THE TINGLER (1959) (Scream Factory Blu-ray Review)

THE TINGLER (1959)

Label: Scream Factory
Region Code: A
Rating: Unrated
Duration: A82 Minutesz
Audio: English DTS-HD MA with Optional English Subtitles
Video: 1080p HD Widescreen (1.85:1) 
Director: William Castle
Cast: Vincent Price, Judith Evelyn, Darryl Hickman, Patricia Cutts, Pamela Lincoln, Philip Coolidge

Following the success of The House On Haunted Hill (1959) Columbia Pictures and director William Castle re-teamed for the spine-chiller The Tingler (1959) again featuring horror-star Vincent Price (Witchfinfder General) - this time as a pathologist Dr. Warren Chapin who through his experience performing autopsies on the recently deceased discovers a curious thing, that the spines of those who experienced extreme fear before their death have been crushed from the inside, theorizing that some sort of parasitic fear-creature to be the culprit, something he comes to refer as "the tingler". 

The doc's wife could care less about his work in his lab, she's too busy running around town with other men, but the doc is assisted by his acquaintance David (Darryl Hickman, Network), who is engaged to Isabel's younger sister sister, Lucy (Pamela Lincoln, Anatomy of a Psycho). Chapin continues his research looking for real evidence of this parasite, and after feigning his intent to murder his cheating wife over her dalliances with other men is able to take an x-ray of her while she's knocked-out, long enough to get some actual x-rays of the creature. 

Along the way he befriends the co-owner of a silent movie theater Oliver Higgins (Phillip Coolidge, North by Northwest) who runs the theater with his deaf-mute wife  Martha (Judith Evelyn, Rear Window), the wife has a fear of blood and cannot scream in fright, her only release is to faint when the doc cuts himself in front of her, planting a devious seed. A short time later she dies of fright in a turn of foul play, scared to death by an elaborate fear-inducing set-up by her murderous hubby, who seemed like such a nice guy, I found it really hard to dislike him, even though he murdered his wife. 

Earlier in the film Price's character established a theory that when you suffer an extreme case of fear the parasitic creatures begins to grow at the base of the spine, but a well-placed scream can kill the creature before it can crush your spine, it's a fun conceit and credit to the screenwriter Robb White (The House on Haunted Hill) for the delightfully schlocky premise, it's good stuff and comes off fantastically in this black and white slice of schlock & shock cinema.

As the mute wife cannot scream she dies in fright, with her husband bringing the body to Dr. Chapin who performs an autopsy upon her immediately, managing to extract the the still living parasite from her corpse, and then the real fun begins. A trip back to the the couples apartment above the cinema they run allows the creature - which looks like a rubbery lobster/centipede - escapes into the cinema. It runs amok in the darkened theater causing Price's character to issue a warning to the audience, that to save their lives they each must scream like never before, tying into the gimmick William Castle devised for this film - one of his best - he called it "Percepto", and it was basically a electric buzzer placed under random seats throughout the theater, which I am sure must have caused quite a stir when they started going off on cue during the movie-within-a-movie premise, it's wonderfully fun stuff. 

Aside from the great premise the film has a few other standout scenes, like when Price's character in an attempt to study fear doses himself with lab-grade LSD (a cinema first!) and the hallucinatory fright-scene that scares the deaf-mute woman to death has a short color-tinted sequence depicting blood pouring from a faucet and filling a bathtub as well as some hokey monster special effects, lots of good stuff crammed into this goofy screamer, it's definitely spine-tingling fun of the highest order.

The ending has a fun EC Comics-esque comeuppance that I just love with Price's character giving a final warning about the Tingler to audience before coming to a proper close with a delightful wink and a nod to the movie goers. This is probably Vincent Price at his most overwrought, the scene of him in the lab tripping on acid is amazing, screaming about the walls closing in on him, it's real square version of a bad trip, love it. 

Audio/Video: The Tingler (1959) arrives on Blu-ray from Scream Factory in 1080p HD framed in 1.85:1 widescreen. The source looks near flawless, it's in excellent shape and the grain is finely managed. Black and white contrast looks good with deep black and a good looking grayscale throughout. It probably looks a bit too good to be honest, you can see the string pulling the rubbery tingler along in some scenes! The film is black and white but is punctuated by a few scenes of color with blood pouring out of faucets, very cool. Audio comes by way of an English DTS-HD MA Mono track that's clean and solid, there's a lot of a shrieking throughout and it handles it without breaking-up into distortion, optional English subtitles are provided.

Extras begin with an audio commentary from Author/Historian Steve Haberman who is always a wealth of knowledge, his commentary is crammed with info, a real William Castle/Vincent Price lecture worthy endeavor. We also get an interview with Pamela Lincoln who says she wasn't a fan of horror but as this was her first movie was happy to land the gig, getting a dozen roses on her first day on set from William Castle, laughing at the site of the Tingler used in the film, but how serious Price took his scenes with it. 

Publicist Barry Lorie shows up for a brief interview discussing his job on behalf of the studios to talk-up new films to critics and exhibitors in addition to installing the "percepto" buzzers at first run theaters during the film's original, theatrical showings and how successful the gimmick was. 

Scream Factory also carry-over the vintage featurette Scream For Your Lives! with actor Darryl Hickman, Bob Burns, author Lucy Chase Williams, film historian David Skal. This is a great extra with Bob Burns speaking about presenting Castle a "skeleton key to the city" in San Antonio and Hickman recalling Castle's schlocky ways, calling him the P.T. Barnum of cinema, and he's not wrong. Williams speaks about the unique facets of the film, like how it was the first film to feature LSD in the cinema.  

Extras are finished up with a theatrical trailer William Castle's Drive-In Scream audio which is an alternate drive-in version of him imploring the audience to scream,  plus the original scream audio from the theatrical; experience with Vincent Price, speaking of whom, also included is a fun theatre Lobby Recording of Price warning movie goers to stay away from The Tingler along with a pretty nifty jingle about the parasitic fear monster. We also get a gallery containing various movie posters, colorized lobby cards, promotional still and behind-the-scenes images.

The single-disc release comes housed in a standard Blu-ray keepcase with a 2-sided sleeve of artwork, the front cover is a vintage movie poster of the film and the reverse side features a promotional image for the film, the disc itself featuring a shot of Vincent Price dosing himself with LSD!  

Special Features: 
- NEW Audio Commentary By Author/Historian Steve Haberman
- NEW I Survived The Tingler – An Interview With Pamela Lincoln (4 min) 
- NEW Unleashing "Percepto" – An Interview With Publicist Barry Lorie (3 min) 
- Scream For Your Lives! William Castle And "The Tingler" – Vintage Featurette (15 min) 
- William Castle's Drive-In "Scream!" Audio (1 min) 
- Original "Scream" Scene (1 min) 
- The Original 1959 Theatre Lobby Recording (3 min) 
- Theatrical Trailer (2 min) 
- Still Gallery

It's always a treat to get another William Castle shlock and shocker on Blu-ray, like their release of Strait-Jacket (1964) Scream Factory knock it out of the park with a solid A/V presentation and some nifty extras, top-notch. 

I SAW WHAT YOU DID (1965) (Blu-ray Review)

I SAW WHAT YOU DID (1965) 

Label: Scream Factory
Release Date: May 17th 2016 
Region Code: A
Rating: Unrated 
Audio: English DTS-HD MA 2.0 Mono with Optional English Subtitles 
Video: 1080p HD Widescreen (1.85:1)
Director: William Castle
Cast: Andi Garrett, John Ireland, Leif Erickson, Sara Lane, Joan Crawford

I Saw What You Did is a pretty restrained thriller by the typical standards of shock-cinema impresario William Castle who usually adorned his b-movie productions with hokey gimmicks galore, but this time around there are no shocker-seats or skeletons on wires jumping out at you. This thriller stars two fun-loving teens Libby (Andi Garrett) and Kit (Sara Lane) who are home alone with Libby's younger sister Tess (Sharyl Locke), the trio amuse themselves with prank phone calls to random numbers pulled from the phonebook. Whoever answers the phone is told "I saw what you did, and I know who you are.", which is fun and annoying, but mostly harmless teen-stuff that most kids have done at one time or another, myself included.

However, on this particular night they call the one guy who just happened to have murdered his wife in the shower Psycho style and buried her in the woods. The man is played by John Ireland and he believes that the young woman on the phone has seen something she shouldn't have, but in an era before called ID they would have gotten away with if not for their teen hormones. After hanging up the girls begin to fantasize about how good-looking Steve sounded on the phone, and their curiosity gets the better of them and they make a trip to home to get an eyeful of the murdering hunk. 

Enter Steve's lustful and somewhat desperate neighbor played by the scenery-chewing Joan Crawford who lusts after her manly neighbor, the woman's panties are definitely moist for the man, even after she figures out that the guy murdered his wife, which certainly smacks of desperation When she catches the young Libby snooping around Steve's house peeping in through the windows the demented woman assumes her to be one of Steve's younger lovers and chases her off, but not before snatching the registration from her car, which is what allows Steve to find out who the anonymous caller lives, leading to him arriving at the teens home while her parents are out for the night. I love the simple and effective initial promise of the movie, while it is a bit far-fetched it is a William Castle movie after all. I liked that it was not as gimmick-riddles as some of Castle's but I found myself wanting it to be more visceral, there's plenty of situations that could have milked for more genuine suspense but Castle was never one to hold out for the true suspense of a scene, he was a schlocky sort of guy and he usually went for the cheap thrills - but that's why I love him. 

Audio/Video: I Saw What You Did arrives on Blu-ray from Scream Factory with a new 2016 HD transfer framed in 1.78 widescreen, the black and white cinematography is crisp with some great contrast levels, the black are deep and the gray scale and white look just fine. The print used for the transfer shows some minor grit and debris from time to time and doesn't appear to have had much clean-up applied to it, which I don't mind. The English DTS-HD MA 2.0 Mono sounds just fine, with dialogue coming through clean and crisp, including the somewhat aloof but suspenseful score from Van Alexander. Extras on the disc include a gallery of stills and publicity materials for the movie,plus two trailers for the movie, on featuring William Castle doing what he did best, hocking his b-movie wares to the masses. 

Special Features
- NEW 2016 High-Definition Transfer
- Original Theatrical Trailer and "Special World Premiere Announcement" Trailer Featuring William Castle (3 Mins) 
- Photo Gallery (4 Mins) 

William Castle's I Saw What You Did (1965) looks quite nice on Blu-ray from Scream Factory and should be a true treat for fans of William Castle's brand of schlock and shock cinema. This one has a very straight forward premise with a nifty initial promise, it might stretch on for a bit in places but I still loved it. Joan Crawford really camps it up here with her thick eyebrows and jealous-rage, and sort of steals the show for a large swath of the movie. I also loved the teen girls, who were a sweet blend of teen prankster mischief and naive. The distribution rights for William Castle's movies seem to be spread around a bit, but I would love to see an nice HD box set of his movies, if Scream Factory could do something along the lines of the Vincent Price Collection for William Castle I know there are oodles of fans out there who would snatch it up! 3/5  

 

WILLIAM CASTLE HORROR COLLECTION (1960-1963)

WILLIAM CASTLE HORROR COLLECTION (1960-1963) 

Label: Mill Creek Entertainment 
Release Date: August 18th 2015 
Duration: 7 Hours 18 Minutes
Rating: Unrated
Region Code: 1
Audio: English Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo
Video: Anamoprhic Widescreen (1.78:1, 1.85:1) 
Director: William Castle
Cast: Rosemary DeCamp, Glenn Corbett, Tom Poston, Robert Morley, Murray Hamilton, Guy Rolfe

Mill Creek have put together a fun set of 60s b-movie fun from the Alfred Hitchcock of schlock - William Castle, a showman of the highest order who infused his movies with scares, fun and plenty of gimmicks. Licensed from Columbia Pictures the set features the film in the original widescreen presentations and the transfers looks mighty fine. 

13 GHOSTS (1960) 
B/W – 85 Mins – Not Rated – Anamorphic Widescreen (1.85:1)
Starring: Charles Herbert, Jo Morrow, Martin Milner, Rosemary DeCamp. Donald Woods, Margaret Hamilton

First up is the fun scare-film 13 Ghosts, we find a Museum employee Cyrus Zorba (Donald Woods) who is on the verge of being evicted from his home alongside his wife Hilda (Rosemary DeCamp), teen daughter Medea (Jo Morrow) and adolescent son Buck (Charles Herbert). This luck seems to have changes when from out of nowhere he inherits a creepy old house that belonged to hus uncle, Dr. Plato Zorba. Of course they take advantage of the inheritance and move right in, but the house comes with baggage, a housekeeper, Elaine Zacharides, played my none other than actress Margaret Hamilton who played the wicked Witch of the West in the classic Wizard of Oz, her most famous role is referenced throughout to fun effect.

Dr. Zorba, who dabbled in the dark arts of the occult, is said to have hid away a vast fortune somewhere in the home,which is also haunted by twelves horrifying ghosts, which can only be seen when wearing a pair of special-made goggles created by Dr. Zorba, which is where the infamous Illusion-O gimmick comes into play. 

At the cinema when the movie would play the audience where given special viewers of which to watch the film, there was a blue filter and a red filter. If you were brave enough you would watch it through the red lens it would make the ghosts stand out, if you chose the blue lens the ghostly images would remove the ghostly images, which is a fun ploy, though I am unsure how effective it was, but that is a kind of showmanship and interactivity sorely missing from today's cinemas, we need more b-movie schlock these days. 

Not scary but pretty amusing, the young kid Buck (Charles Herbert) steals the show as an adolescent boy fascinated by the supernatural, and ultimately the one who solves the puzzle of the missing fortune. 

13 FRIGHTENED GIRLS (1963) 
Color – 88 Mins – Not Rated – Anamorphic Widescreen (1.85:1)
Starring: Murray Hamilton, Joyce Taylor, Hugh Marlowe, Khigh Dhiegh, Charlie Briggs, Norma Varden

Next up is a fun Cold War era espionage thriller set at a Swiss boarding school attended by the daughters of various international diplomats. Candace "Candy" Hull (Kathy Dunn) is the daughter of American Diplomat  John Hull (Hugh Marlowe), she has a crush on her an older man named Wally Sanders (Murray Hamilton, the mayor from Jaws), a spy working for her father. To impress him she begins to do a bit of spying on her own, using her friendship with Mai-Ling (Lynne Sue Moon), the niece of a Red Chinese diplomat, to uncover secrets.Turns out the teen has quite a knack for espionage, and uncovers the murder of a Russian diplomat and is now caught up in a cat and mouse game of espionage and teen romance, and while it is not horror it it a lot of fun, this one feels very much along the lines of an old live-action Disney film from the 60s.  

The gimmick this time out is not some hokey visual process, but some pre-filming publicity by way of a contest, a casting call for thirteen girls from thirteen different countries to reprsent their own country in a starring role in the film. 

MR. SARDONICUS (1961) 
B/W – 90 Mins – Not Rated – Anamorphic Widescreen (1.78:1) 
Starring: Ronald Lewis, Audrey Dalton, Guy Rolfe, Oskar Homolka, Vladimir Sokoloff, Erika Peters

This creepy horror classic is based on a novella by screenwriter Ray Russell (X: The Man with the X-Ray Eyes), and is brought to life by William Castle (13 Ghosts), master of terror! Desperate to retrieve a winning lottery ticket, a greedy baron unearths his father s corpse. An enormous jackpot is his reward, but not without a price his face is frozen permanently into a hideous grin. He enlists his fiendish one-eyed servant to help him lift this horrible curse, but their schemes fail. Finally, he turns to a noted neurosurgeon and his wife s former lover to cure him.

There's never a bad time to watch a William Castle production and tonight was definitely the time to watch Mr. Sardonicus (1961), it was hitting almost all of the right notes for me.  There's a great foggy London-set intro from William Castle himself, ever the showman he comes off as the schlocky Hitchcock, which is very appropriate. We're introduced to a London doctor named Sir Robert Cargrave (Ronald Lewis, Scream of Fear) whom receives a letter from an old flame, Maude (Audrey Dalton, The Monster That Challenged the World) imploring him to visit her, apparently it's a matter of life and death. Once he arrives it's quickly revealed she was coerced into summoning him by her husband Baron Sardonicus, a real bastard played to perfection by Puppet Master 3's Guy Rolfe. The Baron wishes for Cargrave to cure him of a horrible affliction  the Baron  after unearthing his own father's corpse from the grave to obtain a winning lottery ticket he was stricken with a permanently grotesque smile across his face, this aspect reminded me of The Man Who Smiles (1939), if the doctor should refuse or fail to succeed in devising a treatment Maude's life hangs in the balance.

It was a blast to see Guy Rolfe as a younger man, loved him from the few Puppet Master entries from Full Moon. Early on in the film the Baron's face is hidden, shrouded in mystery beneath as mask, which was pretty great. Once the hideous affliction is revealed it's a whole new level of weird, he's a creepy villain and he comes with a one-eyed man servant named Krull (Oskar Homolka, The Seven Year Itch) who threatens to steal most of the scenes he appears in, it's great stuff. As great as Homolka is it's Guy Rolfe who definitely steals the show with his maniacal charisma, not to diminish a strong performance from Ronald Lewis as our hero and Audrey Dalton who turns in a smaller performance but as a sympathetic heroin she's quite fine.  

A fun watch, it drags from time to time, your mileage may vary depending on your temperance for black and white, it's a William Castle production so you just know that there's a gimmick, this time out it's a choose-your-own-ending feature, sorta. Unfortunately we don't get zapped in our asses with an electric shock but this is still an entertaining watch in the tradition of a twisty Twilight Zone episode. 

HOMICIDAL (1961) 
B/W – 88 Mins – Not Rated - Anamorphic Widescreen (1.85:1) 
Starring: Glenn Corbett, Patricia Breslin, Eugenie Leontovich, Alan Bunce, Richard Rust, James Westerfield

Homicidal is pretty much William Castle's spin on Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho, at the top of the movie a pretty blond checks into a hotel and comes on strong to a bellboy, offering him cash to marry her, which he accepts. They arrive at the justice of the peace for a quick wedding and as soon as the nuptials are finished she pulls a kitchen knife from her purse and stabs the justice to death! I was bowled over by this one, the amount of violence is pretty shocking for the time, Castle was definitely trying to one-up Hitchcock here with a knockout blond and some amped up violence and blood. 

The woman runs off and a search begins for the blond murderess, meanwhile the woman, revealed to be Emily (Jean Arliss) returns to her home where she cares for a mute, wheelchair-bound old lady (Eugenie Leontovitch) whom she abuses at every turn for reasons unknown. Also in the picture are the old woman's niece Miriam (Patricia Breslin) and he brother Warren, all of whom become suspicious of Emily as her behavior becomes more and more erratic - with the murder of the justice of the peace having something to do with an inheritance in the family. Arliss is fantastic as the nut-job murderess, and the reveal at the end is truly a shocker that I did not see coming, I knew something was up, but I just couldn't put my finger on what it was until it was revealed - good job Mr Castle, you got me! 

THE OLD DARK HOUSE (1963) 
Color – 87 Mins – Not Rated – Anamorphic Widescreen (1.85:1)
Starring: Tom Poston, Robert Morley, Janette Scott, Joyce Grenfell, Mervyn Jones, Fenella Fielding

The last film on the set is an adaptation of the J. B. Priestley which was previously adapted by James Whale (Frankenstein) in the 30s. we begin with an American car salesman Tom Penderel (Tom Poston, from the Bob Newhart Show) delivering a new car to Casper Femm (Peter Bull) at the the Femm family home located in a very rural area. Pulling up to the gate of the him during a torrential down pour a gargoyle falls onto the hood of the car, destroying the engine and stranding the aloof Penderel at the Fenn Family home. 

Once inside he meets the eccentric Femm family, who announce that Casper Femm has dies following an accidental fall down the stairs, but something more seems to be happening at the home, something murderous. From here we are treated to a macabre comedy of murder as one by one the inhabitants of the home fall prey to a killer, once again, inheritance seems to be the motive. This is a Hammer co-production and it certainly has a British feel about it, the comedic and macabre slapstick tone strongly reminded me of the Price-Lorre-Karloff classic The Comedy of Terrors (1964), this was a hoot and a ton of fun.  

A fun set from Mill Creek of some good old fashioned frights and laughs from the master of the b-movie William Castle. Sony had released these among others on a box set a few years ago, this is a great budget-minded edition from Mill Creek, minus the fun special features from the Sony set. I hope we see a second set in the near future with Castle's Straight-Jacket, The Tingler and Zot! among others. Mill Creek Entertainment released Mr. Sardonicus on a double-feature Blu-ray not too long ago, would love to see a few HD William Castle double-features going forward, these are must own movies for fans of 60s schlock and this set comes highly recommended. 4/5 

Blu-ray Review: MR. SARDONICUS /THE BROTHERHOOD OF SATAN

MR. SARDONICUS / THE BROTHERHOOD OF SATAN 

Blu-ray Double Feature 

Label: Mill Creek Entertainment
Region Code: A
Duration: 69/92 Minutes 
Rating: Unrated / PG
Audio: English DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 with Optional SDH French and English Subtitles 
Video: 1080p Widescreen (1.85:1) (2.35:1) 
Director: William Castle, Bernard McEveety
Cast: Ronald Lewis, Audrey Dalton, Guy Rolfe, Strother Martin, L.Q. Jones, Oscar Homolka, Ahna Capri

Synopsis: This creepy horror classic is based on a novella by screenwriter Ray Russell (X: The Man with the X-Ray Eyes), and is brought to life by William Castle (13 Ghosts), master of terror! Desperate to retrieve a winning lottery ticket, a greedy baron unearths his father s corpse. An enormous jackpot is his reward, but not without a price his face is frozen permanently into a hideous grin. He enlists his fiendish one-eyed servant to help him lift this horrible curse, but their schemes fail. Finally, he turns to a noted neurosurgeon and his wife s former lover to cure him.

There's never a bad time to watch a William Castle production and tonight was definitely the time to watch Mr. Sardonicus (1961), it was hitting almost all of the right notes for me.  There's a great foggy London-set intro from William Castle himself, ever the showman he comes off as the schlocky Hitchcock, which is very appropriate. We're introduced to a London doctor named Sir Robert Cargrave (Ronald Lewis, Scream of Fear) whom receives a letter from an old flame, Maude (Audrey Dalton, The Monster That Challenged the World) imploring him to visit her, apparently it's a matter of life and death. Once he arrives it's quickly revealed she was coerced into summoning him by her husband Baron Sardonicus, a real bastard played to perfection by Puppet Master 3's Guy Rolfe. The Baron wishes for Cargrave to cure him of a horrible affliction  the Baron  after unearthing his own father's corpse from the grave to obtain a winning lottery ticket he was stricken with a permanently grotesque smile across his face, this aspect reminded me of The Man Who Smiles (1939), if the doctor should refuse or fail to succeed in devising a treatment Maude's life hangs in the balance.

It was a blast to see Guy Rolfe as a younger man, loved him from the few Puppet Master entries from Full Moon. Early on in the film the Baron's face is hidden, shrouded in mystery beneath as mask, which was pretty great. Once the hideous affliction is revealed it's a whole new level of weird, he's a creepy villain and he comes with a one-eyed man servant named Krull (Oskar Homolka, The Seven Year Itch) who threatens to steal most of the scenes he appears in, it's great stuff. As great as Homolka is it's Guy Rolfe who definitely steals the show with his maniacal charisma, not to diminish a strong performance from Ronald Lewis as our hero and Audrey Dalton who turns in a smaller performance but as a sympathetic heroin she's quite fine.  

A fun watch, it drags from time to time, your mileage may vary depending on your temperance for black and white, it's a William Castle production so you just know that there's a gimmick, this time out it's a choose-your-own-ending feature, sorta. Unfortunately we don't get zapped in our asses with an electric shock but this is still an entertaining watch in the tradition of a twisty Twilight Zone episode. 

Synopsis: Children are mysteriously disappearing, their parents are being violently murdered and strangely enough, no one has been able to leave! When their car stalls, Ben and his family are stranded and are forced to join the sheriff, a priest and the prominent Doc Duncan in trying to unravel this frightening web of events. Suddenly, KT disappears, triggering a frantic search that results in the startling discovery of a deadly coven, led by Doc Duncan himself! Ben and the others must make a desperate attempt to stop these witches from performing a satanic ritual that transports their malevolent spirits into the innocent children thus creating yet another generation of satanic worshipers!

While not a William Castle production Bernard McEveety's The Brotherhood of Satan (1971) certainly owes a debt to the William Castle produced and Roman Polanski directed Rosemary's Baby (1968), 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 notable the post-apocalyptic A Boy and His Dog (1975) featuring a very young Don Johnson (Django) and his telepathic dog, which I highly recommend!

The film begins with a great scene which sorta blurs the lines of reality and fiction as a bratty kid playing with a toy tank crushes and entire family in a station wagon, it's pretty bloody, too. Next scene were onto a family outing in the desert with, there's the father Ben Holden (TV's Charles Bateman) and his annoying daughter K.T. (Geri Reisch, I Dismember Mama), also along for the ride is Ben's girlfriend Nicky (Ahna Capri, Enter the Dragon). They're on the road when they come across the bloody and twisted wreckage from the start of the film, they do what pretty much anyone would and drive into the nearest village 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) treats the family pretty hostile, a man attacks Ben with an ax screaming "You took them from me!" and the trio jump back in the car just barely escape the mob with their skulls intact. Driving down the road a ways Ben swerves to avoid striking the apparition of a young girl and the car is kaput, stranded on the side of the road as the noon day sun beats down they have few choices other than to head back to the strange village. 

Once there things are a bit less hostile but just as weird and only get weirder, the Sheriff and his Deputy (Alvy Moore, A Boy and His Dog) along with the priest (Charles Robinson, The Cable Guy) and the town doc Mr. Duncan (Strother Martin, The Wild Bunch) set about sleuthing the heinous murders of adult-population and the mysterious disappearance of the town's children. The townsfolk are stressed, sleep deprived, paranoid and at their wits end. It turns out a Satanic Cult is committing the ritualistic murders and turning the town's tots into Satanic occultists in an attempt to gain unholy immortality, and guess what, it's the grandfatherly doc that's the cult leader! 

This is such a great watch, Martin is amazing as the feisty cult leader, maniacal and just chewing up the scenery while leading a group of satanic seniors bent on immortality in services the the Dark Lord. It's drenched in great 70's atmosphere and there's a ton of blood and dismemberment for a PG film, one victim is clawed to death like skinned rabbit tossed into a chicken pen, it's pretty grotesque for PG rating! This schlocky Satanic nightmare is peppered with murderous children, creepy killer dolls, and spooky woods oozing with fog, this was quite the ocult production with some great set pieces.

The finale is superb and unhinged in all the right ways as the cult gather in an underground tomb to perform their unholy ritual with diabolically over-the top incantations "Greetings Dear One, 'Tis We!", only Burgess Meredith could have outdone Martin's elderly satanic MC, this is a fantastic watch and the only thing that irked me was Geri Reisch, who was quite an annoying child actor!

Blu-ray: Over the years Mill Creek has acquired a decent reputation for some very nice public domain budget collections if not for exactly known for stunning transfers but lately we've seen some rather nice 1080p presentations from 'em and I am impressed with what we get here. Both films licensed from the Sony/Columbia Pictures catalog receive pleasing AVC encodes in their original aspect ratios. Mr. Sardonicus' black and white cinematography is crisp and finely detailed with a nice grayscale and decent contrast levels, the print is not pristine and we do get the occasional white speckle but overall this is a fantastic presentation. The Brotherhood of Satan is presented in wonderful color, it's not exactly stunning but there's some nice film grain intact and along with it a pleasing amount of fine detail, it's a very attractive presentation. 

The double feature disc sports English DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 with Optional SDH French and English Subtitles for both films and while it's free of annoying hiss, crackle and pops it's flat and pretty narrow in it's range, it's  acceptable and Von Dexter's eerie score for Mr. Sardonicus comes through quite nicely. The disc is bare-bones affair and there are no special features included but a very nice transfer and acceptable audio are much appreciated. 

Verdict: After the fantastic Happy Birthday to Me/When a Stranger Calls double feature Blu-ray this is my favorite Mill Creek title to date, a great 1080p transfer for two fantastic tales of terror! The Brotherhood of Satan is the highlight here, a colorfully creepy slice of satanic cinema that would make a great double-feature with Race with the Devil (1975). This budget-minded release gets a high recommend, so dig in! 4 Outta 5