MCBASTARD'S MAUSOLEUM: OZONE: ATTACK OF THE REDNECK MUTANTS (1986) Visual Vengeance Collector's Edition Blu-ray Review + Screenshots

OZONE: ATTACK OF THE REDNECK MUTANTS (1986)

Visual Vengeance Collector's Edition

Label: Visual Vengeance

Region Code: Region-Free

Rating: Unrated

Duration: 94 Minutes 12 Seconds

Audio: English Dolby Digital 2.0 with Optional English Subtitles

Video: 1080i HD Fullscreen (1:33:1)

Director: Matt Devlin

Cast: Scott Davis, Blue Thompson, Brad McCormick, Janice Williams, Barbara Dow

In the no-budget schlocker Ozone: Attack of the Redneck Mutants (1986), directed by Matt Devlin (The Invisible Maniac), a toxic chemical spill tears open a hole in the ozone layer above the rural Texas town of Pooleville, mutating the locals into slime-drooling ghouls hungry for flesh. The film opens with a farmer out in a field on his tractor who suddenly starts spewing green-goo, turning into apizza-faced puss-bag with a taste for flesh. The film starts off a bit slow after that, introducing the various characters, establishing that others in Pooleville are also being affected and transforming into mutant flesh-eaters. Enter into this equation an environmental science student Arlene (Blue Thompson, The Abomination) and pesky hitchhiker Kevin (Scott Davis, Necessary Roughness) arrive in the area to investigate the environmental effects of the chemical spill, and find themselves under attack by the mutated locals. When their vehicle is attacked and they are trapped inside they CB radio for help, attracting the attention of unaffected local named Wade (Brad McCormick, The Abomination), with the promise for a sexy good time, who manages to rescue them and take them back to his mother Ruby's (Janice Williams, Tabloid) house, and she's a spark plug, we get an earlier scene of her chasing a chicken around the house so she can lop off it's head for dinner, and she's handy with a shotgun. There's an extended scene when Wade and Kevin get into a tussle, during which they hurl insults back and forth with fun redneck, verbiage like "I'm gonna kick your goat-smellin' ass boy!", "you shit-suckin' slime", and being the 80's you know there's some "you homo" style slurs thrown in there, too. The finale then moves to a dilapidated general Store where the mutated slime-drooling ghouls interrupt a karaoke session attended by a handful of locals, where carnage ensues.

This one is super low-budget and the acting is pretty amateurish, but when the gore kicks in its plenty grotesque, there's lots of green foamy vomit , yellow pus, and buckets of blood and gore, we get eyeballs trauma, tearing of flesh, gut-munching, and even a scalping. There's more than enough carnage here to satisfy any red-blood Romero/Fulci fan, that is if they stomach the no-budget/amateur aesthetic of it all.

This Super-8 splatter oddity is a sort of sister film to Bret McCormick's The Abomination (1986), having been shot directly after it with many of the same cast and locations, it's been scarce since it's only release was a very limited VHS release in the late '80s, but now here it is, available for the first time on Blu-ray with tons of extras from Visual Vengeance, a sub-label of Wild Eye Releasing.

Audio/Video: Ozone: Attack of the Redneck Mutants (1986) gets region-free Blu-ray from Wild Eye releasing as part of the Visual Vengeance imprint, presented in 1080i HD, framed in the original 1.33:1 fullscreen aspect ratio, representing a new director-approved SD master from original tape elements. This low-budget slice of goopy trash was originally shot on Super 8 film and then edited on SD video, the result on disc is pretty good quality for is essentially SOV, I have always thought the SOVs that were shot on film and then transferred and edit on film tended to look better, slightly less murky and smeary, and that holds true. I mean it still looks like a fried turd VHS image, but colors are pleasing enough, but of course being SOV depth, clarity and black levels are wanting, but mirroring the the video it's not perfection but the compressed audio does the job, the range is limited, but the post-dubbed dialogue is intelligible and the low-rent synth score, which has a couple of tasty Goblin-esque moments, sounds fine.

Visual Vengeance continue to do their Criterion-worthy work by offering boat loads of extras on their releases, starting off with an two commentary tracks, first an Audio Commentary with producer Bret McCormick and star Blue Thompson, and a second Audio Commentary with Sam Panico of B&S About Movies and Bill Van Ryn of Drive-In Asylum.

Next, a 10-min Actress Blue Thompson Interview, she gets into shooting right after The Abomination, her larger role, in this film playing the granny zombie, the differences in being directed by Matt Devlin vs Bret McCormick, working found items like a dead cow into scenes, liking Ozone over Abomination, enjoying her time with working with actor Scott Davis, and differences in her characters roles on Abomination vs Ozone. She also speaks of how great the people of Poolville were, getting to help with the effects like the pulsating tumors, and working with real animal guts, which she doesn't think the actors who were sticking it in their mouths! This one is stacked with interviews, we also get the 9-min Director Matt Devlen – Cinema Wasteland Interview, he talks about making three movies with Brett McCormick, how his own mother started Muther Video after the distribution and payment issues with their first film Tabloid, and the scarcity of the film, an 11-min Director Matt Devlen – Producer Trailer Reel, 7-min Actress Barbara Dow – Acting Reel, 18-min Director Mark Pirro – Ozone Interview, the filmmaker who inspired Devlen to get into filmmaking after seeing his film A Polish Vampire in Burbank, an early made-for-video success, he gets into making the film, meeting Devlen, a kindred Super 8 movie-maker, shooting low-budget now vs 30-40 years ago, working with Forest Ackerman, and he gets very political, theorizing a link between Daniel Crag being miscast in 007 leading to Trump being elected, and we get one of his anti-Trump comedy videos via "The 12 days of Trumpmas", which while not exactly political comedy gold is fun enough, because Fuck Trump. There's also 9-min Archival Public Access TV Review: Hollywood Unseen.

But wait, there's more, we get the 6-min Short Film: Babies. which was Devlen's first Super 8 film starring is sister and some Emerson College friends, the 13-min Poolville, TX: The Other Hollywood - Ozone & The Abomination Location Visit that was on the Abomination Blu-ray from VV, 3-min of Deleted Scenes from producer Matt Devlen's personal archives 30-min of Ozone 0uttakes from producer Matt Devlen's personal archives, 12-min of Ozone Special Effects Outtakes, A 37-min Muther Video – Original VHS Intros Reel which I thought were pretty dang fun, all of them featuring Barbara Dow (The Invisible Maniac) who is the karaoke broad who get scalped, plus the 1-min Ozone Image Gallery, which I really enjoyed, the movie is sort of dark and low-resolution, so seeing some nice high quality still photography highlighting the make-up effects, which are sort of hard to make out in the film, was very cool, the last of the on-disc extras are 1-min Tabloid (1989) Trailer, and a selection of Visual Vengeance Trailers.

The single-disc release arrives in a clear keepcase with a Reversible Wrap featuring the original VHS artwork as well as a new illustration, inside there's fun Visual Vengeance ephemera like a ‘Stick Your Own’ VHS sticker set and a Folded Mini-Poster featuring artwork by Belarusian American artist Andrei Bouzikov, plus the first-pressing includes fun goodies like a Limited Edition O-Card with alternate art by The Dude Designs, a 12-page Mini Comic Book, Ozone Mutant Puke Bag with artwork by Marc Gras of ReelStrip, who has previously done comics for the Wild Eye releases of Kung Fu Rascals and The Abomination - which are super-cool, and a Muther Video Logo Sticker.