VOL. 110
BRIEF REMEMBRANCES OF THE RECENTLY RELEASED
NIGHT OF BLOODY HORROR (1969) - BENEATH THE 12-MILE REEF (1953) - THE SAVAGE BEES (1976) - THE NAVY VS THE NIGHT MONSTERS (1966) - DESTINATION INNER SPACE (1966)
Label: Leomark Studios
Region Code: A
Rating: Unrated
Duration: 77 Minutes 15 Seconds
Audio: English Dolby Digital 2.0 Dual-Mono with Optional English Subtitles
Video: 1080p HD Fullscreen (1.33:1)
Director: Joy N. Houck Jr
Cast: Gerald McRaney, Gaye Yellen, Herbert Nelson
Night of Bloody Horror (1960) is a a Psycho-riff directed by Joy N. Houck Jr (Creature of Black Lake), in it Wesley Stuart (Gerald McRaney, The Neverending Story) has recently been released from a mental institution, who now lives with his domineering mother Agatha Stuart (Evelyn Hendricks, Night of the Strangler). He's dating a young woman named girlfriend Susan Collins (Lisa Dameron) who is killed, with a sawing needle that is stabbed into her eye at confession, with Wes becoming a likely suspect in the murder, what because of his past, which includes a younger brother who was murdered thirteen years ago, and he has debilitating recurring panic attacks, announced by a a whirly-tunnel that appears onscreen. I quite enjoyed Houck's bigfoot flick Creature from Black Lake, but this early Psycho-slasher endeavor is a bit ramshackle and uninspired, but it does have some sleazy regional filmmaking charms at least, but it's pretty sluggish and is probably best remembered for it's advertising campaign that promised $1000 payday to anyone who's family member died during the theatrical showing. The film is an only slightly interesting regional curio, and also the first credit role for Gerald McRaney who went onto to star in the popular TV shows Simon and Simon (1981-1989) and Major Dad (1989-1993), who without his signature moustache is pretty unrecognizable here. This BD-R from Leomark Studios is what I believe to be the film's debut on HD physical media, looks about the same as the compressed, blotchy looking versions available on YouTube or those Mill Creek Entertainment public domain box sets, I'd be hard-pressed to recommend unless you're really wanting it on disc, and I do like the original artwork they used. The BD-R disc is barebones, there are extras, no menu, and no subtitles, once you pop the disc in it just starts playing.
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Label: Leomark Studios
Region Code: A
Rating: Unrated
Duration: 127 Minutes 20 Seconds
Audio: English Dolby Digital 2.0 Dual-Mono
Video: 1080p HD Widescreen (2.35:1)
Director: Robert D. Webb
Cast: Robert Wagner, Terry Moore, Gilber Roland
Beneath the 12 Mile Reef (1953) is an Oscar-nominated Technicolor adventure-drama directed by Robert D. Webb (The Jackals), it follows a Greek-American sponge fishing family as they risk everything to harvest Florida's dangerous 12-Mile Reef. Amid fierce rivalry with Anglo fishermen, The Conchs, we have a dramatic clash of cultures and forbidden romance. The rival families are the Petrakis and the Conchs, we have Tony Petrakis (Robert Wagner, Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery) lives with his father Mike (Gilbert Roland, The Diamond Queen), his mother (Angela Clarke, House of Wax), and his sister Penny (Gloria Gordon, A Man Called Peter), who are of Greek descent, they face discrimination, particularly from their white rivals, the Conchs, lead by patriarch Thomas Rhys (Richard Boone, The Shootist). When father and son Petrakis, along with their friend Socrates (J. Carrol Nash, Clash By Night), go diving near Key West, the Conchs threaten to cut Mike's line things get pretty heated. Meanwhile, When the Conchs, Arnold Dix (Peter Graves, Airplane!) falls in love with Rhys's daughter Gwyneth (Terry Moore, Hellhole) the tension rise, and tragedy occurs. The highlight of this Cinemascope/
Technicolor adventure melodrama is the underwater photography during the dives, it's pretty thrilling stuff, but i found the sponge-diving drama a bit of a snooze to be honest, and the while time I was watching it I was sort of pissed off by the misleading artwork for this Blu-ray that seemed to indicate some sort of mutant octopus horror-thriller, but that's far from the truth, though there is a octopus attack scene. This 1080p BD-R presentation retains the films 2.55:1 CinemaScope aspect ratio, the source generally looks good with nice colors, with 2.0 Dolby Digital audio, there are some compression artifacts, and the image quality never rises to the heights of the HD format, but it was watchable. The film was previously issued on Blu-ray from the now defunct Twilight Time, that release is now OOP , so if you're hankering to check out in HD and won't settle for a YouTube version this BD-R from Leomark is a an option, but don't be fooled by the mutant-octopus on the Blu-ray, this is a sponge-diving melodrama, nit a horror-thriller. The BD-R disc is barebones, there are extras, no menu, and no subtitles, once you pop the disc in it just starts playing.
THE SAVAGE BEES (1976)
BD-R
Label: Leomark Studios
Region Code: A
Rating: Unrated
Duration: 89 Minutes 11 Seconds
Audio: English Dolby Digital 2.0 Dual-Mono
Video: 1080p HD Widescreen (1.78:1)
Director: Bruce Geller
Cast: Ben Johnson, Michael Parks, Paul Hecht
Made-for-TV terror The Savage Bees (1976) is directed by Bruce Geller (Harry In Your Pocket) and written by Gordon Trueblood, who was the director of exploitation gem The Candy Snatchers, and also writer of a ton of bug-attack TV mobies like Tarantulas: The Deadly Cargo (1977), Ants! (1977), and this film's sequel Terror Out of the Sky (1978). This one concerns the '70s favorite killer insects, Africanized killer bees. It is set during Mardi Gras in New Orleans, when a swarm of African killer bees escapes from a freighter, threatening the city's festivities. When the beloved dog of Sheriff Donald McKew (Ben Johnson, The Town That Dreaded Sundown) is attacked and killed by a swarm of bees he enlists the help of the local coroner Jeff Durand (Michael Parks, Kill Bill), and the coroner's ex-girlfriend Jeannie Devereaux (Gretchen Corbett, Let's Scare Jessica To Death), who is conveniently a entomologist, alongside Dr. Rufus Carter (Paul Hecht, The Reincarnation of Peter Proud), and Dr. Jorge Meuller (Horst Buchholz, The Magnificent Seven) attempt to warn the local government of the deadly threat, but Deputy Mayor Pelligrino (James Best, Roscoe P. Coltrane from TV's The Dukes of Hazard) is more concerned about ruining the Mardi Gras celebration than protecting people from being stung to death. It's a decent enough nature run amuck entry of the TV movie variety, memorable scenes include a poor farmer attacked by the swarm who leaps into the river, only for the savage bees to relentlessly swarm over the water's surface until he dies, and of course the finale which involves driving a bee-covered car into the temperature controlled Caesars Superdome where they can freeze the bees into a lethargic state. The most ridiculous scene might be that of Dr. Jorge Meuller decked out in protective bee suit only for it to be torn open by a Mardi Gras reveler dressed in a pirate costume, who while being attacked by the bees rips open the scientists protective suit with his toy sword. The presentation here is 1.78:1 widescreen, while this aired as a TV movie here inthe states it did get a theatrical release in foreign territories, presented here with the German title of Morderbeinen Greifen An. The source is pretty beat-up, featuring blown out whites, print damage throughout with nicks, vertical lines, and emulsion digs, looking soft with some occasionally wonky colors, but totally serviceable. Kino Lorber release the sequel on Blu-ray a few years back and it looks terrific, this presentation is quite a bit less stellar, but this BD-R release from Leomark seems to be the only option to own the disc in HD at the moment. Again, the BD-R release is barebones, there are extras, no menu, and no subtitles, once you pop the disc in it just starts playing.
MONSTERS (1966)
BD-R
Label: Leomark Studios
Region Code: A
Rating: Unrated
Duration: 85 Minutes 2 Seconds
Audio: English Dolby Digital 2.0 Dual-Mono
Video: 1080p HD Widescreen (1.78:1)
Director: Michael A. Hoey
Cast: Mamie Van Doren, Bill Gray, Bobby Ban, Pamela Mason
The clunkily named The navy vs The Night Monsters (1966), the 1959 science fiction novel The Monster from Earth's End by Murray Leinster, is a botanical creature-feature about mysterious plant samples from Antarctica that come alive on a South Seas island Navy base when the plane carrying them lands on the island. As the horrific monsters reveal themselves and the horrors that they are. Very much in the vein of the Thing from Another World and The Day of the Triffids, but much cheaper and less interesting than either. The island inhabitants include Navy Lt. Charles "Charlie" Brown (Anthony Eisley, The Mummy and Curse of the Jackals) nurses Nora Hall (Mamie Van Doren, High School Confidential) and Diane (Kaye Elhardt), weatherman Robert Spaulding(Edward Faulkner, Rio Lobo), Dr. Arthur Beecham (Walter Sande, Red Planet Mars), Dr. Marie (Pamela Mason, College Confidential)Ensign Rutherford Chandler (Bobby Van, Doomsday Machine) and CPO Fred Twining (Billy Gray, The Day the Earth Stood Still) and C.W.O. McBride (Russ Bender, I Saw What You Did). The acid-secreting, nocturnal tree-creatures when revealed are less than exciting, we don't even get a cool demon-face like From Hell It Came (1953), so that made me sad. Eventually the islanders get wise to the fact that while conventional weapons don't seem to work homemade Molotov cocktails do, enabling them to defend themselves long enough to call in a napalm strike. I am not a super-fan of this one but i am glad I checked it out, it's got some decent atmosphere, some interesting love triangle dynamics, and terrible looking creatures, but this one is really for the deep-dive monster kids who eat up all things schlocky. This BD-R presentation is 1.78:1 widescreen, which was a nice surprise. The source is pretty rough looking in spots, speckled with emulsion digs and vertical lines, certainly looking for like SD than what the HD format is capable of. Like the artwork for Beneath the 12 Mile Reef the artwork on this BD-R has is not indicative of the actual film. Again, the BD-R release is barebones, there are extras, no menu, and no subtitles, once you pop the disc in it just starts playing, and when it ends it replays again. From what I gather this BD-R is the HD on home video, so if you're curious check it out or just need it on disc, this is it, other than watching it on YouTube.
Label: Leomark Studios
Region Code:
Rating: Unrated
Duration: 81 Minutes 38 Seconds
Audio: English Dolby Digital 2.0 Dual-Mono
Video: 1080p HD Fullscreen (1.33:1)
Director: Francis D. Lyon
Cast: Scott Brady, Sheree North, Gary Merrill
Destination Inner Space (1966) is a sci-fi creature feature directed by Francis D. Lyon (Cult of the Cobra), and written by Arthur C. Piece (Women of the Prehistoric Planet) . When scientists at the Institute of Marine Sciences' Sealab facility on the ocean floor stumble upon a mysterious extraterrestrial craft lurking in the ocean depths US Navy Commander Wayne (Scott Brady, Gremlins) arrives to assess the situation. The research team on the Sealab include Dr. Dr. LaSatier (Gary Merrilll, made-for-TV movie Earth II) and Dr. Rene Peron (Sheree North, Charley Varrick), pilot Hugh Maddox (Mike Road, who was the original voice of Jonny Quest's Roger T. 'Race' Bannon!), and photographer
Sandra Welles Bannon (Wende Wagner, Rosemary's Baby). It turns out that Wade and Maddox formerly served together on a doomed military sub and the bad blood between them in always at the boiling point, leading to some hot-headed inner turmoil. Eventually they mount and expedition and track down the under water saucer, boarding it they find it appears automated, but they recover a cylinder of unknown origin that take back to the Sealab, where oddly, it begins to grow in size, uh-oh. Eventually a scaly aquatic sea creature remerges and causes havoc, even going to the surface of the ocean to destroy the support vessel Topside, disabling communication with the outside world and cutting off the Sealab's oxygen. With the clock ticking before the O2 runs out the crew and Cmdr. Wade must find a way to destroy the alien creatures, who are also carrying a deadly plague that could potentially wipe out the human race! I thought this was quite a fun creature-feature, it's got some shoddy miniature work like the scene of the diving bell descending to the Sealab, which doesn't do much to hide the fact that it's a cheap looking toy in a bathtub, and the underwater saucer looks little better. Where I thought the film really excelled was how serious the cast are about it, this is not played for winks, and I think that pays off. I also adore the man in a rubber suit creature effects, the brightly scaled and finned amphibious creature(s) were designed by Richard Cassarino (The Hideous Sun Demon) and executed by Roger George (Night of the Creeps), the creature design is pretty terrific for the era, and while it might be hokey now, looking at it as monster kid, it's the best thing about the film hands down. The BD-R presents the film in 1080p HD framed in 1.33:1, which I believe is the open-matte version of the film. Kino have released this on Blu-ray as well in the 1.85:1 widescreen theatrical aspect ratio and comparing screenshots this has more image on the top and bottom, which is why I believe this is the open-matte framing. How's it look, pretty decent, not perfection. There are vertical lines, speckling, and digs, but I found the image to generally have nice depth and clarity, and pleasing colors. The Kino release looks superior in every way and has some extras, but this was a pretty satisfying watch. Again, the BD-R release has lossy audio and is totally barebones, there are extras, chapters, menu, and no subtitles, once you pop the disc in it just starts playing, and when it ends it replays again. If I had to choose I say pick up the Kino release of Sci-Fi Chillers which comes packaged with The Unknown Terror (1957) and The Colossus of New York (1958), but this is out there and is an option. Also, I appreciate that the creature seen on the wrap is actually the creature in the film, unlike the Leomark BD-R releases of Beneath 12 Mile Reef and The Navy vs The Night Monsters.
