their harrowing and hilarious attempts at delivering a piano up a perilous flight of stairs in The Music Box, or Hardy’s ill-fated stay at a hospital which leaves him hanging out a window with his leg in a cast (County Hospital). This collection also includes their feature films Way Out West and Sons Of The Desert and a rare silent comedy finally nearly complete for the first time in 90 years.

            Wildlife (Criterion) Paul Dano’s directorial debut is based on a Richard Ford novel about a teenage boy, recently moved to Montana in the 1960s, who watches helplessly as his parents’ marriage implodes. Joe (Ed Oxenbould) is a 14-yr-old, with a close relationship with his dad Jerry (Jake Gyllenhaal). When Jerry is fired from his job working at a golf course, he unravels, and ends up running off to join men fighting a raging fire in the nearby mountains. Carey Mulligan plays Joe’s unhappy, deeply frustrated, mom Jeanette who comes undone herself. Dano directs with studied precision and careful visual composition, keeping the perspective through the young man’s eyes who desperately tries to make sense of all of it. Carey Mulligan and Jake Gyllenhaal are extraordinarily good in this bittersweet tale.

Sukiyaki Western Django (MVD) A crackpot English language “western” by prolific Japanese provocateur Takashi Miike, with a small cameo by Quentin Tarantino. A lone gunman (Hideaki Ito) shows up in western town with warring clans- the white-robed Genji and red-robed Heike. Miike meshes Samurai and punk wear with other perverse, outrageous, anachronistic touches in this cult favorite. It also riffs on the Italian spaghetti western favorite- Django. Cut by nearly 20 minutes when it played the US, this Blu-ray restores the original 2 hour 1 minute cut, which is glorious. 

            The Spider (Shout! Factory) Bert I. Gordon’s 1958 drive-in classic about a giant, carnivorous spider discovered in a cave by two teens (June Kenney & Eugene Persson). The creature is supposedly killed and then exhibited at the local high school, but during a school dance is awoken. Yes, “rock and roll” brings the creature back to life. This is one of my all-time favorite of Bert I. Gordon’s “giant” flicks. The cave sequences were shot in Carlsbad Caverns and the local movie theater in the film is showing another Bert I. Gordon film- Attack Of The Puppet People, which also starred the vivacious screamer June Kenney.

            Gates Of Hell (Scorpion) A 4k restoration of Italian master of the macabre Luci Fulci’s chilling first film of a legendary horror trilogy (which included The Beyond and The House By The Cemetery), all co-starring the gorgeous, charismatic Catriona MacColl. Here she plays a psychic who is accidentally buried alive (don’t ask) and rescued by an investigative reporter (Christopher George). She has nightmare visions occurring in the town of Dunwich, where a priest hangs himself and opens the gates of hell, and they both head there to stop the coming apocalypse on All Saint’s Day. Fulci’s films are so strange and rambling and filled with jaw-dropping moments of outlandish gore. This one has the famous scene with two young lovers in a car (one of them future director Michele Soavi), and when the girl sees the ghost of the priest vomits up her entire guts. Also, the sequence where the town half-wit (played to perfection by the amazing Giovanni Lombardo Radice) has an electric drill jammed through his head. But Fulci’s films are gorgeous filmed and create a supernatural netherworld worthy of H. P. Lovecraft. I have seen this film a thousand times and it gets better every viewing. But, trust me, it never looked so good as this jam-packed Blu-ray.