Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

It seems like VS is doing a lot of needless upgrades as of late so I’m not as surprised.

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

I barely remember the series despite having reviewed it a lifetime ago on DVD. I remember the SWV watermark, though!

This was listed on VS’ site, although they’ve supposedly since removed it. It isn’t explicitly mentioned that it’s the Karloff series, but since Iconoscope is a TV movies/series-centric line, it does seem like the most likely suspect.

https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/dvdtalk...47fb29246.jpeg

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

The new VSL:

https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/dvdtalk...4c04f0779.jpeg

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

…and Married to the Mob (UHD) rounds out the new announcements.

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

And the Cinematographe teasers:

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

A month or so ago, I picked up Prospect 4K UHD from VS and just watched it today. It’s a movie that wouldn’t be for everyone, but if you’re into minimalist, lo fi science fiction, it’s a hidden gem. The plot is relatively insubstantial, but the overall atmosphere (especially the sounds design) and performances from the cast are excellent.

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

This week I watched Cash Calls Hell, which I got from VS a month or so ago. It's a very cool Japanese pulpy neo-noir with awesome black and white cinematography and a surprising amount of heart. Highly recommended.

On the other hand, I also recently tried to watch Hideo Gosha's Violent Streets and couldn't get into it at all, for whatever reason. I'll probably be trading that one in at Half Price Books.

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

https://cimg6.ibsrv.net/gimg/dvdtalk...fef7af5d64.jpg

Perhaps the most notable of the partner titles:

https://cimg0.ibsrv.net/gimg/dvdtalk...7fb2e59624.jpg

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

On the Melusine side they are releasing a new bluray of Debbie Does Dallas. That's a pretty big deal for them.

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

^ Here’s their email (below) about that one, and a couple more, plus the reminder of the Valentine’s sale.

They’ve also got a Romanian movie called BAD LUCK BANGING OR LOONY PORN (2021, and from Magnolia, no less, already released by them on DVD in 2022), about a school teacher whose leaked sex tape leads to a reckoning with the community, which probably makes more sense in their partner label catalog, where it also resides. There is explicit unsimulated sex in it, though, but it’s definitely not a ‘porno’ in the traditional sense, and the cast is comprised of many mainstream Romanian actors. I actually signed it out from the library here! And from what I can see on the ‘Bibliocommons’ library network website, where the Toronto Library recently migrated, it seems to be available at various libraries in the states as well. I wouldn’t call it a classic, and some aspects of it were maybe too culturally specific for me to fully grasp without additional googling as I watched it, but despite that title it takes a surprisingly realistic and even serious look at what might happen in such a situation.

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

A little further to that overdue announcement of SHANGHAI BLUES – and a bit of a digression – I got an email from Metrograph this week regarding their theatrical offerings at their NYC location, and one series that caught my eye was DAYS OF BEING MAGGIE CHEUNG, which showcases ten of her top pictures (eight currently on US Blu-ray), including a new 4K restoration of Tsui Hark’s GREEN SNAKE from 1993. Hopefully that one will make an appearance on disc this year once it’s done on the arthouse circuit. Dude’s 75 now, so it’s nice that films from his broader catalog are being revived while he’s still around to participate.

Trailers for SHANGHAI BLUES (which irritatingly uses the Mandarin track; despite the title it’s a Hong Kong movie and was primarily watched in Cantonese) and GREEN SNAKE:

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

Green Snake is a Seasonal Films title, isn't it? That's a catalog I wish would be freed from whatever rights hell it currently resides in.

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

I only saw Body of Evidence once years ago on VHS. I think it was the Unrated version. I recall I just didn’t find it erotic at all with Madonna banging Willem Dafoe.

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

Body of Evidence is an award-winning movie...won lots of Razzies.

I forget where I saw clips of the scenes that were trimmed to get an R rating but I have no reason to get this release.

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

There’s definitely some good stuff in there (and some crap). Not sure why GREEN SNAKE got restored and can now make the rounds, though. Maybe Tsui Hark and/or his Film Workshop company (which helped make it) had some special pull? I would imagine there must be some kind of deal for it that includes eventual streaming and/or a disc release? If so, perhaps that might bode well for DRAGON INN (92) which he produced through Seasonal (and Film Workshop) but didn’t direct, or his early gem WE’RE GOING TO EAT YOU, which got DVDs in both Hong Kong and the U.S. as I recall, but nothing since.


Aside from grabbing the MADE IN HONG KONG VOL. 2 set – which generally has better films in it than VOL. 1 – the main-line VS January and February titles so far have been head-scratchers to me (ymmv), none more so than BODY OF EVIDENCE. Is there really some demand for that stupid thing? Or some ‘bad movie’ cult that has grown around it, because I sure don’t recall that happening! Maybe the Shout Factory disc was a bestseller? I found it a chore to watch back when it came out in theaters, made worse by having to review it in the paper back because I just couldn’t give a shit about wasting words on a movie that, at the time, was predicted to be a flop, which it was. Some of the real, pro critic reviews were more entertaining than the movie itself! Yet here it is again. -rolleyes-

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

I suppose it's meant to pair with their recent release of Jade, which was equally perplexing.

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

Body of Evidence <shakes head>. The year that it came out, I was standing in line at the bank with a friend of mine. There were about 12 other people around us and we were all waiting quietly. Suddenly, apropos of nothing, my friend pierces the silence by asking me in a louder-than-needed voice "Hey, have you seen that new Madonna movie where she ties the guy up and has sex? You know the one, right? With the candle wax and the broken lightbulb? What's it called again ..?" I was f*cking mortified and pretended not to know him as the entire bank was now staring at us. I would have crawled into a hole in the ground had there been one there. I gave him shit afterwards and he was like "Why? We were just talking." I still feel the embarrassment to this day ... :lol:

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

When I was a teenager in the 90s my father and his wife at the time had VHS copies of all the big 90s erotic thrillers, and I was told that I was absolutely not allowed to watch. So of course I watched them, and Body of Evidence was the one time that I had wished I had listened to them.

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

Not gonna lie, this actually makes me want to watch it. Though I have seen Jade, and that one was just dumb and boring.

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

I figured VS might release a trailer that subtly mocked the film à la the one they did for CONGO, and probably a few others. This is on the listing page but I couldn’t bother scrolling down far enough to notice it if it was there on day one. :lol: I think they’re kinda trying with this one, but honestly this film was just so shitty there’s only so much to work with. And if anyone really wants to punish themselves, the DVD will get the job done for a lot less money! ;)

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

I am pretty certain I saw Body Of Evidence in the theater and I was embarrassed for Willem Dafoe while watching it. I loved him several movies before that and he was well known enough to not need this paycheck at the time, or at least I thought.

I was working in a music store during college when this was released and we got lots of press kits and magazines and such sent to the store promoting Madonna and how this was going to be a massive hit for her acting career. I think that was how I saw it because the store got free tickets. Obviously, we all know how that ended up for her.

I don't think I have seen it since then, with the exception of probably catching the candle wax scene on HBO at some point or another.

Watch it drunk or stoned and with a buddy that likes bad movies and then it might be worth your time.

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

Vs just posted on their Facebook page they are releasing a new VSU edition of Rad later this year.

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

I think that I am happy with my $10 Mill Creek blu-ray of Rad.

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

Ugh. I’ve been keeping up the VSU’s and was planning on getting them all, but I can’t see myself double dipping on Rad.

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

I'm good with my Rifftrax version of Rad.

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

Supposedly the latest clue points to the ‘90s slasher as being Office Killer, which I must confess to having zero familiarity with.

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

I actually saw it in the theater!

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

New titles are up!

I'll post more in a bit, but one thing that's jumping out: VS is teasing a Friday the 13th event for 3/13, and it looks like it involves 1987's Forever Evil.

Quote:

---

But wait! There’s more! How often do we get two Friday the 13ths in a row? To celebrate, we’re slating a set of slashers to drop this next Friday, March 13th! One will issue a brief return of an old VS favorite, and the other will bring the only slasher likely to ever grace VSL—a strange and bloody affair never before available in English on disc. Be there at exactly 12:01 PM ET on Friday, March 13th, to uncover the mystery, exclusively at VinegarSyndrome.com.

---

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

Vinegar Syndrome and its imprints:

https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/dvdtalk...8bfbb78757.jpg

And new partner label titles (and the censoring of the Love Letters of a Portuguese Nun cover is on me):

https://cimg6.ibsrv.net/gimg/dvdtalk...4a28251299.jpg

I would normally snap up Forgotten Gialli vol. 9 and The Ghost Galleon (UHD!) in a heartbeat, but '90s gialli isn't exactly setting my heart aflutter, and The Ghost Galleon is the worst of the Blind Dead films. There were murmurs of an Arrow collection for the UK, and maybe that'll still somehow pan out.

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

I gave up on the Gialli boxes early on. I got the boxed versions of the first two, and the standard for the third. Just too much stuff that’s deservedly forgotten to justify even the sale prices I paid, so the rest have passed me by. And the genre was beyond dead by the 90’s. In countless featurettes over the last 30-ish years, many interviewees – both the original filmmakers and historians alike – lament just how shitty the Italian genre film industry had become by then, with former top names making underfunded films out of a desperation to just keep working. And here we are with a boxed set full of them. I’m beginning to think the well has run dry on that front.

Personally speaking I’d put MASSACRE in with those films too. Proving the rule about the industry’s decline, Fulci reused much of the gore from this film in CAT IN THE BRAIN. It was on YouTube for ages and I don’t recall a DVD release, but 4K? Come on.

Totally agree about GHOST GALLEON. Extremely dull. It’s odd how there’s only ever been one collected release of those films (I think?).

I’m curious about REVIVER 2. If you copy-paste the redacted text the hidden stuff is all ‘2’’s, so I’m not sure if the number of 2’s truly matches the number of letters in the missing words, but my inkling is telling these are from The Philippines, pre-1972. Could be wrong, of course. I’d still prefer another LOST FILMS boxed set over this piecemeal approach, but clearly the LF box wasn’t a bestseller whereas the first REVIVER release sold out.

Aside from that one, and only if looks likely to sell out, there’s nothing crucial for me in this batch, so my wallet rests easy (not that I do preorders anyway). I might try some partner titles if they last until a serious discount.

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

I think you’re right about the Philippines. Here’s a smidgen of info about Reviver 2 that says as much as can be said without exactly revealing anything.

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

^ The main giveaway for me was the word ‘Pulisya’ on the side of the, umm, police cars in VS’s trailer, although I had to frame-by-frame to catch it clearly in just one shot. It’s also interesting that that post is by Chris Koenig. When I saw his name in the list of extras for this release it further cemented my suspicions about the Philippines because he’s contributed to supplements in the past for films from there (among other places). Finally, there are a number of actors in the trailer who could certainly be Filipino, as well as the accent on the one heard speaking.


I’m not sure how long it will last on the site. It’s still over 600 copies but that’s a big drop from 3000 and I don’t think they’re doing standard editions on these. But I also can’t really justify ordering just one item shipped up here at their flat-rate shipping cost. I was able to get the first one with my larger Black Friday order, and I still ended up grabbing one at the store here while I was waiting for that to ship, just to be safe (which did allow me to cobble together the first ‘spoiler’ video on YouTube, though -rolleyes-). This time I may have to just cross my fingers and hit the store when it opens on new release day.


- - - - - - -


ETA: Moved my previous guesses to a spoiler because I’m now certain that these three pictures are not the secret films in REVIVER 2.

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

Just bought one title and that was the Fritz Lang double feature. The slipcover variant sold out at like 7pm last night. The FOMO was real on that one. There should be a few hundred left of the standard edition, though.

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

That Fritz Lang set has been available for forever. It's crazy to me that if you put a slip cover on it, all of a sudden people are gaga over something that they would have never considered buying in a million years.

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

Yeah. But have you seen that slip?!?!? -other-

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

The Film Movement releases frequently have me double-checking to see which ones are new and which ones aren’t. It’s kind of a pain. At first I was thinking I only had a DVD set of those Lang films but it turned out it was the same Blu-ray, which in turn made me think they were doing a new special edition of it, which they aren’t. I do think the films are beautifully shot and that slip doesn’t lie: Debra Paget’s outfits and dance numbers are pretty -eek- for 1959. :thumbsup:

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

Two I was interested in, Fear Has 1000 Eyes and City Wide Fever, the slip cover versions are already sold out.

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

So that cleft chin that was bugging me in the REVIVER 2 trailer actually belongs to Robert Winston, an actor who had a very middling career from the early to mid-60’s, appearing in seven TV episodes and four movies, the last released of which was a leading role in Newt Arnold’s Philippines-shot BLOOD THIRST (his last directorial effort until BLOODSPORT). That was released in 1971 but filmed in 1965 in black and white. Vinegar Syndrome released it years ago in one of their Drive-In Collection double feature DVDs with THE THIRSTY DEAD. This got me to thinking about Chris Koenig’s comment in that thread that Adam Tyner linked to.

The executive producer of BLOOD THIRST was Michael DuPont. The webs don’t say, but I’m wondering if he’s related to the famous DuPont family ‘wealth’ that Koenig wrote about. DuPont’s limited filmography is mostly tied to the Philippines, and includes two stints as an actor, one of which was a supporting role in an earlier Newt Arnold horror film, the US-shot HANDS OF A STRANGER, which he also produced. Perhaps that’s where it all began?

In DuPont’s IMDb listing, there are three directorial credits. Two of these appear to have been released: a religious drama called ETHAN (1964), and an ‘boy’s adventure’ called THE SECRET OF THE SACRED FOREST (1971), starring Lassie’s own Timmy, Jon Provost.

In between these sits a movie that doesn’t seem to have been released: THE BLOODLESS VAMPIRE (1965).

Which brings me back around to Koenig’s post:

If BLOODLESS VAMPIRE is one of the movies in REVIVER 2, I’m definitely keen to see it and even more keen to see what the other film is if DuPont supposedly directed it. It does seem like he had some talent but never really went very far with it.

At the moment, only two cast members are currently listed for BLOODLESS VAMPIRE: American actor Charles Macaulay (SPLASH, V, AIRPORT 77, RAISE THE TITANIC and pretty much every TV show that ever aired in the 1960’s, 1970’s, and a chunk of the 1980’s, including two episodes of the original STAR TREK) and mixed-heritage Filipina actress Helen Thompson, perhaps best known in the west for wrapping up her career as one of Sardu’s assistants in the cult classic BLOODSUCKING FREAKS (another Vinegar Syndrome released, by the way).


- - - - -



ETA: So I posted a variation of this comment on VS’s YouTube trailer right around the same time I posted it here in the wee hours of Monday morning, and lo and behold if someone at that Classic Horror Film Board thread posted here earlier didn’t suddenly just have an inkling earlier today (Tuesday) that one of the movies in the set might be THE BLOODLESS VAMPIRE, minus all the deductive reasoning of course. :lol:

Re: The Official Vinegar Syndrome Thread
 

The two Friday the 13th titles are Intensive Care and a new slipcover for Unmasked Part 25.

And also:

https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/dvdtalk...f56da1e73c.jpg