THE COLOSSUS OF RHODES (1961) (Warner Archive Blu-ray Review)

THE COLOSSUS OF RHODES (1961) 

Label: Warner Archive
Region: Region-FREE
Rating: Unrated
Duration: 128 Minutes
Audio: Enlgish DTS HD-Master Audio 2.0 Mono with Optional English Subtitles 
Video: 1080p HD Widescreen (2.35:1) 
Direector: Sergio Leone
Cast: Rory Calhoun, Lea Massari, Georges Marchal, Conrado San Martin, Conrado San M�rtin, Jorge Rigaud, Angel Aranda, Mabel Karr

Set in 280 BC The Colossus of Rhodes (1961) stars veteran cowboy actor Rory Calhoun as a Greek soldier named Darios who comes to the island of Rhodes to visit his beloved uncle Lissipu (George Rigaud, A Lizard in a Woman's Skin), where the tyrannical king Serse (Roberto Camardiel, Django Kill... If You Live, Shoot!) has just erected a 300-foot tall statue of the sun god Apollo to protect the city's harbor from invading forces, a wise move considering we discover not one, but two, secretive plots to overthrow the king's  reign, with evil-forces within his own court conspiring against him. 

Darios becomes infatuated with local beauty Diala (Lea Massari, L'avventura), the daughter of the statue's architect Carete (Félix Fernández), and also becomes privy to the various treacheries planned against the king, finding himself unwittingly entangled in the overthrow-shenanigans and imprisoned as a suspected spy. The sword and sandal story is full of melodrama and treachery with some good action towards the end, but it's overly long and Calhoun, whom I most remember from demented 80s slasher Motel Hell (1980), doesn't really suit the period, he's a bit too wry and self aware, which I didn't outright hate but it does draw attention to itself. 

That doesn't mean I didn't enjoy this one though, there are some cool set pieces and the locations and sets are elaborate and awesome, visually the film is very sumptuous as these films tend to be. The titular colossus is about three times the size of the actual statue of history, which is believed to have sat not over the entrance of the harbor as depicted, but on a hill overlooking it if memory serves. The film has it being constructed hollow like the Statue of liberty, a defensive weapon that is able to drop fire and burning oil on invading ships and and launch molten metal at it's enemies from a head that opens up like a blooming flower, it may not be factual but it's pretty damn cool looking on film, I love seeing Calhoun climb out it's ear and onto it's arms where he sword battles soldiers before diving into the harbor! Later earthquakes shake the city as a torrential storm beats down upon the it, the city is falling down around it's people while the overthrow transpires, the final leg of the film delivering the action-packed goods, but there's been way too much melodrama and filler in the preceding two hours to make this one of the better sword and sandal pics. Maybe not helping is that I also prefer my sword and sandal flicks with a bit more supernatural elements or some direct appearance from the Gods themselves. 

The Colossus of Rhodes (1961) was the first fully credited directorial debut from Sergio Leone (The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly), he had co-directed a few before but this scale sword and sandal epic was his first official film as a director, which is mighty impressive for a first-timer. The sets and location are epic and the action is damn decent when we finally get around to it. The film even has some of the framing devices Leone would be come to known for with his later (and better) western films, but this thing runs about a half-hour too long at 128-minutes, I know there's an even longer European cut, but for once I'm thankful for the a shorter version! 

Audio/Video: The Colossus of Rhodes (1961) arrives on Blu-ray from Warner Archive in the 128-min U.S. cut of the film, sourced from a 2018 HD master and framed in 2.35:1 widescreen. The source looks good, the grain is a bit course throughout but colors look good and the black levels are decent. There's a good amount of detail that showcases the intricate craftsmanship of the elaborate sets and the enormous titular statue protecting the harbor of the city, this is an impressive HD upgrade that should please fans.

The lone audio option is a DTS-HD MA Mono track, it's clean and well-balanced, the Angelo Francesco Lavagnino (Gorgo) has some nice presence throughout, as does the destruction of the city towards the end, optional English subtitles are provided. 

The only extra on the disc is an audio commentary by  Sergio Leone biographer and film historian Christopher Frayling, it's loaded with content, the man knows his Leone films, but it is a bit professorially dry at times, but it's a good commentary, the delivery is just a bit on the dry side.  

Special Features: 
- Commentary by Film Historian Christopher Frayling

The Colossus of Rhodes (1961) is an entertaining, sun-bronzed sword and sandal entry, more notable for what the first time director went on to do than the actual film, but if you're a fan of these sort of films and can get beyond the startling site of Rory Calhoun in a short toga there's some fun to be had with it. This Blu-ray debut from Warner Archive is impressive with an upgraded A/V presentation that is sure to please the sword and sandal fans and the Sergio Leone completest out there.

NIGHT OF THE LEPUS (1972) (Scream Factory Blu-ray Review)

NIGHT OF THE LEPUS (1972)

Label: Scream Factory 
Region Code: A
Rating: PG
Duration: 88 Minutes 
Audio: English DTS-HD MA  Mono with Optional English Subtitles 
Video: 1080p HD Widescreen (1.85:1) 
Director: William F. Claxton
Cast: Janet Leigh, Rory Calhoun, DeForest Kelley, Paul Fix, Melanie Fullerton, Stuart Whitman

"How many eyes does horror have? How many times will terror strike?" This is what the rabbit-less original one-sheet advertised, with  a family holding off the disembodied eyes peering at them through the darkness with a shovel in hand! Man oh man did the studio go out of their way not to advertise that this was a killer-bunny movie when it came into the cinemas back in '72, for fear of it probably being laughed off the screen no-doubt. That's a fair worry I suppose, the premise is plenty silly on paper (an oftentimes in action), and when I saw it on TV as a kid I thought to myself, "killer bunnies, are you fucking kidding me?"  

That they play it so straight is probably why this one has gone on to have such a cult-following all these years later, it's so earnest it's kitschy, the director and cast are straight-faced, as they confront the threat of giant (dog-sized really, not all that giant) rabbits in the Arizona desert. It opens with rancher, Cole Hillman (Rory Calhoun, Motel Hell) riding his horse on his rural property, when suddenly his horse falls to the ground after breaking it's leg in a rabbit-hole, forcing the rancher to pull out his rifle and put the animal out of it's misery. We learn that Cole's property is lousy with rabbits since all the predators have been killed off, so he seeks the help of college president Elgin Clark (DeForest Kelley, Bones from TV's Star Trek). As a longtime resident of Tucson, Arizona it was a hoot to see DeForest and Calhoun speaking right in front of the historic Old Main building on the University of Arizona campus where I worked for 20-years, though the the most notable film shot at the U of A campus to my reckoning would have to be the 80's classic The Revenge of the Nerds (1984)! 

We are then introduced to scientist couple Roy (Stuart Whitman, Eaten Alive) and Gerry Bennett (played by horror royalty Janet Leigh, The Fog) whom are asked by Elgin to go out to the ranch and see what they can do about this over-population of rabbits, which they do. They take a few of the bunnies back to their lab to run some hormone experiments on them in hopes of curbing the breeding population, but their bratty daughter loves one of the test rabbits and pulls an old switcheroo, resulting in the wrong rabbit being released into the population, which somehow enables the animals to grow to abnormal size seemingly overnight!

The normal sized rabbits were already wreaking havoc on the small Arizona community, so you can imagine that 150 lb. dog-sized rabbits prove to be an even more formidable and fearsome. As the menace grows they slaughter a family of campers and a produce truck driver who stops off on the side the road at the worse possible moment, the bloodletting in this is one is surprisingly ample considering this was an early 70's Eco-horror entry. As the rabbits turn to eating people they do not do so in gory detail, but the aftermath is plenty bloody in a Hammer films Kennsington gore sort of way, check out some of the screen grabs in the review for a few shots of this. Even the rabbits get bloody, being fired upon with rifles through the floorboards by people trapped in the basement after a house is overrun by the unfriendly bunnies! Probably the most disturbing footage is real, the film opens with a montage of newsreel footage about past rabbit explosions in the South West, the footage of people rounding them up and slaughtering the long-eared rodents is kind of harrowing. 

The film was directed by William F. Claxton who gad a long and storied career directing westerns for both the big and small screen, I don't think he did any other horror films, though he did direct a handful of Twilight Zone episodes. This is not a Western but it has the look and feel of one, set in rural Arizona there's a lot of dusty vistas, the cast has a Western look about them, so it's nice to see a 70's eco-horror flick with a unique Western atmosphere, it's a good looking movie. There's also a bit of trippiness to a scene of a young girl witnessing the blood-soaked bunnies in a closed-down mine, transitioning to a nightmare scene and the little girl waking up screaming, it's a nice touch. 

    
While this gets plenty of guffaws based on the admittedly silly sounding premise it's played straight without any winks and nods at the viewer, everyone is so damn serious and it makes it a better film I think. The movie is technically well made, even the special effects are good, the rabbits are real - there's no puppets I could spot - though there are some dead rabbits, but apparently they bought them that way, they didn't kill them, and there's a fun anecdote about that on one of the commentaries! The rabbits are shot on miniature sets and in slow-motion to give them some weight, they do great work here I think, it might be laughable to a degree but I just love this sort of thing, it might not have aged well but if you love old school practical and optical effects there's a lot to love, just look at the detail in those miniature Campbell soups cans and Lipton tea boxes! 

I also give the fun finale a nod of approval, it ingeniously involves electrifying a length of train-track to electrocute the bad bunnies, it's a frenzy of frying bunnies, gunfire and rabbits set on fire with a flame-thrower - though I assume the flaming rabbit used for the scene was a bunny-cadaver, and to that end there's a Humane Society approval that pops up at the end of the film, so there's hope.

Audio/Video: Night of the Lepus (1972) arrives on Blu-ray from Scream Factory through their licensing deal with Warner Brother, with a new 2K scan courtesy of WB, and it looks wonderful. The new scan is rich and finely detailed, grain is nicely ma aged, showing up poor in the under lit scenes but it;s very natural and filmic looking Blu-ray, the hairs of the killer bunnies has loads of details, offering plenty of fine detail and some nice looking depth. Black levels are very nice all around, offering good detail in the darker scenes. 

Audio comes by way of an English DTS-HD MA Mono track with optional English subtitles, the score from Jimmie Haskell (Dirty Mary, Crazy Larry) sound quite nice in the mix, dialogue  is always crisp and clean and never difficult to discern, and the horrifying rabbit sounds and gunfire come through robustly. 

Onto the extras it's nice to see Scream Factory are not just plundering the b-movie vaults at Warner Brothers but also providing new extras for the titles, which is something Warner Archive (whom I love for the fantastic work they do) just aren't able/willing to do for catalog titles, so this is why we love seeing them sub-license these titles to someone like Scream Factory! The main extras are two new commentary tracks, the first from author Lee Gambin (Massacred by Mother Nature: Exploring the Natural Horror Film) who gives a loving and enthusiastic reading on the film, he has an unabashed love for the film, loves it without shame and pours the love on with lots of info about eco-horror, the cast and crew, the ad campaign and how the film was received. The second track is from Pop Culture historian Russell Dyball, who begins by going into a surprising amount of depth about the newscaster at the start of the film, who was apparently the inspiration for Kent Brockman from TV's The Simpsons among other TV newscasters. The inclusion of two commentaries was pretty great, this is not a film I've watched a lot, or even read about much, so there was a lot if info packed into these two commentaries, and there's not a whole lot of overlap between the two, they're both trivia/anecdote heavy and very enjoyable with great energy. 

The disc is buttoned-up with a trailer, TV spots,radio spot and an image gallery. The single-disc release comes housed in a standard Blu-ray keepcase with 2-sided sleeve of artwork, the a-side featuring the original one-sheet artwork, featuring the now familiar eye-centric illustration, the b-side is not an artwork option but a scene from the film with text detailing the transfer credits, the disc itself features an excerpt of an alternate poster option.     

Special Features:
- NEW 2K scan of the original film elements
- NEW Audio Commentary with author Lee Gambin (Massacred by Mother Nature: Exploring the Natural Horror Film)
- NEW Audio Commentary with Pop Culture historian Russell Dyball
- Theatrical Trailer (2 min) HD 
- TV Spot (22 sec) HD 
- Radio Spot (1 mn) HD 
- Still Gallery (5 min) HD 

Night of the Lepus (1972) is a fun b-movie entry with a notable cast, it's way better than a killer-bunny movie has any right to be, so if you haven't checked it out don't pass it up, I think you'll be pleasantly surprised if you're a fan of strange 70's eco-horror. The new 2K transfer looks awesome and the new audio commentaries are a great value-add for those looking to upgrade this killer-rabbit classic.

Screenshots sourced directly from Blu-ray reviewed.

Killer Rabbits! Scream Factory Presents "Night of the Lepus" (1972) in its Blu-ray Debut on June 19th

NIGHT OF THE LEPUS (1972)

Label: Scream Factory 
Region Code: A
Rating: PG
Duration: 88 Minutes 
Audio: English DTS-HD MA 
Video: 1080p HD Widescreen (1.85:1) 
Director: Stuart Whitman
Cast: Janet Leigh, Rory Calhoun, DeForest Kelley, Paul Fix, Melanie Fullerton

Synopsis: How many eyes does horror have? How many times will terror strike? Giant mutant rabbits are on the loose in the campy 70’s cult classic Night Of The Lepus for the first time on Blu-ray on June 19, 2018 from Scream Factory. This release features a new 2K scan of the original film elements and comes complete with new audio commentaries.

There was no limit to the horror ... no end to the Night Of The Lepus! A hormone intended to alter the breeding cycle of rabbits overrunning Arizona ranchlands ends up turning them into flesh-eating, 150-pound monsters in Night of the Lepus.

Stuart Whitman (Eaten Alive), Janet Leigh (Psycho), Rory Calhoun (Motel Hell) and DeForest Kelley (Star Trek) are among the intrepid humans facing off against the behemoth bunnies, using guns, flames, dynamite and anything else in their grasp to battle their oversized, hungry tormentors.

Special Features:
- NEW 2K scan of the original film elements
- NEW Audio Commentary with author Lee Gambin (Massacred by Mother Nature: Exploring the Natural Horror Film)
- NEW Audio Commentary with Pop Culture historian Russell Dyball
- Theatrical Trailer
- TV Spot
- Radio Spot
- Still Gallery

MOTEL HELL (1980) (Scream Factory Blu-ray Review)

MOTEL HELL (1980)

Label: Scream Factory

Region Code: A

Rating: R

Duration: 101 Minutes

Audio: DTS-HD Master Audio Stereo

Video: 1080p Widescreen (1.85:1) 

Cast: Rory Calhoun, Nancy Parson, Nina Axelrod, Wolfman Jack

Director: Kevin Connor

MOTEL HELL may just be one of the strangest slasher entries of the nineteen eighties. We have a cannibal farmer named Vincent (Rory Calhoun, The Red House) and his portly sister Ida (Nancy Parsons, Porky's) who run the welcoming Motel Hello just off a country road in the middle of nowhere. The duo sell a tasty variety of smoked meats to tourist under the name of Farmer Vincent's Fritters. They're motto is "It takes all kinds of critters to make Farmer Vincent's fritters!", some of these critters just happen to be of the human variety.

That fun premise alone would be just odd enough but the producers of Motel Hell take it to even weirder places. Farmer Vincent is portrayed with straight-faced comedic perfection by Rory Calhoun who sets up elaborate traps on the roadways to ensnare fresh meat. My favorite scenario involves luring would-be swingers to the hotel under false pretense and a series of cows decoys - this is just fun stuff. But wait, it gets weirder! Vincent doesn't put his meat to the grinder right away - no sir! He plants them in a secret garden buried up to their necks with a burlap sack covering their heads. He then cuts their vocal chords and are fed cream corn through a series of funnels until they are ripe for slaughter. Now they're entranced by a psychedelic translucent pinwheel and plucked like a carrot from the ground. Vincent's strange gardening activities are shared by his demented sister Ida played by Nancy Parsons who is simply exquisite with her dry delivery and strange mannerisms. It's a damn shame we didn't to see more of her in these types of roles because she is a blast. 

Apparently not all tourists are destined for the smokehouse when Farmer Vincent develops a crush on a pretty young gal named Terry (Nina Axelrod, Remote Control). Scooping her up off the road following and accident he caused he brings her back to the motel after planting her boyfriend in his special garden. When she wakes Vincent explains that her boyfriend Bo (Everett Creach, Howard the Duck) was killed in the motorcycle accident, with nowhere else to go Terry decides to stay on at the motel. Vincent and Ida set about teaching Terry how to properly smoke a sausage... if you know what I mean. Over time Terry quite improbably agrees to marry the much older Vincent to the dismay of his distrusting sister. When Vincent's dimwitted brother Bruce (Paul Linke, TV's CHiPS) develops his own amorous feelings for Terry things turn sour - even more so when he discovers that big brother is turning tourists into breakfast sausages. 

When it is revealed to Bruce that his demented brother is stuffing his sausage with more than just pork products we are treated to a classic chainsaw vs. chainsaw battle that pre-dates Tobe Hooper's The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 (1986) with farmer Vincent wearing a pig's head! Motel Hell is a strange and wonderful slasher with lots of quirk and black humor -  the wit is wry and the happenings are bizarre. The film has left an indelible mark on horror cinema - it's influence can  be seen in the indie film Porkchop (2010) with a pig-faced killer to Robert Rodriguez's Planet Terror featuring a chef doubting his choices just before expiring. 

Motel Hell is a true cult-classic that just gets better with each subsequent viewing. This is one of my favorite movies and it comes highly recommended. It might be interesting to note that Tobe Hooper was originally tapped to direct this film but jumped ship to direct the carnival-slasher The Funhouse (1981). Watching it one cannot help but notice the similarities with The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 (1986) which shares not just a weird sense of humor but the dueling chainsaw battle.     

Blu-ray: Having picked-up the Arrow Video Blu-ray last year I was still pretty damn excited to see this bizarre entry get a US release from none other than Scream Factory who are just on fire with a string of quality titles. Just in the past few months we've seen the first-ever DVD/BD releases of The Final Terror (1983) and Without Warning (1980) and jam-packed editions of genre favorites. From what I can see comparing the UK disc with this it's the same HD transfer and is a significant improvement over the previous MGM DVD with very nice colors reproduction, clarity and moments of fine detail. Some of the darker scenes can be a bit grainy but I've never been one to complain about a little grain - just glad it's not rampant with digital noise or marred by excessive DNR. Staying true to the original exhibition we have a DTS-HD Master Audio Stereo Audio is nice if unremarkable. The dialogue, Lance Rubin's score and effects come through crisp and clean with no distortion. 

Onto the extras lets begin with a few High Rising Productions produced extras carried over from the Arrow Blu-ray. Co-star Paul Linke gets a video interview with Another Head on the Chopping Block (14:50) as does former Playboy Playmate, Rosanne Katon with From Glamour to Gore (11:26). Porky's alum Nancy Parsons gets her own retrospective in Ida, Be Thy Name (18:07) with interviews from Scream Queens Elissa Dowling and Chantelle Albers, genre commentator Staci Layne Wilson and critic Shelagh Rowan-Legg.

We don't get the director commentary from the Arrow version but instead get a brand new audio commentary from the director moderated by Dave Parker - the director of The Hills Run Red. The new making of doc It Takes All Kinds: The Making of MOTEL HELL (24:33) is exclusive to this release with new interviews from director Kevin Connor and producer Robert and Steven Charles Jaffe plus actor Marc Silver - a fantastic new feature and the one that pushes this one past the Arrow release as the must-own edition of Motel Hell. The other new video feature is Shooting Old School with cinematographer Thomas Del Ruth (15:45).

The Collector's Edition Blu-ray from Scream Factory comes with a limited Edition slipcover featuring new artwork from Nathan Thomas Millner featuring the chainsaw wielding pig-faced killer bathed in that ominous neon-red.Millner who also did the artwork for one of my favorite pieces commissioned by Scream, that being the The Burning Blu-ray. There's also the standard sleeve of reversible art featuring the original theatrical poster art. 

Extras:
- NEW Audio Commentary with director Kevin Connor, moderated by filmmaker Dave Parker
- NEW It Takes All Kinds: The Making of MOTEL HELL featuring interviews with director Kevin Connor, producers/writers Robert Jaffe and Steven Charles Jaffe and actor Marc Silver (24:33)
- NEW Shooting Old School with cinematographer Thomas Del Ruth (15:45)
- Another Head on the Chopping Block: An interview with actor Paul Linke (14:51)
- From Glamour to Gore: An interview with actress Rosanne Katon
- Ida, Be Thy Name: A look back at MOTEL HELL’s frightful female protagonist Ida Smith (18:09)
- Original Theatrical Trailer (2:40)
- Behind the Scenes Gallery (19 Images) 
-  Poster and Production Gallery (73 Images) 
- Scream Factory Trailer (7:05) 

Verdict: A strange and quirky slasher entry with an awkward balance of skewed humor and straight faced horror which makes for an odd but awesome viewing experience that just gets better with every viewing.  I love me some Motel Hell and can safely say that this is the definitive edition of the film - a must own slice of offbeat slasher cinema.