DEAD & BURIED (1981)
3-Disc Limited Edition 4K UltraHD + Blu-ray + CD
Label: Blue Underground
Release Date: July 20th, 2021Region Code: Region-Free
Rating: R
Duration: 94 Minutes
Audio: English Dolby Atmos; English 5.1 DTS-HD MA; English 1.0 DTS-HD MA; French 1.0 DTS-HD MA with Optional English SDH, Français, Español Subtitles
Video: 2160p UHD Widescreen (1.85:1), 1080p HD Widescreen (1.85:1)
Director: Gary A. Sherman
Cast: James Farentino, Melody Anderson, Jack Albertson, Lisa Blount, Robert Englund
Directed by Gary Sherman (Raw Meat) with a script by Dan O'Bannon (Alien) and and Ronald Shusett (The Final Terror) the early 80's cult-classic Dead & Buried (1981) is a sort of unsung gem of melancholic small town horror. Set in the sleepy coastal village of Potters Bluff, a seemingly idyllic coastal town steeped in fog and the smell of the briny sea, a place that has a lot of old world charm. It's also a place where out-of-towners and wayfaring strangers are warmly welcomed, just before they're horrifical murdered, just ask weekend photographer Freddie (Christopher Allport, Invaders From Mars), who arrives early one morning to take pictures of the ocean. While doing so he encounters a knockout blonde named Lisa (a never sexier Lisa Blount, Prince of Darkness) who seduces him, only to have her and a group of villagers beat him to bloody pulp, throw a fishing net over him, douse him in gas and then set him on fire, all the while they're creepily photographing and recording his death on super-8!
Later his body is staged inside his VW split-window van and staged to look like an fiery accident. On the scene of the accident is dutiful Sheriff Dan Gillis (James Farentino, The Final Countdown) and an eccentric mortician/coroner (Jack Albertson, Uncle Joe from Willy Wonka & The Chocolate Factory). Against the odds the man has somehow survived, and regains consciousness at the crime scene; screaming in pain. Afterward he is sent to the hospital with disfiguring
third-degree burns over his entire body, covered from head to toe in gauze bandages. Later he is visited once again by lovely femme fatale Lisa, who slips into his hospital room dressed as a nurse, jamming a syringe needle into his eye, killing him!
What follows are more newcomers arriving in Potter's Bluff and being slain by the usually very friendly citizens of the village. Future murder victims include a drunken hobo on the boat docks, a young hitchhiker, and a family of three looking for gas and lodging, all of whom meet their grisly fate in similar fashion, photographed while being brutally murdered, their dying moments caught on film. Not everyone seems to be in on the bizarre community murder spree, certainly not the sheriff, who is beginning to lose his mind with the sudden abundance of grisly murders plaguing his quaint little seaside village.
Gillis's wife Melody Anderson (Firewalker) is a sweetheart, but even she seems to be acting a bit strangely, her husband is shocked when he finds her teaching witchcraft to her grade school teachers, and she seems to have a habit of disappearing for spans of time that cannot be accounted for. Furthermore, it seems that some of the murder victims are reappearing back among the living, taking their place among the residents of the increasingly eerie coastal community, without explanation, leaving Sheriff Gillis and us viewers to ask "What the fuck is happening in Potter's Bluff?".
Gillis's wife Melody Anderson (Firewalker) is a sweetheart, but even she seems to be acting a bit strangely, her husband is shocked when he finds her teaching witchcraft to her grade school teachers, and she seems to have a habit of disappearing for spans of time that cannot be accounted for. Furthermore, it seems that some of the murder victims are reappearing back among the living, taking their place among the residents of the increasingly eerie coastal community, without explanation, leaving Sheriff Gillis and us viewers to ask "What the fuck is happening in Potter's Bluff?".
I first saw Dead & Buried on VHS more years ago than I'd care to remember, rented from a mom & pop video store in the village of Ovid, New York. I found myself entranced by the artwork, featuring a moonlit porcelain face of a cadaver peering out from what looks to be a salt flat, with the tagline "The creators of Alien bring a new to terror to Earth" followed by "It will take your breath away. All of it". The whole thing was quite ambiguous and cryptic, I had no expectation of what I was in store for, and when I watched it I found it so mesmerizing and atmospheric. Small town terror has always appealed to me, I come from a small town and could easily transpose Potter's Bluff for my home town, which made it all the more creepy. I felt the same way when I read Stephen King's short story The Mist, at the time I lived directly across the street from a grocery store, and when I read the book out on the front porch I would imagine it all happening at that store right across the street! Anyway, Dead & Buried was dripping with atmosphere and small town menace, and it was pretty damn grisly, too! The special effects in the film come by way of Oscar-winner Stan Winston (Pumpkinhead), and they were pretty great; we have the gnarly burn victim, a visceral face and throat laceration, and some disfiguring facial trauma followed by a cool facial reconstruction at the mortuary. The one effect that is a bit of a sore thumb is a local scientist who has acid pumped into his sinus cavity, that one is grisly but it's always looked a bit rubbery, and the increased 4K resolution certainly does not improve it, but the rest of the special effects and make-up is quite solid,
Another kick in the pants for me was seeing Jack Albertson, aka Uncle Joe from Willy Wonka & The Chocolate Factory, here as the eccentric mortician/coroner. A guy who truly throws himself into the reconstruction of the cadavers that end up on his slab, but he gets into way too much! Of course the coroner figures heavily into what's transpiring around Potter's Bluff, and he's sort of the Wizard of Oz man-behind-the-curtain pulling the strings of the entire community in a way that I still find chillingly macabre. One of my favorite scenes is when the sheriff's wife has a Bride of Frankenstein "We belong dead" sort of realization that also smacks a bit of Bob Clark's fantastic small town chiller Deathdream (1974), all this sort of stuff is a sweet spot for me, I am so into low-key small-town terror and this one is a minor classic of the sub-genre.
The film was shot by cinematographer Steven Poster (Donnie Darko) whose diffused style is soft and dreamy, or perhaps nightmarish in this instance, and it works to create and unsettling visual vibe that stand out, the same of which can be said of Donnie Darko. The spine-tingling score from Joe Renzetti (The Exterminator) ratchets up the creep-factor and suspense with taught strings and ominous piano orchestrations that accentuate the macabre underpinnings of the film.
Audio/Video: Dead * Buried (1981) arrives on 3-disc Limited Edition offering both 2160p UHD and 1080p HD widescreen 1.85:1 presentations, sourced from a brand new 2021 4K 16-bit scan of the 35mm IP, it's an eye-popping new restoration supervised by the film's Director of Photography Steven Poster, ASC (The New Kids). This is a film I have watched on VHS, DVD and Blu-ray several times over and this new 4K scan is absolutely gorgeous, for starters the grain field is more organic looking. The previous 2009 Blu-ray from BU had some ugly digital artifacts, banding and visible edge enhancement, and struggling to resolve the murky low-light, soft-focus cinematography. The new scan in both 2160p UHD and 1080p HD are impressive, gone are the artifacts and banding, and the heavy grain texture looks terrific, still heavy, but organic and fluid. Thanks in part to the new Dolby Vision HDR expanded color-grading the blacks are much deeper and more nuanced, skin tones are warmer and more life like (which admittedly could be considered ironic with this film), and the whites are truer without the yellowing evident on the previous HD release, and also now properly framed in the correct 1.85:1. It's worth noting, just to set expectations, that Dead & Buried was shot with a softer diffused lensing, so it is never going to be a crisp, razor sharp film with the depth and clarity of a newer movie, but with that said, this is wonderfully organic and textured restoration. The screenshots and comparison at the bottom of the review are sourced from the Blu-ray without the benefit of the Dolby Vision HDR, and while they look fantastic, the UHD is appreciably superior even to those.
Audio on the discs comes by way of English Dolby Atmos; English 5.1 DTS-HD MA; English 1.0 DTS-HD MA; and French 1.0 DTS-HD MA with optional English SDH, Français, Español subtitles. The Atmos tracks opens up the sound field quite nicely without sounding exaggerated and stretched thin. There's a sense of distance and space, and dialogue
Audio on the discs comes by way of English Dolby Atmos; English 5.1 DTS-HD MA; English 1.0 DTS-HD MA; and French 1.0 DTS-HD MA with optional English SDH, Français, Español subtitles. The Atmos tracks opens up the sound field quite nicely without sounding exaggerated and stretched thin. There's a sense of distance and space, and dialogue
indoors and out sound accurate to the setting and location. It's the terrific score from Joe Renzetti that benefits the most from the Atmos upgrade though, the ominous score is filled with strings and piano orchestrations that increase the tension and add an additional layer of fright, I only wish it was available as an Atmos isolated track on the disc. As usual I preferred the original English DTS-HD MA mono 1.0 audio, there's just something about these cult-classics that I think comes across better in mono to my ears, I like the vintage sound.
Onto the extras Blue Underground carry-over all the extras from their previous releases; this includes a trio of audio commentaries; the first from Director Gary Sherman, a second with Co-Writer/Co-Producer Ronald Shusett and Actress Linda Turley, and a third with Director of Photography Steven Poster, ASC which gets deep into the process of how things were filmed. We also get a trio of fantastic archival interviews; the first is the 19-minute interview with the late Stan Winston's Dead & Buried EFX, then the 12-minute Robert Englund: An Early Work of Horror, and the 14-minut Dan O'Bannon: Crafting Fear, plus we get 5-minutes of HD Theatrical Trailers.
Blue Underground sweeten the deal with a host of new extras beginning a brand new commentary from Film Historians Troy Howarth and Nathaniel Thompson. These guys are a commentary dream team, it's a great listen as the guys touch on every facet of the film you could ever hope for including the production, the cast and crew, and it's status as a cult-classic. There's also 33-minutes of vintage behind-the-scenes super-8 footage with commentary from Gary Sherman and others.
Also new is the 4-minute Dead & Buried Locations: Now & Then that compares locations shot for the film back compared to how they look now, with locations in Mendocino and Los Angeles, California. Director Gary Sherman and Composer Joe Renzetti sit down for the 15-minute Murders, Mystery, and Music, discussing their debut collaborative effort, how they approached the score, the decision to include big band music, and how certain scenes were scored. The last of the new interviews is the 13-minute The Pages of Potters Bluff, an interview with novelization Author Chelsea Quinn Yarbro who adapted the film into novel form. A great addition, and one I would love to see other labels carry foreword. She gets into her process, how she tackles film novelizations in writing versus what you see on screen, and how her name stood on it's own and sold a few copies of the book separate from the movie, which did not come out for months after the paperback's release.
The video disc extras are buttoned up with eight (eight!) Poster and Still Galleries that includes advertising materials, the Japanese souvenir program, lobby cards, stills, Stan Winston's FX, video & book releases, and DP Steven Poster’s location stills. This is an exhaustive release from top to bottom, from the exceptional A/V presentation down to the no-stone-left-unturned set of extras, both new and archival. The extras are mirrored on the accompanying Blu-ray, which also features the new scan in 1080p HD, and also benefits from the Dolby Atmos audio upgrade.
The 3-disc limited edition arrives in a clear Scanavo Criterion-style keepcase that houses the three discs on three separate hubs. We also get a reversible wrap that features both the original illustrated artwork, which is fantastic, and an alternate artwork. Like with their release of Lucio Fulci's Zombie (1979); Blue Underground are offering 3 different artwork options to choose from when you order from retailers like Amazon and Diabolik DVD. You can get the original artwork 'Poster', or 'Burned' and 'Needle'. Inside there's a 20-page illustrated collector's booklet with writing by former Fangoria editor Michael Gingold who has done a ton of these Blue Underground UHD releases, and they're all terrific reads. This time around Gingold frames his writing on this unsung film in the context of telling the story of the sort of unsung distributor Avco Embassy Pictures, and it's a fascinating story. The booklet also contains cast and crew credits, CD soundtrack info and track list and chapter selection for the film. I love these oversized keepcases with slipcovers, the Dead & Buried logo looks fantastic on the spine in big bold orange/yellow lettering, and the release has a nice weight to it when you hold it in your hands.
ALTERNATE SLIPCOVER - COVER A 'POSTER'
ALTERNATE SLIPCOVER - COVER C 'NEEDLE'
Special Features:
- Audio Commentary #1 with Director Gary Sherman
- Audio Commentary #2 with Co-Writer/Co-Producer Ronald Shusett and Actress Linda Turley
- Audio Commentary #3 with Director of Photography Steven Poster, ASC
- NEW! Audio Commentary #4 with Film Historians Troy Howarth and Nathaniel Thompson
- NEW! Behind the Scenes of Dead & Buried with Commentary (33 min) HD
- NEW! Dead & Buried Locations: Now & Then (4 min) HD
- NEW! Murders, Mystery, and Music - Interviews with Director Gary Sherman and Composer Joe Renzetti (15 min) HD
- NEW! The Pages of Potters Bluff - Interview with Novelization Author Chelsea Quinn Yarbro (13 min) HD
- Stan Winston's Dead & Buried EFX (18 min) HD
- Robert Englund: An Early Work of Horror (12 min) HD
- Dan O'Bannon: Crafting Fear (14 min) HD
- Theatrical Trailers (5 min) HD
- NEW! Poster & Still Galleries: Posters, Advertising Materials, Japanese Souvenir Program, Lobby Cards, Stills, Stan Winston's FX, Video & Book, Steven Poster’s Location Stills
- BONUS! Dead & Buried Original Motion Picture Soundtrack CD by Joe Renzetti (17 Tracks, 44 mins)
- BONUS! 20-Page Collectible Booklet with new essay by Michael Gingold
- Audio Commentary #1 with Director Gary Sherman
- Audio Commentary #2 with Co-Writer/Co-Producer Ronald Shusett and Actress Linda Turley
- Audio Commentary #3 with Director of Photography Steven Poster, ASC
- NEW! Audio Commentary #4 with Film Historians Troy Howarth and Nathaniel Thompson
- NEW! Behind the Scenes of Dead & Buried with Commentary (33 min) HD
- NEW! Dead & Buried Locations: Now & Then (4 min) HD
- NEW! Murders, Mystery, and Music - Interviews with Director Gary Sherman and Composer Joe Renzetti (15 min) HD
- NEW! The Pages of Potters Bluff - Interview with Novelization Author Chelsea Quinn Yarbro (13 min) HD
- Stan Winston's Dead & Buried EFX (18 min) HD
- Robert Englund: An Early Work of Horror (12 min) HD
- Dan O'Bannon: Crafting Fear (14 min) HD
- Theatrical Trailers (5 min) HD
- NEW! Poster & Still Galleries: Posters, Advertising Materials, Japanese Souvenir Program, Lobby Cards, Stills, Stan Winston's FX, Video & Book, Steven Poster’s Location Stills
- BONUS! Dead & Buried Original Motion Picture Soundtrack CD by Joe Renzetti (17 Tracks, 44 mins)
- BONUS! 20-Page Collectible Booklet with new essay by Michael Gingold
Dead & Buried (1981) is a terrific slice of small town terror that gets under the skin with it's blend of macabre sea side atmosphere, dark humor, and some shockingly grisly murders set-pieces. This high-caliber cult-classic is long overdue for re-appraisal and some love and appreciation from the broader horror community, and this stunning 4K UHD presentation from Blue Underground is absolutely the way to see it, highly recommended.
Screenshot Comparison:
Top: Blue Underground Blu-ray (2009)
Bottom: Blue Underground Blu-ray (2021)
More Screenshots from the
2021 Blue Underground Blu-ray:
Extras:
