Figured this label was worth its own thread after so many years (interweb opinions about its owner 'Demon Dave' DeFalco notwithstanding, heh), as they do unearth some obscure gems on a regular basis. The site usually goes offline regularly until they put up new releases or sales. A new batch just went up in the last couple of days. Dark Force used to be run by Code Red's Bill Olsen and DeFalco, but now it's just the latter. The site has added a handful of Vinegar Syndrome titles over the last few months, which probably explains in part why Vinegar Syndrome's Joe Rubin is appearing with DeFalco on a commentary for a couple of the new titles (Rubin's been doing this elsewhere as well, as I recall), along with Severin's David Gregory on at least one as well. I do wonder if those guys are maybe helping the label after Olsen's passing last year. Dark Force has always been a bit ramshackle in their operations, so maybe the expertise will help.

https://darkforcesuperstore.com

Personally, I'm grateful that they're digging out some deep cuts from the Hong Kong cinema vaults.

Anyway, the first three are upcoming releases, followed by some notables from the previous batch. I find their prices to be a bit high for this kind of stuff, although not as bad as what Severin and VS charge for new titles in some cases, but Dark Force's sales are pretty good if you catch them, so it's usually best to wait.



^ This film is known for sharing a title with another Hong Kong film (a co-production with the Philippines) from the same year called THE GOLDEN TRIANGLE, with Yasuaki Kurata. Interestingly, this one was announced a while back from Canada's Gold Ninja Video, supposedly coming out late March but I have my doubts knowing their history. Their releases to date have all been BD-Rs, in part due to the public domain nature of many of their finds. Hopefully they'll switch to properly replicated discs eventually:
https://goldninjavideo.com/collectio...-triangle-1975







^ ​​​​​​​This one's actually a Taiwanese film starring Pearl Chang Ling, who was a pretty big martial arts star in the 70's and early 80's. Kinda wish they'd update their sleeve art to reflect her better-known name in the west. This has indeed been fairly hard to see for a long time now.

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^ Personal note: this super-cheap regional Blaxploitation show is a lot of fun but does NOT deserve a 4K release. Not sure why they went with one for this title other than to charge more. I'll get this to replace my old PD DVD (which like most of them actually had ok picture quality because the elements seemed to have survive in decent shape). I put on of the fight scenes on YouTube 15 years ago, and it's done alright since then:


^ The earlier (Code Red?) Blu-ray of this also had interviews with Robinson and Perry, but I can't tell if those have been ported over here. For $32.99, they should've been!

I saw Mirror Mirror years ago and can't remember if it's good or bad.

Ditto. My mind leans toward ‘just ok’ and I see I gave it a 5 out of 10 at IMDb at some point over the years (which probably isn’t terrible for such DTV fare). I might revisit it in one of their cheap sales, but doubtful.

I have that Code Red release of The Black Gestapo (1975).

Never thought I'd see the day it would be getting a 4K UHD release.

Considering the limited copies available, I'm mulling over if I should upgrade

I likewise have that Blu-ray — $10 in a Kino sale in 2021, and apparently OOP now — but personally I don’t think it’s a film that needed 4K to make it any more or less enjoyable than it is (subjectively speaking). Frankly, putting fringe-y drive-in stuff like that on 4K just almost seems too cash-grabby to me, but I’ll admit to a bias as I don’t actively collect 4K. VELVET SMOOTH is probably a more galling example; a super-cheap, borderline amateurish, regional production (made by and starring many of the folks from FORCE FOUR, another schlock gem which did at least get a double-feature DVD release from Code Red) that’s been in countless public domain iterations over the decades, and instead of a legit DVD or Blu-ray at some point down through the ages, instead it goes straight to 4K!? As much as I enjoy it — in a so bad it’s almost good kind of way — it just doesn’t need 4K treatment and isn’t worth 4K prices, and I don’t think the better-made BLACK GESTAPO is either. Just my two cents.

One silver lining might be Dark Force’s seemingly random sales throughout the year. I could see them discounting their 4K discs as steeply as they do some of their Blu-rays, which might encourage me to get VELVET at least, although if GESTAPO is limited to just 300 copies, maybe it won’t last until a sale? Then again, knowing the tendency of the Dark Force and Code Red guys to magically “find” additional boxes of discs in their warehouses for seemingly years after titles supposedly go out of print, who knows how many copies actually exist!

Their website is currently down yet again, which might mean they’ll have more new titles and/or a sale when it goes live again.

I happened to go on Facebook tonight to check for new posts from the Vinegar Syndrome Toronto store (and literally nothing else because social media mostly makes me nauseous), but before signing out I noticed a live stream from Dark Force in my feed. Some folks might’ve noticed in the bargains thread that Dark Force had a couple of ‘lawsuit bundles’ they were selling during BF to help in their battle against . . . someone? They didn’t specify. I think someone here mentioned Synapse and it does seem like they’re connected somehow through a parent company called RedOak, I guess? It turns out the suit was brought by the son of the father(deceased)/son producing team behind the 1981 horror film JUST BEFORE DAWN, who fraudulently put the copyright in his name – more than once – so he could claim ownership of the film (apparently a no-no) and then sue Dark Force / Code Red over their previous Blu release of the film and squeeze several other companies that distributed it like Grindhouse, Ronin, Kino, Diabolik, Target, Walmart, even Amazon. Most apparently settled as well.

Apparently the law sided with Dark Force on Wednesday so Demon Dave was reading the decision on FB and unsurprisingly hurling a ton of verbal abuse at this producer, his lawyers (one of whom is a partner in Synapse) and promising a lawsuit in return. A little of Dave DeFalco goes a looonng way, though (one comment described him as “when you buy Bane off Temu” ), so I checked out after about 15 minutes, but I wonder if they’re just planning a new release of the film when all this is over. I missed the previous versions. The film has a pretty rugged release history and all versions to date seem to have some compromises here and there, either in the versions included on the discs, or the participants in the extras. Guess we’ll see.

ETA: noticed an old X post from Oct/Nov on Reddit in which DF noted that the negative of the of the film was found recently on DF’s behalf, which presumably played a big role in all of this.

I've seen a few minutes of some of the FB Live streams over the last few weeks about this. That dude is wild. He had some guy walking around behind him with a shotgun. Weird shit.

Yeah, he seems to really lean in to the whole wrestling heel routine. Last night after he was done reading the legal document, he and his buddy (probably that guy) started playing rock songs with ‘relevant’ gonna-get-ya lyrics while strutting back and forth in front of the camera, uttering threats and insults and literally flexing their rather flabby muscles. The other guy was wearing a face mask with LED animal teeth on it. That’s when I checked out.

Searching ‘Just Before Dawn lawsuit’ last night also brought up a DF thread at the other br site to which DeFalco appears to be a regular contributor. Like all threads there it’s a weird rabbit hole of pedantry, but I’ll give him credit for basically staying in character throughout, at least when it comes to this situation.

Dark Force is having a Fire Sale. I don’t think it’s a ‘going out of business’ kind of fire sale, just a random one, possibly to bolster their legal costs in the battle discussed earlier.

This should be all of them, including the ‘Emergency Fire Support’ boxes filled with a bunch of movies and merch:

https://darkforcesuperstore.com/sear...ection=product

"Get some great deals on your favorite cult movie releases while helping support us during this time of hardship due to the fires & legal situations!"

Yeah, I saw that bit and kinda suspected one of those events likely ranked higher in importance than the other to those guys.

I’ve been randomly and sporadically following Dark Force’s battle with Don May of Synapse, his lawyer, and the producer’s crooked son over JUST BEFORE DAWN. Say what you will about him – and there’s a lot one could say, either way – I’ll give Demon Dave credit for going all-in over a movie that definitely doesn’t deserve this kind of struggle!

Earlier this week he posted an email on Facebook from Don May to various partners that seems to implicate him in the scheme to sue all the retailers who sold the allegedly unauthorized (but apparently authorized) Code Red edition of the film, many of whom paid up, including big retailers like Target and Walmart, plus the various little guys like Grindhouse and Diabolik who couldn’t really afford the hit.

Tonight he announced that Kino Lorber is apparently onboard the legal battle now. He promoted a livestream but it doesn’t appear to have actually happened.

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