MCBASTARD'S MAUSOLEUM: NIGHTMARE (1981) aka NIGHTMARE IN A DAMAGED BRAIN (Severin Films Blu-ray Review)

NIGHTMARE (1981)

aka NIGHTMARE IN A DAMAGED BRAIN

2-Disc 4K Ultra HD + Blu-ray

Label: Severin Films

Region Code: Region-Free

Rating: Unrated

Duration: 99 Minutes 10 Seconds

Audio: English DTS-HD MA 2.0 Dual-Mono, 5.1 Surround with Optional English Subtitles

Video: HDR10 2160p Ultra HD Widescreen (1.85:1), 1080p HD Widescreen (1.85:1)

Director: Romano Scavolini

Cast: Baird Stafford, Sharon Smith, C.J. Cooke, Mik Cribben, Danny Ronan, William Milling, Tammy Patterson, Kim Patterson, Candese Marchese, William Paul, Kathleen Ferguson, Tommy Bouvier, Geoffrey Marchese, Michael Sweney

In the notoriously sleazy and gore-drizzled shocker Nightmare (1981) aka Nightmare in a Damaged Brain, directed by Romano Scavolini, George Tatum (Baird Stafford, Dog Tags) is a schizophrenic, homicidal mental patient who is plagued by recurring nightmares of a decapitated woman's head, which are connected to a not-at-first explained trauma he suffered as child. He's been committed to a NYC psychiatric hospital where has undergone an secret experimental drug program, and declared fit to return to society, and released. However, his psychiatrist becomes alarmed when he fails to report for his regularly scheduled therapy sessions, and seems to have disappeared. One of the first places he goes is down to 42nd Street to a take in a peepshow, the lurid adventure triggering a foaming-at-the-mouth seizure with more flashbacks to that mysterious childhood trauma. He then steals a car and heads to Florida, making a stop-over in Myrtle Beach, where he follows a woman home from the bar and stabs her to death. Eventually he does make it to Florida where he sets his sights on a single-mother Susan (Susan Temper, Blast-Off Girls) and her children, young daughters Kim (Kim Patterson) and Tammy (Tammy Patterson), and her mischievous freckle-faced son, C.J. (C.J. Cook), the latter of whom is a rambunctious troublemaker who loves to pull morbid pranks.

Once George arrives in Florida the film loses a bit of steam as we spend a lot of time with Susan and her domestic situation, as she tries to balance being a single-mom while spending time with her new boyfriend Bob (Mik Cribben, Beware: Children at Play), which is more difficult because of not only C.J.s prankster shenanigans, but he says he's being followed by a strange man, plus Susan is receiving creepy calls as home as well.

Eventually this turns into a Halloween inspired home invasion slasher with C.J. and the other kids being babysat by horny teen Kathy (Danny Ronan). George shows up at the house armed with a rock pick, dons one of C.J.'s Halloween masks and dispatches both the babysitter and her boyfriend quite gruesomely - leaving troublemaker C.J. to protect his sisters from the maniac home invader with his mother's handgun, which of course he knows where she stashes it.

Right at the end there are longer flashbacks to the trauma George suffered as a kid involving what turns out to be his dad and his lover. All throughout the film we've been getting shorter flashbacks, scenes filled with glorious blood-soaked gore and violence, especially that nasty decapitation by axe, but in the end we get the full scenario with context, and boy is it a doozy, no one who has seen this has ever forgotten it! We also get a shorthand explanation of why George was obsessed with Susan and her family in particular.

Honestly I've never thought this was a particularly engaging or well-made slasher flick, it's notorious for being a video nasty and for how utterly skin-crawling sleazy and gory it is, but the story itself is rather hard to follow. I'd watched it several times on various formats over the years before I ever 'figured it out', but the first time I saw it I was just I wasn't quite getting it, but was still delighting in the lurid nastiness of it all, as well as the unsettling psychotronic score, and while I didn;t think it was great I liked the tone and vibe way more than I enjoyed the actual story. It's definitely grown on me with each successive watch though. One thing that has always struck me about it though was the turn from Stafford as the deeply-troubled George, a man psychologically tormented and driven to murder by the horrifying images of his childhood trauma that continuously play out in his fractured mind.

The rest of the cast is not always so great, while I love the freckle-faced CJ for his mischievous pranks, he and his sisters are no child-thespians, and they're deliveries of dialogue are pretty terrible, like they're reading it off of cue cards just off screen - which could be the case. But hey, they're in good company, because very few people give anything close to a natural sounding sentence throughout the entire film, that goes for the cops, and the doctors, pretty much everyone else who is not George. I am not sure if that stilted dialogue had anything to do with director/

screenwriter Romano Scavolini being from Italy,. I am sure that and fact that this is ultra low-budget and the cast are largely unknowns who didn't go onto to do much of anything else had a little something to do with it.

Audio/Video: Nightmare (1981) arrives on region-free 4K UHD + Blu-ray in 2160p UHD framed in 1.85:1 widescreen with HDR10 color-grading. This is sourced from 4K scans of the internegative and various foreign print sources to create the longest and most complete version available to date. Apparently the original negative was either lost, destroyed or rumored to be sitting in a dilapidated mine vault that is too dangerous to venture into - take your pick. The source(s) showcase a bit of film blemish, fading and color-shifts, and some occasional flickering. The grain is course and not altogether satisfactorily resolved, but there are pleasing textures and some fleeting moments of fine detail throughout, it's just not consistent, which makes a bit of sense considering the stitched together from various elements aspect of it all. The HDR10 gives it an edge over the accompanying Blu-ray with deeper blacks, and improved clarity, and the WCG color grading brings out the primaries, especially the blood work. The color-grading is also more finely dialed-in and looks more accurate compared to the Code Red Blu-ray, if a tad darker. Overall I was quite pleased with it it, it's quite an upgrade from the previous Blu-ray, and while it's not UHD perfectionist is probably the best this particular Video Nasty will ever look unless the OCN is miraculously recovered at some later date.

Audio comes by way of both English DTS-HD MA 2.0 dual-mono or 5.1 surround with optional English subtitles. The racks are clean and well-balanced, not the most immersive stuff I've ever had in my ears but it does the job, and the tasty psychotronic score by Jack Eric Williams comes through nicely. Comparing the two tracks I preferred the 2.0 mono over the unnecessary 5.1 mix.

Extras on the 4K UHD include a pair of archival commentaries, the first is an Audio Commentary with star Baird Stafford and special effects assistant Cleve Hall moderated by Lee Christian and David DeCoteau; and a second Audio Commentary with producer William Paul, plus the 2-min of Trailers. Onto the Blu-ray disc, which also features the film in HD, we get the same commentaries and trailer plus more.

The "more" comes by way of the 72-minute Kill Thy Father and Thy Mother – Interview with director Romano Scavolini where he talks at length about developing the film, including how the secret CIA sponsored MK-Ultra experiments inspired it. We also get the 39-min Dreaming Up A Nightmare, a compilation of interviews the explore the production, release and notoriety of the film featuring former president of 21st century distribution Arthur Schweitzer, actor/unit production manager Mik Cribben, Production Supervisor Simon Nuchtern, Florida producer/special effects artist William Milling, uncredited editor Jim Markovic and archival interviews with actor Baird Stafford and special effects artists Edward French and Cleve Hall. A huge get here is The Nightmare Of Nightmare, an 8-min interview with special effects legend Tom Savini who was erroneously credited as the film's special effects director in the print advertising, and is still credited in the actual film. For years he has dismissed any involvement with the film, but it's great to have him here on video to set us straight.

More new stuff comes by way of the 12-min The Stuff That Nightmares Are Made Of - Interview with Makeup Artist Robin Stevens; the 11-min A Nightmare on Many Streets - Locations Tour with Rue Morgue Writer Michael Gingold who walks us down 42nd Street and various Florida locations; 1-min of Deleted Scenes sourced from Dutch and Australian VHS sources, plus the 2-min Open Matte Peepshow Sequence, giving us even more titillating peepshow action (and a few seconds of the gory decapitation) in it's open matte glory. The disc is finished-up with a 10-min Image Gallery containing publicity pics, behind-the-scenes shots, death pics from the flick, and a treasure trove of home video release covers from around the world.

The 2-disc UHD/BD arrives in a dual-hubbed black keepcase with a Reversible Sleeve of Artwork, the b-side featuring the UK VHS variant artwork with Severin homaging the original UK VHS release with a Severin World 2000 imprint, which is just cool.

This release is also available direct from Severin Films in a 3-disc limited Edition with an exclusive slipcover, booklet, plus a third disc, A Blu-ray containing the 71-min doc Damaged: The Very British Obscenity of David Hamilton Grant, who served time for selling copies f the film that were longer than the BBFC approved cut, plus over three hours of Rare David Hamilton-Grant Productions flicks. None of these are available on this 2-disc standard release version I have reviewed here, but it is still available from Severin.

Barring some future discovery of the long thought loss original camera negative this is easily the most definitive version of the film; it's the longest most complete cut, it looks and sounds better than ever in 4K with HDR10 color-grading, and the extras, even on this slightly cut-down standard 2-disc edition, are fantastic. This notoriously gory and skeezy Video Nasty gets a first-rate UHD/BD, and whom better to do it that Severin Films who have released more Video Nasties in definitive editions than any other label out there.

Special Features:
Disc 1: 4K UHD
- Audio Commentary with star Baird Stafford and special effects assistant Cleve Hall moderated by Lee Christian and David
DeCoteau
- Audio Commentary with producer William Paul
- Trailers (2:31)
Disc 2: Blu-ray
- Audio Commentary with Baird Stafford and Cleve Hall moderated by Lee Christian and David DeCoteau

- Audio Commentary with producer William Paul
- Kill Thy Father and Thy Mother – Interview with director Romano Scavolini (71:44)
- Dreaming Up A Nightmare – Featuring former president of 21st century distribution Arthur Schweitzer, actor/unit production manager Mik Cribben, Production Supervisor Simon Nuchtern, Florida producer/special effects artist William Milling, uncredited editor Jim Markovic and archival interviews with actor Baird Stafford and special effects artists Edward French and Cleve Hall (39:09)
- The Nightmare Of Nightmare – interview with erroneously credited special effects director Tom Savini (7:34)

- The Stuff That Nightmares Are Made Of - Interview with Makeup Artist Robin Stevens (12:18)

- A Nightmare on Many Streets - Locations Tour with Rue Morgue Writer Michael Gingold (11:05)

- Deleted scenes (1:18)
- Image Gallery (10:14)

- Open Matte Peepshow Sequence (2:45)
- Trailers (2:31)

Screenshots from the Severin Films Blu-ray: