Severin Films, with sales and distribution expertise
provided by MVD Entertainment Group, has a new 2K film restoration (sourced
from a newly discovered 35mm answer print) of director James C. Wasson’s
controversial 1980 horror film, Night of the Demon, set
for release as a double-disc Blu-ray special edition on Feb. 22.
There will also be a single-disc DVD edition
available on the same date.
You can toss out those coveted VHS copies that you’ve
hung on to for the past decades … deeply held treasures to be sure. You can even retire the 2011 DVD edition of Night of
the Demon that you might have acquired
along the way … this is the real deal and it only took something like 40 years
to get here.
Back in 1979 Jim L. Ball wrote the script and acted
as producer, he hired Wasson to direct his story about an anthropology professor
by the name of Bill Nugent (Michael Cutt in his film debut — Volcano,
Hider in the House), who is sought out by a young
woman by the name of Carla (Shannon Cooper), who tells him a fantastic tale about
her father being murdered by a Bigfoot creature.
Despite a series of unexplained killings, including
that of two Girl Scouts, the local police remain skeptical that Bigfoot could
be the culprit. Bigfoot, seriously?
In any case, Nugent sees this as a perfect
opportunity to take some of his students, along with Carla, into the spooky woods
for a field trip. Genre fans will
immediately recognize this little group of six, including students Roy (Bob
Collins), Pete (Michael Lang), Gary (Ray Jarris) and Linda (Jody or Jodi
Lazarus), as the victim pool.
They will journey into the woods, get a clue from a local
by the name of Carlson (William F. Nugent) — who claims to have actually seen
Bigfoot — which leads them to a crazed woman, Wanda (Melanie Graham), who lives
in a cabin even deeper in the woods.
Once they arrive there, the slaughter begins.
At this point, Night of
the Demon is a pretty straight forward
victim pool horror film. The producer, Jim
L. Ball, was convinced that it was not marketable, so, as the story goes, he took
over the production and filmed a series of flashback inserts that were very
graphic to spruce things up.
The “new” version was considered so graphic by UK
standards that it was banned. Ball,
likely short of production funds at this point, cuts a direct-to-VHS release,
multiple versions from various companies will follow … that should be the end
of Night of the Demon. Into the dustbin of VHS history it goes,
never to be heard from or seen again.
Wrong, it becomes a cult film!!
So, what has Severin Films assembled here? For starters, this is the uncut, 96-minute version
of the film … first time on Blu-ray.
As to bonus goodies, the Blu-ray special edition (two-disc
set), comes with Ball’s unseen 1964 feature film, Fraternity
of Horror, two feature-length documentaries
from David Gregory — Ban the Sadist Videos! and Ban the
Sadist Videos, Part II! — and a whopping eight
featurettes — “Just a Little Green Kid Outta Waco, Texas,” “The Demon Made Me
Do It,” “Eye of the Demon,” “Cryptid Currency: Transgression Aggression in
Bigfoot Cinema,” “Tales from the Cryptid,” “Deconstructing Patty,” “Mondo Bigfoot”
and “My Nasty Memories.”
