MVD Entertainment Group's 2K Restoration Of Director Amando de Ossorio’s Hudson River Massacre First Time On DVD And Blu-ray On Feb. 25

MVD Entertainment Group will have Spaghetti Western fans all a twitter on Feb. 25 with the DVD and Blu-ray debut of the new 2K film restoration of director Amando de Ossorio’s 1965 “lost” classic, Hudson River Massacre.

It’s a big deal for those cinephiles who treasure the Spaghetti Western films from the golden era (early 1960s to mid-‘70s).   Indeed, entire websites are devoted to tracking the DVD and Blu-ray (and VHS) releases of their favorite films from Italy and Spain — both the famous and the obscure.   So these sites lit up like fully decorated Christmas trees when MVD announced a “MVD Classic” label release for this off-beat tale of Canadian trappers fighting back against the ruthless tyranny of the Hudson Bay Company.

Spaghetti Western stalwart George Martin (A Pistol for Ringo, The Return of Ringo, Sartana Does Not Forgive, Professionals for a Massacre and more) stars as Victor DeFrois, who has remained on the sidelines in the conflict between his trapper friends and the James Sullivan (Santiago Rivero) run Hudson Bay Company.   But, everything changes when his brother is framed by Sullivan and executed by the British Mounted Police!!

DeFrois decides to strike back where it will hurt the most by kidnapping Sullivan’s daughter, Ann (Giulia Rubini — A Stranger in Paso Bravo, Ringo and His Golden Pistol, The Sign of the Coyote, etc.).   A raid is carried out with the help of his friends, including Leo Limoux (Franco Fantasia — Blood for a Silver Dollar, Seven Dollars to Kill, Adiós, Sabata, etc.) and his “companion,” Muia (Pamela Tudor (Dollars for a Fast Gun, Ballad of Death Valley), but DeFrois never counted on falling in love with her.   It matters not, as it is all out war!

Spaghetti Western fans have two viewing options for Hudson River Massacre, they can either watch the English-dubbed version or the Spanish-language presentation.

Bayview Entertainment Selects Jan. 14 For The DVD Release Of Director David Orden's Inside Out

Bayview Entertainment will be bringing the Shoreline Entertainment production of director David Orden’s suburban nightmare film, Inside Out, to the DVD marketplace on Jan. 14.

In a quiet neighborhood, where everyone seems to delight in sharing sidewalk gossip, the order of things is thrown into chaos when a new neighbor moves in.   He is Doctor Peoples (Eriq La Salle — three-time Emmy nominee for his role as Peter Benton on the television series, E.R.), who immediately ticks off the community by ignoring their greetings and mowing his lawn, for some odd reason, in the middle of the night.

Off-putting enough, but when someone like Norman (Steven Weber — The Shining mini-series, Hamburger Hill, Single White Female, The Temp), who is just barely hanging on to his suburban dream, has the challenge of a mysterious, unsettling stranger on the street, he begins to unravel.   Snooping becomes spying which leads to paranoia as Norman goes down the rabbit hole, even to point of shaving his head and scaring the bejesus out of his family and friends.

Inside Out is a dark suburban tale, with a twist … imagine a drip, drip, drip in the dark, that you can’t find, that slowly drives you mad as the drip, drip, drip grows ever louder.   That’s what poor Norman is confronted with in the form of an unsettling new neighbor, who may or may not be up to no good.

Also streeting on DVD on Jan. 14 from Bayview Entertainment is the Spanish-language import from writer/director Francisco Lupini-Basagoiti, I Killed My Husband, starring Maria Conchita Alonso as a wife who discovers that her husband is sleeping around on the very day that she has planned an elaborate party for him winning the Pritzker Architecture Prize.

The fun begins when her efforts to scare him — with a gun — go awry and he ends up dead!!   The party!!   What to do … of course the party must go on and it is up to Alonso to out-maneuver all the guest questions as to where the man of the hour — or lover of the hour (as more mistresses arrive) — is as the night goes on.   It’s Weekend at Bernie’s with a Spanish flair.

I Killed My Husband is presented in Spanish with English subtitles.

Arrow Video's 2K Restoration Of Director José Ramón Larraz’s Deadly Manor Ready For Blu-ray On Feb. 28

Arrow Video, with domestic sales and distribution expertise provided by MVD Entertainment Group, will be serving up prolific Spanish filmmaker José Ramón Larraz’s 1990 direct-to-video haunted house thriller, Deadly Manor, on Feb. 28 as a new 2K film restoration (from the original film elements) on Blu-ray for the first time.

Take those coveted VHS copies and toss them (or, perhaps, a formal and very fitting burial should take place in the backyard) and set your sets on this loopy victim pool/haunted house horror tale on Blu-ray (packed with goodies) … and we mean loopy in a good way, of course.   

What makes Deadly Manor so much fun as a genre film is the set-up before we ever get to the “haunted house” part of the story.   We have the usual meet-and-greet with our classic victim pool of teenagers, who are heading off for a “camping” adventure, but they decide to stop and pick up the shadiest of hitchhikers (does he have a chainsaw? … No, OK … let’s stop).   

His name is Jack (Clark Tufts — Voodoo) and he is of little help in getting them to their destination as they soon become lost and end up at a super creepy place in the woods, of course.   Lost, with a sketchy hitchhiker … and we are just getting started!!

Any reasonable person would just keep on going if they came across a car on blocks, in a weeded front yard of an abandoned old house, and inside the car they happen to find a creepy old photo (are those blood stains … don’t look too close).   Doesn’t that serve as a warning that maybe it’s best to push on, even if you are lost?   

But no, the kids are lost, Jack’s no help and it is starting to rain so why not skip the lake and spend the night — with a complete stranger — in an abandoned house.   Before entering, one of their members, the lovely Helen (Claudia Franjul), spots someone in one of the windows, gets spooked and runs off into the woods … first victim.

Loopy, we said.   No one, not even Tony (Greg Rhodes — Final Exam), Helen’s boyfriend, bothers to go look for her, instead they go inside the house and start to explore.  In short order, they find coffins in the basement, more photos of the woman from the car, pictures of dead people and trophies in a jar (don’t ask).   Leave, hell no … die one by one they will.

Deadly Manor is a wonderful slasher flick that has at least one red herring (is Jack the killer?), a real haunted house (well, maybe it’s really a death trap) and a mysterious woman (Jennifer Delora — Frankenhooker, Bad Girls Dormitory) who wanders about the place (naked at that).   And, this is the best part, there is actually a “final girl” and it is not who you would have your money on … sweet!!

Bonus goodies include commentary from Diabolique Magazine’s Kat Ellinger and Samm Deighan, a newly-prepared video session with our mysterious woman, Jennifer Delora, a second video session with producer Brian Smedley-Aston (Squirm, Performance, Blue Sunshine, etc.) and an archival video session with filmmaker José Ramón Larraz.

 

Wolfe's DVD Debut Of Writer/Director Simone Gordan’s An Almost Ordinary Summer Will Take Place On Jan. 21

Wolfe opens the New Year on Jan. 21 with the domestic DVD debut of the Italian box office sensation from writer/director Simone Gordan’s An Almost Ordinary Summer.

In the midst of great loss, Carlo (Alessandro Gassmann — The Mongrel, An Italian Name, Transporter 2), finds love and solace in a very unexpected place … with Tony (Fabrizio Bentivoglio — Human Capital, Forever Young, The Invisible Witness) a free-spirit, married with a family, but they are just people he takes care of (money, villas, etc.).   

When Carlo’s grown son, Sando (Filippo Scicchitano), and Tony’s daughter, Penelope (Jasmine Trinca), each find out what Carlo and Tony have planned, they team up in an effort to break things up.   

Mismatched families, a comedy of errors and a lovely Italian setting, An Almost Ordinary Summer should have been titled, “A Nearly Perfect Summer … Except For Our Scheming Kids.”

An Almost Ordinary Summer is presented in Italian with English subtitles.

VCI Entertainment's Blu-ray Double Feature Of Mommy And Mommy's Day Ready On Jan. 21

VCI Entertainment has tabbed Jan. 21 as the street date for a deliciously wicked double-feature starring Bad Seed Patty McCormack as, well, more or less herself as an adult.

We’re talking about writer/director Max Allan Collins’ 1995 direct-to-video gem, Mommy.   Yes, starring Patty McCormack in the title role.   VCI is teaming it with the 1997 sequel, Mommy’s Day, which makes for one hell of a double-feature on this Blu-ray/DVD Combo Pack special edition (with a bonus DVD chocked full of extras).

It’s clear that everyone had a great time with Mommy.   It’s pure cheese, but you have Patty McCormack as Mrs. Sterling (aka: Mommy), who projects her pent-up desires on to her 12-year old daughter, Jessica Ann (Rachel Lemieux) … Jessica Ann doesn’t get student of the year, the teacher dies.   A witness to the murder, dead too.   You get the idea.

On board as cast members are none other than pulp fiction crime novelist Mickey Spillane and scream queen great Brink Stevens (both reprised their roles in the sequel).

It eventually dawns on Mommy, as she becomes the prime suspect in a series of murders, that her little darling will rat her out, so she tries to kill her, then saves her from a junkyard dog, only to try and murder her one more time.   Dog, no … Mommy, yes!!

The sequel, Mommy’s Day, has a terrific opening as Mommy (aka: Mrs. Sterling) is on death row, but there’s a reprieve and before you can say “hallelujah” the prison gates swing open and she’s out on probation … on drugs, monitored and forbidden to see Jessica Ann.   

Did you catch that last condition of probation, “forbidden to see Jessica Ann?”  Anyone who gets in the way of that one ends up dead, but Mommy insists, as the body count mounts, “I didn’t do it … and I can prove it.”   So who is the killer … Jan. 21 with the arrival of VCI Entertainment’s Blu-ray presentation of Mommy 25th Anniversary Widescreen Double Feature you will find out the answer to that question … and more!!

Extras — on a bonus DVD included with the Combo Pack — are the featurette titled “Leonard Martin on Mommy,” the original trailer, a blooper reel, the PBS documentary on Mommy, a video session with writer/director Max Allan Collins and Patty McCormack titled “Mommy’s Day” and the J. Rigler documentary, The Making of Mommy.

Wanrer Bros. Home Entertainment Confirms Jan. 7 As The Street Date For Writer/Director Todd Phillips' Joker

Last week we reported that Best Buy, iTunes and Target were all taking preorders for writer/director Todd Phillips’ Joker for delivery on Jan. 7.

Sure, they jumped the gun on the official press announcement from Warner Bros. Home Entertainment, which is unfortunate, but a fact of life these days.   

The announcement came Tuesday morning, Dec. 3 and sure enough Blu-ray/DVD and 4K Ultra HD/Blu-ray Combo Packs, as well as a stand-alone DVD edition, will be available as advertised on Jan. 7.

As mentioned last week, the ARR is 95 days and, for the record, ticket sales have expanded to $330.5 million.

What the press included, which the various retailers were silent on, was the bonus features.   These are limited to four featurettes (no commentary from filmmaker Todd Phillips) — “Joker: Vision & Fury,” “Becoming Joker,” “Please Welcome … Joker!” and “Joker: A Chronicle of Chaos.”

Universal Pictures Home Entertainment Tabs Jan. 21 As The Street Date For The Addams Family

There was The Addams Family television show back in the mid-‘60s with John Astin and Carolyn Jones as Gomez and Morticia Addams.   It spawned two theatrical hits, one in 1991 simply titled The Addams Family, with Raul Julia and Angelica Huston taking up the roles of Gomez and Morticia … everyone came back two years later for Addams Family Values.

Universal Pictures Home Entertainment will be teaming up with Metro Goldwyn Mayer on Jan. 21 for the latest rendition of this seemingly timeless tale of the loveable members of the Addams clan in the directing team of Greg Tiernan and Conrad Vernon’s CGI presentation of The Addams Family.

The ARR comes in at 102 days and ticket sales for this Gomez (voiced by Oscar Isaac — as Poe Dameron in the latest Star Wars trilogy) and Morticia (voiced by Charlize Theron) family gathering were an impressive $96.4 million … with those numbers look for a sequel to be in theatres by 2021.   Timeless!!

Planned for release to the home entertainment packaged media marketplace are a stand-alone DVD edition and a Blu-ray/DVD Combo Pack.

As to bonus nuggets, look for deleted and extended scenes, a pair of music videos — Christina Aguilera’s “Haunted Heart” and the ensemble group presentation of “My Family” — plus there will be four featurettes — “Welcome to the Family,” “Life of a Scene,” “Charades with Thing” and “Addams Family Throwback.”