HANGER (2009) (Unearthed Films Blu-ray Review)

HANGER (2009) 

2-Disc Collector's Edition 

Label: Unearthed Films

Region Code:

Rating: Unrated

Duration: 92 Minutes 

Audio: English Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo and 5.1 Surround with Optional English Subtitles 

Video: 1080p HD Widescreen (1.78:1) 

Director: Ryan Nicholson 

Cast: Debbie Rochon, Dan Ellis, Nathan Dashwood, Ronald Patrick Thompson, Lloyd Kaufman, Wade Gibb, Alastair Gamble, Candice Lewald

Hanger (2009) is a cheaply made gore film from the late director Ryan Nicholson, a savage slice of no-budget exploitation that opens with a scumbag pimp named Leroy (Ronald Patrick Thompson, Collar) beating up a pregnant prostitute named Rose (Debbie Rochon, Slime City Massacre), before performing a botched hanger abortion on her, killing her in the process and dumping the fetus in a garbage can, where it is later found by a homeless man who names the kid Hanger, and raises him as his son. 

Eighteen years later the vagrant "father" kicks Hanger (Nathan Dashwood, Gutterballs) out into the world on his own, where he meets up with his biologicals father John (Dan Ellis, Star Vehicle), who sets him up with a job at a junkyard, and pays a prostitute to get his kid's rocks off, however, she is so horrified by his fucked-up, hanger-scarred face she tries to run away, which angers John who smashes in her skull with the door of his pick-up truck. 

At the junkyard Hanger befriends another fucked-up looking guy named Russell (Wade Gibb, Gutterballs) who has down syndrome. As the film progresses John and Hanger, along with Wade, embark on a bloody rampage to get revenge on the pimp Leroy and his crew, and that's pretty much the movie in a nutshell. If you're at all familiar with the low-budget films of the late Vancouver-based filmmaker Ryan Nicholson you know that his films were usually very light on plot and actual story, and very heavy on the ultra-graphic gore and sleaze, and on that level this film is a whopper of a success. It's dripping with heinous imagery you won't soon forget.

The stomach churning sights include a graphic abortion scene right at the top of the film, a tampon sniffing scuzz, a rapist in a Santa suit drugging and then sodomizing the guy  with down syndrome before graphically fucking Hanger's colostomy hole, a prostitute killed by douche, and we even get Troma impresario Lloyd Kauffman playing a transvestite who gets his dick mutilated in a meat-grinder! It's total fucking trash cinema that is demented and designed to offend with scene-after-scene of vile carnage and uncomfortable nudity.

Hanger is not a traditionally good or well-made movie, no sir, but if you're a fan of no-budget Troma-esque gore and fucked-up gutter cinema along the lines of Street Trash, but made on a shoestring budget, this bit of filth is worth seeking out. It's the sort of film that once endured will be hard to forget - I mean, how do you forget a a scene of a guy making a cup of tea with bloody tampons for tea-bags, and then savoring the flavor?

Another Nicholson trademark is that there is not a single person to root for in the film, everyone is either a deformed sicko or heinous is their own right with no redeeming values whatsoever, it's just a bunch of sick fucks brutally raping and killing each other for ninety-two minutes with some gag reflex inducing bits of gore and grotesqueries along with some truly uncomfortable nudity. Nicholson was quite good at filling the screen with gore and disgusting misogynistic characters, it's not for everyone, but if you're a sick-fuck cinema fan with a taste for no-budget trash these Ryan Nicholson films are sure turn your stomach in a good way. 

Audio/Video: Hanger (2009) arrives on Blu-ray from Unearthed film in 1080i HD framed in 1.78:1 widescreen, and it starts off with a text blurb stating that the ghosting and compression anomalies seen throughout are baked into the existing digital elements. Sure enough, it's a below-standard  warts and all presentation with poor image consistency and a general lack of fine detail and crispness, which all goes back to the source elements and not the actual transfer from Unearthed Films.

Audio comes by way of English LPCM 2.0 stereo and DTS-HD MA 5.1, surround with no subtitles options. Audio fares quite a bit better than the video presentation, though I thought the stereo track sounded better, or at least more authentic sounding. There are some issues with poorly recorded dialogue that are a bit of a chore to decipher, and subtitles would have been appreciated. The biggest benefactor of the uncompressed audio is the soundtrack featuring tunes from Nomeanno, Bison, Grass City, SpreadEagle and others. 

Unearthed have been doing fantastic work honoring the work of the late Ryan Nicholson, having acquired the Plotdigger Films catalog and releasing them on Blu-ray with spiffy (sometimes iffy) presentations and over-stuffed with an array of extras, which they continue with Hangar. Extras on disc one include an audio commentary with Director Ryan Nicholson, the 90-minute xxx-rated version of the film in standard definition, an over hour-long making of documentary, a fun 12-minute featurette documenting Troma-honcho Lloyd Kaufman's contribution to the film, 20-minutes of Additional Scenes, 7-muntres of Deleted Scenes, the 3-min Black on White Bred - an longer version of a porn seen in the film,  a 2-minute Blooper Reel, a 30-minute image Gallery and 9-minutes of trailers for Hangar and other Unearthed flicks. 

Disc two, also a Blu-ray, is dedicated to over eighteen-hours of raw footage from the shooting of the film divided up into five volumes, and I have not even begun to dig into these, and to be honest I really have no plans to anytime soon, just seeing the two versions of the main feature was quite enough for me, but like the movie itself, even the extras can be a bit of an endurance test.

The 2-disc release arrives in a standard keepcase with a single-sided sleeve of artwork featuring a pretty cool illustration of the character "The John" from the film which looks more expensive than the actual flick, that same artwork is also replicated on both discs.  

Special Features: 
Disc One: 

- XXX Version of Hanger (90 min) 

- Audio Commentary with Director Ryan Nicholson
- Behind the Scenes Featurette (114 min) 

- Behind the Stoma: The Making and Taking of Hanger (20 min) 
- Taking of Hanger Enough Dope to Hang Yourself With: On The Set with Lloyd Kaufman (12 min) 

- Black on White Bred (3 min) 
- Deleted Scenes (7 min) 

- Blooper Reel (2 min) 

- Additional Scenes (20 min) 
- Trailers: Hangar (2 min), Gutterballs (1 min), Torched (1 min), Untold Stories (3 min), A Serbian Film (2 min) 
- Stills Gallery (30 min) 

Disc Two - Outtakes 

- Hanger Raw Tapes Volume 1 (207 min)

- Hanger Raw Tapes Volume 2 (180 min) )

- Hanger Raw Tapes Volume 3 (219 min)

- Hanger Raw Tapes Volume 4 (240 min)

- Hanger Raw Tapes Volume 5 (214 min)

Another solid release from Unearthed Films commemorating the depraved cinema of director Ryan Nicholson who passed away a few years ago from brain cancer. Nicholson made some real sickie films that don't always appeal to me, some are fun like Gutterballs, others are cheap, mean-spirited exploitation like this, and I prefer the latter, but I dig that Unearthed Films are bringing these to the filth-starved masses with deluxe edition Blu-rays, even if some of them still look like turds in HD.

Screenshots from the Unearthed Films Blu-ray: 

Extras: