THE BROTHERHOOD OF SATAN (1971)
Label: Arrow Video
Duration: 92 Minutes
Rating: PG
Region Code: A
Audio: English PCM 2.0 Mono with Optional English Subtitles
Video: 1080p HD Widescreen (2.40:1)
Director: Bernard McEveety
Cast: Strother Martin, L.Q. Jones, Charles Bateman, Ahna Capri
While not a William Castle production Bernard McEveety's The Brotherhood of Satan (1971) certainly owes a tip of the hat to the William Castle produced and Roman Polanski directed Rosemary's Baby (1968). It's a sweet slice of Satanic paranoia from producer L.Q. Jones who acted in many films including Martin Scorsese's Casino (1995) as well as producing and directing a few of his own, most notably the post-apocalyptic cult-classic A Boy and His Dog (1975) featuring a very young Don Johnson (Django) and a telepathic dog traversing the wastelands, which I highly recommend!
The film begins with a scene that sorta blurs the lines between reality and fiction as a bratty kid playing with a toy tank seemingly crushes and entire family in their station wagon. Then we're onto a family outing in the desert with father Ben Holden (prolific TV actor Charles Bateman), his annoying daughter K.T. (Geri Reisch, I Dismember Mama), and his Ben's girlfriend Nicky (Ahna Capri, Enter the Dragon). They're on the road when they come across a mangled car wreck, and they do what pretty much anyone would, and drive into the nearest town, Hillsboro, to alert the authorities. However, when they arrive the entire town is in a state of pure panic and paranoia, even the town Sheriff (L.Q. Jones, The Ballad of Cable Hogue) treats the family unusually hostile. Then a man attacks Ben with an ax screaming "You took them from me!" and the family just barely escape the mob with their skulls intact. While driving down the road to find another more sane town Ben swerves to avoid striking the a young girl who appears in the middle of the road which causes the car to breakdown. Now stranded on the side of the road as the noonday sun beats down upon them they have few choices left other than to head back to the town of Hillsboro.
Returning they find things are a bit less hostile but just as weird, and things only get weirder the longer they're there, discovering that the people in town are freaked because of a series of gruesome murders and the disappearance of eleven young children. Ben teams-ups with Sheriff, his Deputy (Alvy Moore, Intruder), the village's priest (Charles Robinson, Death Wish 4: The Crackdown) and the town doc Mr. Duncan (Strother Martin, Sssssss) to get to the bottom of the murders and the mysterious disappearance of the children. Spoilers ahead, if you've seen any of the trailers for this film, you already know that a satanic cult is committing the ritualistic murders and turning the town's tots into Satanic occultists in an attempt to gain unholy immortality!
This is junk food cinema for me, I love it, Strother Martin is fantastically entertaining as the feisty cult leader, he's just maniacal and chewing up the scenery while leading a group of satanic senior citizens who are hellbent on immortality in services the the Dark Lord. The flick is drenched in great 70's atmosphere and there's a ton of blood and dismemberment - with one victim clawed to death like skinned rabbit tossed into a rabid chicken pen, and it's pretty grotesque for PG rating! This schlocky Satanic nightmare is peppered with murderous children, creepy killer dolls, and spooky woods that ooze fog, this was quite the occult production with some great set pieces.
The finale is satanic-panic nirvana and totally unhinged in all the right ways as the cult gather in an overly dramatically decorated underground tomb to perform their unholy ritual with a diabolically over-the top incantation that starts off with "Greetings Dear One, 'Tis We!", intoned by Strother Martin who is clearly loving this over-the-top role. Perhaps only Burgess Meredith himself could have outdone Martin's elderly satanic MC, it's a fantastic watch and the only thing that irked me a little bit was Geri Reisch, who was quite an annoying child actor, maybe not on par with Bob from Fulci's The House By The Cemetery, but pretty annoying.
Audio/Video: The Brotherhood of Satan arrives on Blu-ray from Arrow Video in 1080p HD framed in 2.40:1 widescreen. To my eyes this looks to be the same HD scan provided to Mill Creek Entertainment by Sony back in 2013 for their double-feature with Mr. Sardonicus, and later in 2017 as a triple-feature with Torture Garden and The Creeping Flesh. It's a pleasing mage, the heavy grain appears natural throughout, and the colors and skin tones colors are pleasing, with solid black levels. Grain can appear heavier in the darker scenes, and there are vertical scratched and other blemishes that appear throughout, which are identical to the Mill Creek Entertainment releases. Arrow's release however is not crammed onto a disc with one or two other films like the MCE releases, though. Arrow offer a stronger encode which allows for marginally tighter grain and details that are free of black crush, but I am hard-pressed to see a huge difference between the two presentations, with colors and framing being virtually identical.
Arrow upgrade audio with an uncompressed English PCM 2.0 mono with Optional English subtitles. Dialogue sounds very good with a nice directness to it, and the score from
Jaime Mendoza-Nava (Mausoleum) also sounds great.
Where Arrow advances big time over previous editions are in the extras department. We begin with a fun, conversational audio commentary with UK film-writers Kim Newman and Sean Hogan who offer up plenty of Satanic Panic 70's era bits of film knowledge, and laying on plenty of love for this well-crafted film. We also get an 15-minute video essay Satanic Panic: How the 1970s Conjured the Brotherhood of Satan by David Flint, and the 18-minute The Children of Satan, an interview with actors Jonathan Erickson Eisley and Alyson Moore who played two of the kids. They tell how they ended up cast in the film and their experiences on set. The disc is buttoned-up with a 2-minute of Theatrical Trailer, 2-minutes of TV Spots, and 2-minutes of Radio Spots, plus an Image Gallery of lobby cards and promotional images.
Special Features:
- Brand new audio commentary by writers Kim Newman and Sean Hogan
- Satanic Panic: How the 1970s Conjured the Brotherhood of Satan, a brand new visual essay by David Flint (15 min) HD
-The Children of Satan, exclusive new interview with actors Jonathan Erickson Eisley and Alyson Moore (18 min) HD
- Original Trailer (2 min) HD
- Brand new audio commentary by writers Kim Newman and Sean Hogan
- Satanic Panic: How the 1970s Conjured the Brotherhood of Satan, a brand new visual essay by David Flint (15 min) HD
-The Children of Satan, exclusive new interview with actors Jonathan Erickson Eisley and Alyson Moore (18 min) HD
- Original Trailer (2 min) HD
- TV Spots (2 min) HD
- Radio Spots (1 min) HD
- Image Gallery
- Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Richard Wells
- FIRST PRESSING ONLY: Illustrated booklet featuring new writing by Johnny Mains and Brad Stevens
- Image Gallery
- Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Richard Wells
- FIRST PRESSING ONLY: Illustrated booklet featuring new writing by Johnny Mains and Brad Stevens
The Brotherhood of Satan (1971) is a fantastic bit of satanic cinema from the seventies, it's a well-shot and interesting story of small town devilry. If you're a fan of stuff like The Devil's Rain (1975) and Race with the Devil (1975), both of which came out a few years after this gem, I know you're gonna love it. The Arrow disc doesn't offer a new scan of the film but the uncompressed audio, new extras and packaging make this an easy upgrade if you're a fan of extras and packaging.
Screenshot Comparison:
Top: Mill Creek Entertainment Blu-ray (2017)
Bottom: Arrow Video Blu-ray (2021)
Extras:
