DATE WITH A VAMPIRE (2000) Visual Vengeance Blu-ray Review

DATE WITH A VAMPIRE (2000) 

Visual Vengeance Collector's Edition Blu-ray 

Label: Visual Vengeance 

Region Code: Region-Free 

Rating: Unrated 

Duration: 59 Minutes 

Audio: English Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo with Optional English Subtitles 

Video: 1080i HD Fullscreen (1.33:1) 

Director: Jeffrey Arsenault

Cast: Lori Thomas, Robin Macklin, Cynthia Polakovich, Joe Zaso

The Bram Stoker's Dracula cinemascape of the 90's an early '00s were lousy with low-budget, softcore vamp flicks on cable and direct-to-video markets, cheaply made and low-budget, and the shot-on-video Date With A Vampire (2000) from director Jeffrey Arsenault (Night Owl) and written by Kevin J. Lindenmuth (Vampires and Other Stereotypes) was certainly one of 'em. In it a centuries old vampire named Violet (Lori Thomas, Stab 2) living in NYC who hungers for sexual pleasure, prowling the smoke-filled bars for fresh blood, luring both men and women into her wicked web of lust and murder. Enter the handsome Chuck (Robin Macklin, Rome '98), lonely fireman freshly emigrated from the Midwest, who easily falls right into her hypnotic seduction, following her back to her mansion and straight into her bed for a night of erotic softcore pleasures. However, when she takes a bit out of his neck she is none-to-pleased, he ends up tied to her bed and threatened with  immortality or a lengthy death by blood-starvation, but Chuck has secrets of his own. What ensues atmospheric hour of erotic seduction and mind games, plus a few other surprises, including a feral cellar-dwelling bloodsucker (Joseph Zaso, Five Dead on a Crimson Canvas), and an uninvited guest by way of Violet's former lover Rebecca (Cynthia Polakovich, Vampire Playmates). The flick is just short of an hour long and it feels padded with lingering softcore sex scenes and slow-motion camera moves, and while I do appreciate some exploitative softcore nudity, these erotic vampire tales are just not my cup o' tea. Sure, I appreciate the nudity, and I though that Lori Thomas and Robin Macklin had decent chemistry, but at the end of the day it just didn't come together for me, and even at sixty minutes it dragged. 

Audio/Video: The flick gets makes it's Blu-ray debut via a region-free disc from Visual Vengeance, presented in 1080i fullscreen (1.33:1). the shot-on-digital tape cheapie was originally shot on consumer grade equipment, what we get looks like a terrific VHS presentation, a little murky, quite dark, soft and ill-defined, but colors generally look very good, and true to the source limitation of the standard-def format. Audio comes by way of English Dolby Digital 2.0 with optional English subtitles, offering a true representation of the source, dialogue sounds just fine, effects and score come through with some occasional source related hiss, but it's always intelligible and serviceable, just limited by the original recording quality. 

Extras are plentiful, starting off with an Audio Commentary with director Jeffrey Arsenault, which truthfully is more interesting than the feature, as he talks at length about the journey making the film, shooting a feature with a small crew and with limited resources. It's a track that ends up being very candid, and usually even when it's a film I don't care for that much, the stories behind it are usually pretty interesting.  

We also get a 4-min Interview with director Jeffrey Arsenault who talks about how the project came about, shooting on digital after shooting film for 18 years on Crimson Nights with DOP Scooter Mcrea (Shatter Dead), the idea for a two character vampire film modeled after what Roger Corman was doing, the location, the challenges of shooting on video, getting use to the technology, specifically using the Sony VX1000 who he was not happy with and never shot with again. The 11-min Interview with screenwriter Kevin J. Lindenmuth features the writer discussing how the director asked him to write a two person movie with minimal locations. He gets into how he  approaches writing his characters, there's talk of his own vampire movies, and his own unique twist on classic vampire mythology pertaining to the reincarnation and souls. He also talks about first encountering Arsenault at a horror convention, and how he went on to cameo in the Alien Agenda movies. 

Nextm is the 7-min Interview with actress Cynthia Polakovich who notes that this was her first film after doing some doing theater and off Broadway, memories of making another Arsenault film, Vampire Playmates, and being somewhat being typecast.  Interview with Basement Vampire actor Joe Zaso runs about 22-min, he talks about being cast, meeting Arsenault on the set of another film directed by Kevin Lindemuth, calling himself a 'Horror Himbo', the location at the home of Nathaniel Thompson, where he also shot his own film Machines of Love & Hate, comparing Arsenault to other directors he worked with, late-90s the erotic vampire sub-genre, and his memories of the switch to from film and tape to digital, 

Other extras include a 2-min Interview with Location Manager Nathan Thompson: Date With a Vampire Memories, a 6-min Buckingham Manor Location Video with Nathan Thompson, 2-min Image Gallery, and the 2-min Original Trailer. 

But wait, there's more, we get a Bonus Film: Blood Craving (2002, 29:37), also directed bY Arsenault, which features an Audio Commentary with director Jeffrey Arsenault, as well as a 2-min Interview with director Jeffrey Arsenault, 1-min Image Gallery. The last of the disc extras are a 3-min Original First Draft Trailers, 1-min Blood Craving Original Trailer, the 48-sec Blood Craving Visual Vengeance Trailer, 10-min After Midnight Entertainment: Trailer Reel, and a selection of vampire-heavy Visual Vengeance Trailers for Date with A Vampire, Vampire Playmates, Vampire's Embrace, Vampire Night.

Packaging includes a Reversible Wrap featuring artwork for both Sate With A Vampire and  Blood Craving, plus a Folded Mini-Poster with unique artwork, one of the 'Stick Your Own' VHS Sticker Set, plus a Limited Edition O-Card by Rick Melton. 

Special Features:

- Region Free Blu-ray

- SD master from original tape elements

- Audio Commentary with director Jeffrey Arsenault

- Interview with director Jeffrey Arsenault (3:32) 

- Interview with screenwriter Kevin J. Lindenmuth (11:04) 

- Interview with actress Cynthia Polakovich (7:09) 

- Interview with ‘Basement Vampire’ actor Joe Zaso (22:02)

- Location Manager Nathan Thompson: Date With a Vampire Memories (1:56) 

- Buckingham Manor Location Video with Nathan Thompson (6:03) 

- Image Gallery (2:38) 

- Original Trailer (1:35) 

- Bonus Film: Blood Craving (2002,29:37)

- Blood Craving Commentary with director Jeffrey Arsenault

- Blood Craving Interview with director Jeffrey Arsenault (2:21)

- Blood Craving Image Gallery (1:08)

- Blood Craving: Original First Draft Trailers (2:50)

-  Original Trailer (1:06) 

- Visual Vengeance Trailer (0:48)

- After Midnight Entertainment: Trailer Reel (10:12) 

- Visual Vengeance Trailers: (Date with A Vampire (0:54), Vampire Playmates (0:43), Vampire's Embrace (1:19), Vampire Night (1:18)

- Reversible Wrap featuring new Blood Craving art

- Folded Mini-Poster

- Limited Edition O-Card by Rick Melton (First-Pressing Only) 

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FUNGICIDE (2002) Visual Vengeance Collector's Edition Blu-ray Review + Screenshots

FUNGICIDE (2002) 

Visual Vengeance Collector's Edition Blu-ray 

Label: Visual Vengeance

Region Code: Region-Free 

Rating: Unrated 

Duration: 83 Minutes 26 Seconds 

Audio: English Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo with Optional English Subtitles 

Video: 1080i HD Fullscreen (1.33:1) 

Director: Dave Wascavage

Cast: David Weldon, Wes Miller, Mary Wascavage, Dave Bonavita, Dave Wascavage, Silas Purcell 

The zero-budget SOV comedy-horror Fungicide (2000) comes to us from Dave Wascavage, the director Suburban Sasquatch, the astonishingly cheap looking slice of homespun hilarity concerns a disparate group of people who converge at a isolated Pennsylvania bed-and-breakfast for some rest a relaxation only for that weekend to be disturbed by killer mushrooms. Among them we have professional wrestler Tony Ignitus (Dave Bonavita, Suburban Sasquatch) who suffers from anger-induced spontaneous combustion,  real estate developer douche-nozzle Jackson P. Jackson (Dave Wascavage, Head Case), TV reality show soldier Major Wang (Wes Miller,  Suburban Sasquatch), and a cackling mad scientist, Silas Purcell (David Weldon, Zombies By Design), plus the host of the bed and breakfast, the hippy-dippy psychic, new ager Jade Moon (Mary Wascavage, Tartarus). The problems start with the arrival of Silas, a full-tilt cackling mad scientist who accidentally spills a vial full of frothy serum that he's recently whipped up in his parent's basement, on the front porch upon arrival, which seeps into the soil and contaminates a cluster of mushrooms, which mutates them into carnivorous killer mushrooms that spread spores throughout the nearby forest, creating an army of killer shrooms, forcing the survivors to arm themselves and fight back!

Fungicide is a jaw-droppingly bad movie, a lo-fi cheesy shit-fest of the highest-caliber, a no-budget production chock full of wonderfully bad acting, with performances that careen wildly from under-cranked lethargy to delightfully over-the-top. The early '00 digital CGI renderings of killer mushrooms don't fare much better, these digital sequences feel like a bad acid trip. The killer shrooms achieved with practical effects look like they were made with shower curtains and trash can lids, they have toothy maws and range in height from a foot or so to human sized, even growing arms and hands so that they can battle the humans with martial arts and stick-fighting, it is a truly stupefying experience from start to finish. When the shrooms eat you we learn that they absorb your knowledge, and when they eat you they regurgitate your skeleton, and when the CGI created shrooms are attacked with weapons they blow up into shard of geometric shapes, it's a wild, wild watch. 

It's a cheapie from start to finish, the homespun quality of  feels like a group of friends were just fucking around with a video camera in their backyard, and somehow just happened to make a movie while doing it, which is pretty cool. It might sound awful, and it sort of is, but I have to say, I had a pretty great time watching this. It's so campy and over-the-top, I admired how stunningly bereft of production value it is, the large butcher knife the reality TV soldier carries around with him is obviously a Dollar General Halloween prop, the damn blade looks about an inch thick with rounded edges, and the way the shrooms are brought to life both practically and digitally is hilariously cheap, its bad by design. This easily could have been an unwatchable shit-show, the saving grace is that director Dave Wascavage and his small cast of friends and family all knew exactly the sort of film they were making,  and they went for it, but it never tries to be more than what it is, they know it's silly shit, and they lean into the silliness full force, playing into the camp and cheapness of it, to maximum absurd effect. It's not a good movie, but it does kick total fung-ass!

Audio/Video: The film is presented on Blu-ray in 1080i HD framed in the original 1.33:1 fullscreen aspect ratio, sourced director-approved SD master from original tape elements. Audio comes by way of English Dolby Digital 2.0 stereo with optional English subtitles. It looks and sounds what you would expect an early '00 shot-in-video with consumer grade cameras should and would look like, check out the screenshots below, they're indicative of what to expect. 

Visual Vengeance once more go above and beyond for this shot-on-video oddity, they truly are the Criterion of crud, with an impressive array of extras. We get four audio commentaries, the full 73-min Rifftrax Version of Fungicide, as well as 3-min Alternate Opening Credits, 7-min of Deleted Scene and Outtakes, a expansive 7-min Image Gallery, an 8-min Troubled Moon Trailer Reel, 2-min Fungicide - Producer Trailer, the 1-min Fungicide - Visual Vengeance Trailer, plus 3-min of Visual Vengeance Trailers. 

Visual Vengeance packaging is top-notch, we get a Reversible Wrap featuring the original home video artwork. Inside there's a Folded Mini-Poster, one of the patented Visual Vengeance ‘Stick Your Own’ VHS Sticker Set. The first-pressing also includes a Limited Edition Slipcover, which looks like it cost much more than the actual film it promotes, plus 'Grow Your Own Killer Mushroom' Seed Packet, which is just a next level bit of movie ephemera - you don't see Criterion stuffing their releases with mushrooms spores, shame on them. 

Special Features: 

- Director-approved SD master from original tape elements

- New commentary from director Dave Wascavage and co-writer/co-prodcuer Mary Wascavage

- Archival commentary with Dave Wascavage, Mary Wascavage and David Weldon

- Commentary from Sam Panico of B&S About Movies and Bill Van Ryn of Drive-In Asylum

- Commentary from Schlock And Awe Films

- The full RIFFTRAX version of Fungicide (72:52) 

- Alternate opening credits (2:38) 

- Deleted Scene (1:28).

- Outtakes (5:14) 

- Image Gallery (6:55) 

- Troubled Moon Trailer Reel (7:55) 

- Fungicide - Producer Trailer (1:39) 

- Fungicide - Visual Vengeance Trailer (0:53) 

- Visual Vengeance Trailers: Saurians (1:12), ReAnimator University (1:08), Suburban Sasquatch (1:00)

- Reversible sleeve featuring original home video art

- Folded mini-poster

- ‘Stick Your Own’ VHS sticker set - FIRST PRESSING ONLY

- Limited Edition O-Card - FIRST PRESSING ONLY

- Limited Edition 'Grow Your Own Killer Mushroom' seed packet - FIRST PRESSING ONLY

Screenshots from the Visual Vengeance Blu-ray: 

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BRUTE CORPS (1971) Dark Force Entertainment 4K Ultra HD Review

BRUTE CORPS (1971) 

Label: Dark Force Entertainment

Region Code: Region-Free 

Rating: R

Duration: 87 Minutes 41 Seconds 

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

Video: HDR10 2160p 4K Ultra HD Widescreen (1.78:1) 

Director: Jerry Jameson 

Cast: Paul Carr, Joseph Kaufman, Alex Rocco, Jennifer Billinglsy 

Brute Corpse (1971) is directed by Jerry Jameson (The Bat People), a low budget exploitation cheapie wherein a  hitchhiking draft dodger named Kevin (Joseph Kaufmann, (Private Duty Nurses) is thumbing his way through Mexico when he teams up with  free-spirited hippie hitcher named Terry (Jennifer Billingsley (Lady In A Cage). They have the bad luck of crossing paths with a hardened group of America mercenaries travelling through Mexico on their way to a job in Central America. The soldiers-for-hire calls themselves Burckhardt's Bastards, and are lead by Colonel Burckhardt (Charles Macaulay, Three O'clock High, Blacula), who lets his cadre of savage and sadistic trained killers do whatever they want, to whomever they want. At the start of the film they encounter a gang of rowdy motorcyclists tuffs at a roadside gas station, when the gang pester the soldier Quin (Roy Jenson, Chinatown) he responds by cold-bloodedly blowing them away with a shotgun. They next stop off in a small Mexican village where the most demented among them, Wicks (Alex Rocco, Motorpsycho) attempts to purchase the daughter of the local barkeeper, the scoundrel getting rather indignant when the protective father refuses, his refusal nearly costing him his life. The other mercs include the bearded MacFarlane (Michael Pataki, Graduation Day), black soldier Hill (Felton Perry, RoboCop Trilogy), Ballard (Parker West, Lemora: A Child's Tale of the Supernatural), and the second in command, Ross (Paul Carr, Ben), who is the only one who is turned off by the group's violence and lawlessness, his growing conscience slowly eroding his loyalties to Col. Burckhardt and putting him at odd with his fellow mercs.

When the mercs encounter the hitchhiking duo they invite them into their makeshift encampment inside a rock quarry and initially play nice, offering them food and conversation, before a bit of rough housing and vulgar flirtation evolves into the men attacking and tying up Kevin, with the idea of raping Terri. As the men get increasingly horny and argue over who gets first dibs on the girl. As temperatures rise and the Col. decides that the men will have to fight it out amongst to see who gets to rape her first, leading to some brutal in-fighting. While the savage mercs are distracted Kevin manages to slip away and sneak into the nearby town where the Sheriff Alvarez (Joseph Bernard, The Baby) and the old men who populate the town turn out to be cowards who don't want to get involved. With few options left the draft-dodger takes matters into his own hands, facing off against the elite killing squad, with the help of a sympathetic Ross, who can no longer quietly stand by and do nothing. 

The cast of this cheap vetsploitation flick is well above the film's weight class, the barebones set-up of of it are pretty interesting but it does sort of fritter away the more exploitative and sharper edged exploitation elements. Alex Rocco as the super-sleazy mercenary is still a good time though, the hitchhiking hippie duo have some good chemistry, and I love the turn of events at the end. Sure, its not gonna top anyone's list of best exploitation films ever made, but a good time is a good time, and with a cast like this, you know it's gonna get the job done, and it does, so I still give this early 70's slice of drive-in sleaze a recommend. 

Audio/Video: Brute Corps was previously issued by Code red back in 2016 sourced from the interpositive, and while I never saw that release I was fairly impressed with it in 4K, sourced from what is advertised as a new 4K restoration from original 35m interpositive, presented in 2160p UHD, framed in 1.85:1 widescreen, with HDR WGC color-grading. The source looks terrific, grain is well-managed if a bit course, it's not as refined as if it would have been sourced from the OCN, but looking terrific, nonetheless. The image is stable and offers plenty of sweaty detail in the close-ups of faces and clothing, the HDR color grade us used tastefully, nothing egregiously hot or hyper-vivid, but the greenery of forests, the merc's uniforms and earthy dirt and grime look natural and nicely suffuse, clothing worn by our hitchhikers, the dude's red button-up and her yellow fringe, cropped halter top also look quite good, making the Michael D. Margulies (The Baby, Crazy Mary Dirty Larry) raw cinematography look pretty good. Audio comes by way of English DTS-HD MA 2.0 dual-mono with optional English subtitles, the track is in solid shape, clean and largely free of hiss, dialogue is prioritized nicely. The score by Jack Walker is pretty decent, if ill-suited for this, it didn;t feel like an exploitation score, it was a little too cool for what this is supposed to be. 

No new extras for this release, but Dark Force Entertainment do carry over most of the extras that were present on the previous Code red DVD and Blu-ray releases. We start off with Audio Commentary with Writer/Producer Michael Kars who gives a solid account of the making of the film, how it started out as a knock-off of the biker film The Rebel Rousers (1970), location scouting, casting, production issues and plenty more. We also get a 33-min Archival On-Camera Interview with Co-Stars Felton Perry and Parker West, interviewed separately. Felton perry recalls memories of being cast and the shoot, remembering co-star Paul Karr as passionate actor,  and how Michael Pataki was upbeat and fun, Charles Macaulay had a way of speaking that was commanding. He also relates a funny story of the older Roy Jenson was quite fit and put him to shame during a friendly jog, which inspired him to get back into shape. He says that Paker West was very cool, they a good relationship on-set, joking around, and getting into their fight sequences. He also remembers Jennifer Billingsley and director Jerry Jameson, before offering a bit of career retrospective,  including his memories of shooting Trouble Man (1970), Magnum Force (1973) as Eastwood's doomed partner, doing nudity in Night Call Nurses (1972), Walking Tall (1977) with Jo Don Baker, Sudden Death (1977), and his recurring role in the Robocop flicks. Parker West gets  into how he landed the role, originally going for the lead role but at that time he did not want to do nudity, the origin of the director's nickname of "Two-shot" Jameson nickname, and memories of Paul Carr. He also talks about how Charles Macaulay was authoritative, becoming buddies with Perry on set, and memories of Jenson, Rocco, Kaufman, Billingsley, while noting that he thought of Michael Pataki as a "poor man's Richard Burton", and how in a strange turn of events Pataki was dating the sister of a girl he had previously dated. He also speaks of his way of creating his own character, playing him as Southern, the backstory he came up with for the character, as well as almost dying on the set during the filming of one of the troop carrier scenes when a camera came flying at them.  He also brings up memories of shooting Lemora: A Child's Tale of the Supernatural, his TV and theater work, as well as his improv comedy and stand-up career, and noting the last movie he went out for was Benjamin Buttons, auditioning for the role of Brad Pitt's older body double. Not carried over from previous release are a Trailer, TV Spot, and the 'Katarina's Bucketlist Mode' introduction featuring hostess Katarina Leigh Waters that accompanied the Code Red Blu-ray. 

The single-disc release arrives in a black keepcase with a single sided sleeve of artwork featuring the original illustrated movie poster, which is also replicated in the disc itself. The back of the wrap features a separate illustrated movie poster artwork.  

Special Features:

- Brand new 4K restoration anamorphic widescreen 16x9 master from original 35m IP

- Archival Audio Commentary with Writer/Producer Michael Kars

- Archival On-Camera Interview with Co-Stars Felton Perry and Parker West (31:33)

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