Devil Times Five Times Four

I've figured it's time to reach back into the vaults of Code Red to pick out another cool, cult release; and when I stumbled across the same title in one of those Mill Creek 50 packs, I knew this would make a great comparison piece. The film is 1974's Devil Times Five, one I was particularly interested in since it features my favorite kind of movie monster: children! Code Red released this all the way back in 2006, when they were working with Media Blasters, and later re-released it in 2009, but I'll come to that later. Mill Creek, meanwhile, has included this in a number of their jumbo horror movie collection sets, but the particular one I've got is their Chilling Classics box of 12 double-sided discs. Now, the Chilling Classics box technically came out first, but Mill Creek has this strange habit of swapping out some titles for others over the years (presumably as rights ownerships change) but without changing the set title or online listings. So I'm not sure if Mill Creek got a hold of it before or after Code Red, and more importantly, if you order Chilling Classics from Amazon or someplace, there's about a 50/50 chance you'll get the version with Devil Times Five, as opposed to another which replaced several titles including Devil with others.

Update 7/30/15 - 6/10/16: Oh boy, it's time to step it up again! Code Red has just re-released this movie (making it their third time), with an all new blu-ray edition. Is it worth the double-(or tripe- or quadruple-, depending where you are with this movie) dip? Let's get into it, people!

Update 11/28/24: Now the Devil has changed hands again, and Vinegar Syndrome is issuing a new release for 2024.  They've restored it to 4k, issued it on UHD, and cooked up some new special features.  Does this movie deserve it?  I don't know, but it sure is fun!

So, I wasn't kidding when I said kids are my favorite movie monster. Forget zombies, forget vampires. Give me little kids turned rampant murders any day. The obvious mainstream examples would include Village Of the Damned and The Omen, which I'm all for, but I really love the crazier indie ones like Who Can Kill a Child, The Children, Bloody Birthday, Cathy's Curse, Bad Ronald, or Julie Darling. Heh, I think I just gave you hints of about six or seven reviews you can expect to see on this site in the future. Oh man, I'm so on board for a bunch of cute little kids on the rampage. And Devil Times Five? Well, it's not as good as any of those movies... in fact, objectively speaking, you probably couldn't call it a good movie at all. But it's got its moments, and those moments are enough to make this worth seeing, especially if you're predisposed to the obscure killer children subgenre like I am.

There's a scene with a mentally challenged character, ham-fistedly overplayed in an Of Mice and Men "aw, shucks" kind of way. And when this attractive married women visits the house, she randomly decides to invite him into her room to seduce him, laughing as she tells him to pull down his pants. Lord knows why, the only explanation seems to be that she's an alcoholic so this sort of activity is in her daily wheelhouse. Anyway, as the guy strips down to old western movie style long underwear, an attractive blonde woman walks into the bedroom and demands to know what's going on. The brunette says, "I've had him before, and I can have him any... time... I... want." So the blonde woman yells, "you bitch!" grabs her, and they wrestle on the floor as very dramatic action music with blaring horns kicks in. Then a third woman walks in (the long underwear guy has just quietly stepped out of the room at this point), and at this point the two fighting women's robes have opened in the standard, sleazy exploitation kind of way, and the fight stops and the blonde goes, "we were just having a little... fun?" And the third woman says, "whatever turns you on honey," brushes her hair and leaves the room. End scene. And none of that has any bearing on the rest of the story whatsoever. Did I mention that this wasn't an objectively good movie?

Anyway, eventually some kids - who've been wandering around the woods since the bus taking them to an asylum crashed - show up and start killing all the people who stay at the house one by one. Again, this isn't anywhere near the same level as, say, Who Can Kill a Child, which is a genuinely pretty great film. It's all kind of amateurish, but it gets entertainingly weird, with some great kills and odd-ball scenes. There's a bit of a Neon Maniacs feel to things, as each of the kids as an over-the-top identity: one boy acts like a soldier, carries a toy gun and has his own military marching band theme in the soundtrack, another one dresses and acts like a nun. A third is child pop star Leif Garrett who turns out to have a cross-dressing fetish. Of course, there's five all together, hence the title. It has a low budget, almost home made feel much of the time, despite featuring a number of recognizable television actors like Sorrell Booke, a.k.a. Boss Hog on The Dukes of Hazard. But for my money, it's not the campy laughable moments that make this movie (though there's some fun to be mined from there, too) but the dark, demented moments that really stand out as genuinely powerful despite the goofiness of the rest of the film.

1) 2005 Mill Creek DVD; 2) 2006 Code Red DVD; 3) 2016 Code Red BD;
4) 2024 Vinegar Syndrome BD; 5) 2024 Vinegar Syndrome UHD.

One mark against Mill Creek's version is that they've added a watermark (boo!) that occasionally fades in and out of the lower right corner of the picture. Yuck. I understand Mill Creek has given up this practice, but it's common on their older discs.

About the only thing Mill Creek has going in its favor is that it's open matte. Mill Creek's is full-screen, while Code Red has matted the picture down to an anamorphic 1.78:1 widescreen on both their DVD and blu. It's not a question of additional info gained on the sides, but rather lost on the top and bottom. And I guess there's some contention about the aspect ratio being either 1.78 or 1.33, because people complained, and in 2009, Code Red re-released Devil Times Five open matte in a double bill with Mark Of the Witch, but missing all the extras.  Vinegar Syndrome, meanwhile, has come down on a more likely side of 1.85:1, which mattes the image slightly more, but also reveals a smidgen more along the sides.

Otherwise, it's not exactly a photo finish in terms of which label beats out which. Both DVD transfers seem to be from the same print, as evidenced by the weird bit of damage that pops up in a single frame in the top set of shots. But only Mill Creek has the very serious interlacing problem, as seen in the second set of shots. There's actually very little print damage on hand, by the way, that frame is a rare instance of anything bigger than a small speck, but it shows both companies started at the same place. And the back of Code Red's case tells us their transfer is from "original 35mm elements." Mill Creek's looks dark and murky, while Code Red's is much more colorful and clear. Detail is lacking in both though.

Code Red's DVD is clearly a new scan far ahead of Mill Creek's, but their blu, which we're told is a new 2k scan of the original negatives, is so much more alive and photo realistic! The film has come a long way in HD. Vinegar Syndrome's blu is another step forward, especially on the UHD, but there's less less ground for improvement.  Still, even just comparing the BDs, grain is more thoroughly captured and looks like true film.  Very fine detail is clearer, too - like the veins of his eyes in the first set of shots - BD to BD, and especially on the UHD.  The increased resolution also gives more rounded edges and reduced pixelation when you zoom in further.

As for audio, Code Red's blu has some soft fuzz to it, but the mono audio track is otherwise very distinct, with clear, easily discernible dialogue and music.  It's also lossless DTS-HD, putting it ahead of both DVDs.  Vinegar Syndrome's is DTS-HD, too, but sounds a little more robust.  They've also added optional English subtitles for the first time ever.

And Code Red came up with some great extras for this. There's a terrific audio commentary by producer Michael Blowitz, director #2 David Sheldon (Grizzly, Just Before Dawn) and actresses: Joan McCall and Dawn Lyn. They're all enthusiastic, have some good memories of the production, and thanks to a good moderator, answer a lot of the questions viewers will be bound to have after watching this film. A key thing we learn is that the original director was deemed to be shooting too slow, so was taken off the film and replaced by another director, and big sections of the script were "torn out," leaving key plot points and things unexplained. So that's why you have stuff like that crazy cat-fight I described earlier that doesn't fit into the story - it was filmed later in LA and not part of the original screenplay. I think it's safe to say all the good, compelling content was by the original director and the campier, more laughable stuff was the later guys. It's too bad... I would've loved to have seen the film completed as it was originally intended; but I can't deny that some of the new stuff isn't entertaining in a different way, and the mish-mash of the two makes for a more bizarre, possibly more memorable, film.

Then there's on-camera interviews with all four commentary participants plus actor Tierre Turner. They're all edited into a featurette that runs a little over twenty minutes and is pretty informative, plus it's neat to see the little soldier boy all grown up and laughing about this crazy film he made. Then there's an alternate opening title using the Devil Times Five title card (which is the one on the Mill Creek transfer), since the one on the film uses The Horrible House On the Hill. Plus there's also a cool theatrical trailer ("The Devil Times Five leaves nobody alive!"), a very short poster gallery and six bonus Code Red trailers. AND there are three easter eggs with extra footage from the interviews, which are fairly substantial by easter egg standards, so be sure to hunt those down (they're not hard to find). The Mill Creek set, of course, has no extras.

Code Red's blu carries pretty much everything over from their special edition DVD. The commentary's here, the interview's here, the trailer's here, and the Easter Eggs are now plainly on the menu as "Bonus Interviews." The only things missing are the alternate title card, gallery and Code Red bonus trailers, and who cares about those?

Happily, Vinegar Syndrome retains all of the Code Red extras, so if you missed their release at the time, you don't have to drive yourself nuts trying to find a copy on EBay to fill out your special edition.  And they've come up with new stuff, including an audio commentary by The Hysteria Continues gang.  I feel like the results are always mixed with these guys, and if I wasn't giving this disc a proper review, I probably would've skipped the track.  But there are some good parts.  There's your usual mix of childhood anecdotes, opinions and stuff you won't care about unless you know these people personally.  And they throw out a lot of half-researched rumors, like speculating that the director's girlfriend, who plays the nun, was underage at the time (no, she was in her mid-twenties, which they'd have known if they'd listened to the Code Red extras).  But they - mostly the main guy, the British author - did dig up some vintage reviews that he reads from and throws in some actual facts.  It's honestly not bad and overall better than I went in expecting.  Give it a listen if you're in the mood.

Much better though, are the new on-camera interviews.  The second AD actually has some great memories, including one very interesting story none of the other special features hint at.  And the son of the executive producer was a kid at the time of filming and hung out with the "Five" on-set, so he has some fun memories.  Then, finally Stephen Thrower comes on for a deep dive into the original director's career and an appraisal of his work on this (especially interesting since the people in the Code Red extras are constantly throwing the director under the bus).  Honestly, these days, Thrower is the film expert for cult titles.  Usually when I see an expert commentary or interview on a horror title, I roll my eyes, because they tend to be so lazy, indulgent and no more informed than the casual viewer.  But I've learned never to skip a Thrower.

Anyway, VS has also brought back the alternate title card that Code Red dropped.  Their release comes in an embossed slipcover, though I don't care for the art style on this one, and reversible cover art with the original poster on the flip.

The infamous, slow motion black and white sequence.

Man, I don't know who complained about the matting (well, actually I think I do... there are a couple Amazon reviews and a guy who posted on the Latarnia forums). Surely the film was shot full-frame with the intention to matte it to 1.85 or so for theatrical exhibition, like pretty much every movie from that time. So, sure, there's a bit of curiosity value for the hardcore film lover to see the fullframe version and discover the odd little detail here and there. But I'll take the widescreen OAR any day. Couple that with the surprisingly compelling collection of extras and vastly improved transfer, and that makes the Vinegar Syndrome's new Devil Times Five the definitive choice by a wide margin. Though I guess it's nice that the full-frame versions are out there as an option; maybe there are a couple hardcore fans out there who feel they need both. And if that's you, I'd recommend the Code Red double bill over the crummy Mill Creek discs unless you're buying one of their boxed sets already anyway.

Cathy's Curse, Huzzah!!

Oh man, I have been waiting for this release!  It's been killing me that there's no special edition, or even halfway decent release of Cathy's Curse ever since I fell in love with it in one of those generic 50 Movie Pack DVD sets.  Specifically, it's Chilling Classics from Mill Creek, which I still own, so we can have us a comparison.  Because boy, wait 'till you see the difference!  The Mill Creek DVD isn't just barebones, it's cut, interlaced, fullscreen, soft, stretched, damaged, watermarked, and orange... oh, so orange.  Happily, Severin has arrived to save the day at last with their brand new blu-ray release.

Update 5/25/17:  But is this extended version of Cathy's Curse still cut?  Apparently this film still has some missing footage...

Update 9/14/17: Resolved! I'm now pleased to report that this extended version of Cathy's Curse is indeed completely uncut. But read on for the story of the supposedly missing footage.

Update 6/2/24: And now Cathy's Curse is in 4k!  Severin has returned to this crazy film with a new scan and UHD release.

Now, when I say I fell in love with Cathy's Curse, that doesn't mean it's some great film.  It's kind of a mess.  But it's a delightful, endlessly entertaining mess.  If you're a fan of Beyond the Door, and enjoyed the little foul-mouthed kids, then this movie is gonna be like Christmas for you.  Conceptually, it's closer to Beyond the Door 2 (the Bava one), focusing on one possessed kid and a lot of weird issues; but tonally it's closer to the original.  It's not Italian, though; it's Canadian.  But it's just as light on coherence and sense as the best of Fulci.  The only thing it's lacking, which would've made this a much better known cult film, is a few over-the-top gore scenes.

I'm guessing S.C. stands for Sinister Cinema, who once released this film on VHS.

Now, I had to do a little research outside the film to put this together, because the film's back-story is confusing as heck.  But essentially this film is about a guy named George.  As a kid, his mother ran off with him, leaving behind his father and sister, who immediately proceed to die in a car wreck.  Decades later, in present day 1979, George returns to his family home with his wife, who just so happens to have a habit of suffering nervous breakdowns, and his daughter Cathy, who immediately gets cursed by George's late sister.  This curse essentially makes her act like a rotten brat, but one who can back it up with a cavalcade of supernatural powers.  Soon, everybody's getting tormented in one random way after another, except for George, who can't understand what everybody's always so upset about.

And I mentioned that all previous releases of Cathy's Curse were cut, right?  Yeah, they're not censored for sex or violence or anything; they've just had about ten minutes removed, making the movie even more incomprehensible.  The extended cut isn't much better in that regard, but it is a bit, and also has some amusing extra bits of dialogue, so is probably the superior version of the film.  Severin doesn't make us choose, though; they've included both cuts.  The shorter, cut version doesn't have anything unique to it, though, except for a couple of title cards to attempt to make up for the exposition they cut.

A scene only in the full, director's cut.

But thanks to a helpful anonymous commentor (see below), it turns out there was still possibly more to be seen from this odd, little film.  He pointed out that a 1985 Comet Video compilation film called Terror On Tape included a gruesome shot from Cathy's Curse not seen on the Mill Creek or Severin discs, and he's quite right!  Terror On Tape is a direct-to-VHS film in the vein of Terror In the Aisles, The Best Of Sex and Violence or Zombiethon, where it's really just a clip show of a bunch of horror films with a little wrap-around to it.  In this case, the wrap-around stars Cameron Mitchell as a bit of a ghoul who runs the Shoppe of Horrors Video Store, where people come in seeking recommendations and he shows them gruesome selections from his movies.  And one film they show a solid four minutes to is Cathy's Curse.  Everything they show is what can be seen in previous versions except for the scene where Cathy "pushes" the old lady out of a window and her mother rushes up to the body in their lawn.  In Terror On Tape, there's an extra shot: a close-up of the woman's head where blood spurts out the top of it!  Then the next shot is the mother running to the body and it's the same as every other release.

Cathy's Curse deleted scene?!

Now, it did occur to me that maybe the Terror On Tape editor took some liberties and edited in a shot from one of the other Continental VHS films they feature, like Nightmare City or Return of the Alien's Deadly Spawn.  Terror does proceed to show other clips from Cathy's Curse after this one, jumping about from one moment to another with no transition (except at the end, when Mitchell says, "just a second, I've got to show you what she does to her mother!").  So maybe Terror decided to spice the clip up with a shot from something else?  Watching the whole movie, they don't seem to goose up any of the other films they highlight, but looking back at that whole scene in Cathy's Curse, it is a very awkward edit there, so it does look like it could be a cut to an insert shot...

And thanks to another helpful commentor - ciasisback - the source of that footage has been found!  It is indeed an insert shot of gore taken from another movie.  Another movie featured in Terror On Tape, even.  It's a quick snippet from when the zombies violently raid the television dance studio in Nightmare City.  So apparently Terror did have a little fun with Cathy, and actually, it's not a bad creative decision.  But it's nice to know that the Severin blu of Cathy's Curse is complete and totally uncut.

as seen in Terror On Tape

So Cathy's Curse has been released on DVD a bunch of times before, actually.  But it's always been by budget labels like Brentwood, Alpha Digital and Mill Creek, and usually in multi-disc collections like my Chilling Classics box.  Severin is the first to even come close to giving it a respectable disc, and they've actually come through for the film in spades.  Their 2017 blu saw both cuts fully restored in widescreen HD with a 2k scan from "recently found film elements," and as you can see, the difference is night and day.  Of course, the distinction is helped a lot by the fact that the DVD version may well be the worst digital transfer I've ever seen in my life.  But still, the blu looks great in its own right.  That's not to say there wasn't more room for improvement, though, and we got there this week with an all new 4k scan (yes, of both cuts) from "the recently discovered negatives," in an even more impressive BD/ UHD combo-pack.

1) 2005 Mill Creek DVD; 2) 2017 Severin BD;
3) 2024 Severin BD; 4) 2024 Severin UHD.

So, the Mill Creek DVD is presented in about 1.30:1, looking vertically stretched and cutting off the sides.  If I push myself to find one nice thing to say about it, it's at least slightly open matte, so it shows a little extra vertical information for the curiosity seekers among us.  The 2017 blu, on the other hand, is slightly letterboxed to 1.85:1.  I already listed all the major problems with the DVD in the opening paragraph, and I'm glad to report Severin doesn't have a single one of those issues.  Among a million other improvements, we can finally see what color things are supposed to be.  And the DVD isn't just interlaced, it looks like it was originally interlaced and then badly de-interlaced so it was left with ghosting frames, and then copied with additional interlacing on top of that, leaving motion with an almost spacey look.  Now it looks like an actual movie with a pretty smart looking transfer.  Blacks are a little milky and crushed; I'm guessing the "found film elements" were a generation or two after the original negatives.  But I can't imagine anyone being at all disappointed with this.  Really, who thought we'd ever see Cathy's Curse looking so good?

Still, why settle?  Now Severin has given us a 4k scan of the negatives.  The framing is still 1.85:1, though it's ever so slightly tighter all around.  But the colors are richer with more natural skin tones and the blacks are deeper and more natural.  Film grain is clearer and more filmic even on the BD.  And then on the UHD, it's really captured thoroughly, even in background areas where it's still a little soft on the blu.  And the colors are even more vibrant, with particularly strong reds.  Even a quick once glance at the comparison shots shows a slightly faded, washed look to the 2017 BD (and an extreme one to the DVD, of course), which the new release solves.

Curiously, the back of Severin's 2017 case promises English, French, Italian and Spanish audio; but really both versions on both sets (that is to say, the 2017 and 2024) just have the original English mono track in DTS-HD 2.0.  Optional English subtitles are also included on all three discs for both cuts.

And for the first time, Cathy's Curse has extras!  Good ones, too.  We get a 20-minute on-camera interview with the director, in French with English subtitles.  And we get a featurette with the actress who played Cathy (she says, "don't see this movie, it is not worth your time;" but she is so wrong!), and her mom who did costumes for the film.  There's also a short introduction to the film from some screening, where the host dresses as Cathy.  And there's a fan commentary (on the shorter cut) by a couple critics who helped convince Severin to restore this film, which is pretty amiable for that kind of commentary.  There's also the trailer, and if you pre-ordered the film direct from Severin, you got a nice 12"x18" poster as well.  In fact, you could really go all out and order their "Cursed Bundle," which includes a signed copy (by the director), the poster, a glow-in-the-dark t-shirt, a mask(!), a pin, "and some creepy crawlies," whatever the heck that means.

The new 2024 set keeps all of the 2017 stuff, and comes up with more, chiefly a new on-camera interview with the actor who plays the father.  There's also a silly new, 10-page booklet called The Darkest Double Dip, and it includes has reversible artwork.  What's more, if you order it directly from Severin, you can also get a fancy slipcover with light-up eyes.

I'm thrilled to see this film restored - twice even! - but do I recommend it?  Not if you're looking for a top notch, genuinely scary horror movie.  The Exorcist, this ain't.  Mainstream viewers will just see a stilted, cheesy, low budget mess with sub-par acting and effects.  Cathy's Curse is only for the kind of fan who sees the charm in offbeat cult flicks.  But if that's you, you're gonna love it.  And if you did love the blu, you'll be happy with the new double-dip.

Oh, and if you're wondering: The Alpha Incident isn't nearly on the same level as Cathy's Curse, but it has an absorbing premise and one pretty neat scene.

The Night Of the Living Dead Never Dies

George Romero's Night Of the Living Dead (1968) is a true horror classic.  And because it was inadvertently let into the public domain, it's been released on home video a bajillion times.  So, I thought I'd just quickly look at about half a bajillion: the best editions, the worst, releases with unique special features, a few crazy oddities, separate documentary discs and pretty much everything you need to assemble as complete, a definitive experience as you could ever want.  Actually, maybe this won't end up being so quick.

Update 8/21/18 - 1/3/20: I've added another stand-along NotLD feature documentary to the fire... one that turned out to be surprisingly rewarding!  It's called Autopsy Of the Dead, and if you're a serious Living Dead fan, you'll want to get acquainted with it.  ...Also, I wasn't sure if this was worth bumping up to the top of the site, but in my massive fit of site updates, I've also added the latest Arrow blu-ray to the Annie Hall page.

Update 10/6/22: Further proof that Night Of the Living Dead never dies: another new upgrade.  This time Criterion has reissued their 2018 4k remaster onto a genuine UHD disc.

Update 8/19/24: For Update Week 2024, I've risen three more Night Of the Living Dead DVDs from their graves. Specifically, we've got what I think might be the oldest, first DVD release of the film, 1998's Madacy disc.  Then we've got a random triple feature public domain disc from a label called Dreamline, and then we've got one of the more important US DVDs, the 2009 40th Anniversary special edition (the SD partner to their blu-ray release, which I've already included) from Dimension Films.

I find my opinion swinging back and forth on Night Of the Living Dead.  Honestly, I've been more excited to add some of the later entries in Romero's Dead series to my collection than Night.  Obviously, it deserves all the credit for being the original, not just in Romero's saga, but an entire cultural movement of zombie horror.  It created it all.  Sure, "zombies" were around in cinema before, from White Zombie to I Walked With a Zombie; but these specific flesh-eating ghouls and rules like "shoot them in the head" were pretty unique to Night and still rather doggedly followed by endless amounts of film, television and literature to this day, some forty years later.  Sure, there are progenitors.  For example, the whole "board yourself up in a house and go stir crazy to survive the hordes of marauding monsters that want to eat you" premise certainly borrows from 1964's The Last Man On Earth.  But I doubt any horror film, even the classic Universals, have been so heavily and frequently borrowed from as Night Of the Living Dead.

But there's also what I've always called a "dinner theater" aspect to Night that tends to put me off.  Sure, long, heavy-handed speeches about whether it's better to hide in one location or another have turned up in many subsequent films - certainly the guys in Day were willing to go even broader than anyone here.  But there's just something about that painted on bruise on Karl Hardman's head while he flails around shouting at Keith Wayne that feels like something less than a proper movie, like the difference between a local playhouse and Broadway.  Not that all the acting's bad - Duane Jones absolutely nails it in this picture, and even Hardman is actually successfully achieving an intentional sort of 12 Angry Men over-the-top pre-method stagey sort of performance that older films typically utilized before pure naturalism came into vogue.  It's not bad acting, it's just a different style.  But it's not consistent and even when it is, it's not always so easy for modern audiences to get engrossed in.  Like, for all it's campy faults, I can pop in the slick Land Of the Dead anytime.  But ask me if I want to watch Night and it's like, uh, I don't know if I want to sit down for all of that.

But then again, my most recent watch of the Museum of Modern Art's new 4k restoration was as breezy and involving as the film's ever been for me, and I started to appreciate how much tighter and purer this story was (with its pitch perfect ending) compared to any of its legit or unauthorized sequels.  Thinking about it, at least part of my reluctance to go back to the original Night probably stems from its long history of fuzzy, low contrast junk transfers it's had for so many decades.  The film slipped into the public domain early on, so every label and it's cousin has released the film, each usually in worse condition than the other.  And that brings me to the meat of this article.  You know, I can still remember watching Elite's highly touted restored laserdisc edition in the 90s... it starts out with the gray, soft image and the music warbling, and suddenly the picture explodes to reveal a fresh, attractively clear repeat of the same opening sequence.  I'm just going to stick to DVDs and blu-rays today; but if you're disappointed that's not going back far enough, don't worry - I've got a couple DVDs that don't half measure up to that old laser.

There's an overwhelming amount to cover here; this is going to be my longest single post ever.  But let's just start with some visual comparisons so we can sink our teeth in.

1998 US Madacy DVD.

1999 US Anchor Bay 30th Anniversary DVD, '98 Edition.

1999 US Anchor Bay 30th Anniversary DVD, 30th Anniversary Edition.

2001 US Front Row Features DVD.

2002 US Echo Bridge DVD.

2002 US Elite Entertainment Millennium Edition DVD.

2004 US Legend Films DVD, All New Color Version.

2004 US Legend Films DVD, Restored Black-and-White Version.

2005 US Mill Creek Chilling 20 Movie Pack DVD.

2007 US Dreamline DVD.

2009 US Dimension DVD.

2009 US Legend Films Rifftrax DVD.

2010 Japan Happinet blu-ray, The 40th Anniversary Re-Issue.

2013 US Code Red 2 Great Brother-Horrors DVD.

2018 US Criterion Collection blu-ray.

2018 US Criterion Collection blu-ray, Night of Anubis work-print edit.

2022 US Criterion Collection UHD.

Oh boy, that's a lot of versions to even wrap your mind around.  So let's just run through each of them quickly, shall we?

We start out with Madacy's 1998 DVD, which is mostly fullframe, but at 1.31:1 fullframe also has a black bar along the top for whatever reason.  It's interlaced and just generally faded and washed out compared to our next disc, Anchor Bay's 1999 30th Anniversary Edition.  Specifically, mine is the limited edition version (my copy is #02643/ 15,000... remember when 15,000 copies was considered "limited?"), which is different in that it also includes the soundtrack CD.  A non-limited edition also exists in a slimmer case without the CD, but the same cover, DVD and booklet.  This version is infamous because it features 15 minutes of new scenes shot by John Russo and other original personal of the 1968 film, including Bill Hinzman reprising his role as the original graveyard zombie, edited into the film.  It also has a new score and makes some other editorial changes (the radio broadcast is re-voiced with alternate dialogue).  I almost considered leaving this one out, for a separate post, but it also includes what they call the "'98 Edition," which is the original cut of the film, without the new scenes, but does feature the new score.

The original graveyard zombie is back!

Apparently, Romero was originally meant to have done these new scenes, too, but was caught up writing his Resident Evil script, though I wouldn't be surprised if that was just a convenient excuse to skip out on this misguided endeavor.  The new scenes are terribly written and acted, derailing the thrust of the original film.  The new score made sense in theory, since they'd always wanted to record an original score but were forced by budget constraints to use library music.  Unfortunately, the new score is slow and unrelenting piano plodding on for the entire run and not a fraction as effective as the original soundtrack.  And interestingly, in the extras, they make additional claims like, "when Duane was beating those two zombies out by the truck, all of those effects for this 30th anniversary edition have been enhanced and are much better than they were in the original picture itself."  But that's just not true.  I examined still frames of that scene very carefully, and they didn't change a thing.  Just bizarre.

l to r: Front Row Features, Echo Bridge.

Next up we've got a couple of no frills budget discs from some a collection of cheapo labels: Front Row, Echo Bridge, Mill Creek and Dreamline.  The Mill Creek is part of a 20 Movie Pack set.  These are barebones with transfers worse than the laserdisc.  I like how Echo Bridge even ripped off Front Row's ridiculously cheesy menus with the random fire and electro bolt animations, but bothered to make some minor changes, replacing the purple arrow with a ghost and removing the title of the film.  These are the worst of the worst, which I've mostly just included to show how far the new editions have come.  But it's interesting to note that these transfers aren't identical either, and we'll get into those differences a little later.

Then we come to the Millennium Edition from Elite, the same company that did the laserdisc restoration, and for a very long time was the go-to edition of Night Of the Living Dead.  With the best PQ and a host of quality extras, even though this came out back in 2002, it remained the king until basically the days of HD.

Code Red goes bonkers!

After that we have the Legend and Rifftrax DVDs.  The original Legend disc has an optional audio commentary by Mike Nelson of Rifftrax, but is decidedly not the "rifftrax."  More on that later.  The notable feature of that one is that it features their unique colorized version (past colorizations on VHS were made by different companies and feature distinctly different palette choices).  It also has the film in black and white as well.  Then there's the actual Rifftrax DVD, which came out five years later with the actual rifftrax featuring Mike, Kevin Nelson and Bill Corbett.  It bears inclusion because it does offer the option to watch the film with its original audio, sans riffing.

And the last of the DVDs, then, is Code Red's wacky 2 Great Brother Horrors double-feature, which pairs Night up with I Eat Your Skin.  It re-dubs the film Night Of the Livin' Deadz, inexplicably crops both films to 2.35:1, and presents them in "Lollipop Covermation," which essentially means laying various color filters over the the films.  It also includes random commercials between the movies, because I guess this is meant to be a "party disc," and has an animated menu of a toilet bowl.  I did promise you oddities, didn't I?

Finally, we've got the two leading blu-rays in the NotLD field: Japan's Happinet disc which was the best you could get for a long time, and this summer's fancy new 4k restoration from Criterion.  Criterion's disc also includes a second, workprint cut.  So okay, let me quickly talk about that.  People were clamoring for the workprint ever since Romero announced at a festival that he found the long-lost 9 minutes of footage that distributors pushed him to cut from the film upon its initial release (when the notorious jump cut happens in the basement).  So when Criterion announced their upcoming release, people kept hitting them for the workprint - will we finally get to see that famous lost footage?  Well, turns out Romero was somehow mistaken, or there was some misreporting, and the lost footage is still lost.  But with more than half their customer base demanding the workprint, Criterion gave us the workprint so they wouldn't get chucked overboard by ravenous fans.  It just doesn't have the lost footage and the same jump cut happens at the same point in the workprint.  So it's really a non-event.  I guess it's interesting to see as a curiosity piece; they do show the full open matte, so we can really see the edges of the frames, which will be relevant to this post a little further down.

1998 US Madacy DVD.

1999 US Anchor Bay 30th Anniversary DVD, '98 Edition.

[The 30th Anniversary Edition cuts this portion out of their edit.]

2001 US Front Row Features DVD.

2002 US Echo Bridge DVD.

2002 US Elite Entertainment Millennium Edition DVD.

2004 US Legend Films DVD, All New Color Version.

2004 US Legend Films DVD, Restored Black-and-White Version.

2005 US Mill Creek Chilling 20 Movie Pack DVD.

2007 US Dreamline DVD.

2009 US Dimension DVD.

2009 US Legend Films Rifftrax DVD.

2010 Japan Happinet blu-ray, The 40th Anniversary Re-Issue.

2013 US Code Red 2 Great Brother-Horrors DVD.

2018 US Criterion Collection blu-ray.

2018 US Criterion Collection blu-ray, Night of Anubis work-print edit.

2022 US Criterion Collection UHD.

So let's really sink our teeth into the PQ.  Let's begin with the AR, because I think there's an important point to be looked at here in terms of the latest remaster.  To start with, most of the transfers, naturally, are fullscreen, at the 1.33:1 ratio.  Code Red's 2.35:1 is of course not the correct ratio at all, and crops a whole ton of vertical information, though interestingly they justify it on their packaging by saying, "Code Red is proud to present this classic motion picture in 2.35:1 Letterbox as many Asian countries viewed it that way."  Well, okay.  Anyway, it's just a novelty.  But interestingly, Criterion widens their framing just slightly to 1.37:1, which they call "its original aspect ratio" (the workprint is also in 1.37 if you crop away the non-picture elements around the edges, and reveals just an extra sliver more).  I'm not even going to touch the debate about whether the film should actually be matted widescreen as many have argued for years, but I am interested in the difference between the 1.37 and 1.33 for one particular reason.

This one's from Criterion's blu, for the record.

Look at the bottom left-hand corner of the screenshot above.  See that light, fuzzy spot?  That's not part of the gravestone or the edge something in the foreground.  It's actually an interesting little flaw that plagues various scenes in this picture.  Look at the previous comparisons shots of the car: there it's bigger and dark.  Look in the comparison shots of Judy Riley coming out of the cellar: there it's in the upper left-hand corner.  You might think oh that's just a shadow on the wall, but no, it moves with the camera as it pans.  And various other scenes in this film have these corner intrusions, too.  None of the extras on any release mention it, but if I were to get presumptuous for a moment, I'd guess we're seeing the lens hood?  The workprint actually gives us the best look at these flaws, as they show the entire edges of the film.  But now look at Happinet's blu-ray comparison shots, which are 1.33:1.  They zoom in a bit, which most people have regularly written off as a slight drawback of an otherwise excellent edition.  But I can't help but notice that they keep the fullframe ratio while essentially cropping out all those little corner intrusions!  The Legend DVD zooms in similarly, but doesn't frame it to leave those corner obstructions out like Happinet has done.  So I'm just thinking perhaps they've actually nailed the proper AR better than any other release before or since.  I mean, I can't say that for certain... I don't think, at this point, even the original filmmakers could.  And it could just as well be a case of a silver lining coming out of what is essentially a mistake on their part.  But it's something to seriously consider, because some of those corners can get distracting and take you right out of the movie.

Speaking of lower left-hand corners... is that a camera tripod?

Anyway, that's the framing.  How about the rest of the image quality?  Well, the worst offenders are not only the fuzziest, but in the case Echo Bridge, Front Row and Mill Creek, interlaced.  Dreamline actually isn't interlaced, but instead is so overly compressed, multiple frames in a row will routinely turn into splotchy pixelated messes.  The Front Row disc even has an issue keeping its black and white imagery in true gray-scale, having gone a bit green.  Anchor Bay's 30 Anniversary Edition claims to be remastered, but it looks like all they really did is boost the contrast, making the shadows substantially darker.  Also, their '98 Edition is interlaced, though the 30th Anniversary cut on the same disc is not.  Mill Creek's looks particularly low contrast and blandly gray.  And of the DVDs, the Millenium Edition comes basically by virtue of not having any of the flaws the others have: it isn't interlaced, zoomed in, fuzzy, cropped, colored or overly contrasted.

l to r: 2002 US Elite Millennium Edition DVD, 2010 Japan Happinet blu.

But I know, these days, the finer points of the DVDs' PQ don't matter so much now that we're in the age of HD.  So let's leave those behind and just look at the two blu-rays.  And we can naturally discount the workprint as it's incomplete, unattractive with all it's excess junk around the edges and uncleaned damage.  Edits consist of big clunky splices, and the whole thing's really just included as an informational point of interest, not a legit way to watch the film.  And I should also note that the two blus I've got for us today aren't the only blu-ray editions.  There's a flat Mill Creek blu here in the US, and one from Forgotten Films that I almost bought, but now I'm glad I didn't.  And there's a more respected (but OOP and hard to get) Umbrella blu in Australia, and a poorly regarded one in the UK from Optimum, just for a few examples.  But as I mentioned earlier, Happinet has long been regarded as the best blu-ray presentation of Night until this year, when Criterion's release of the MoMA's 4k restoration taken from the original 35mm negative (the first edition to hail directly from those elements) came around to usurp it just this year.

And yes, right away, either blu is a big jump from the DVDs in terms of resolution and clarity.  Even going from the Millenium to the Happinet (which might actually be sourced from the same print), it's a serious boost in photo realism and sharpness.  You can finally see the details of Judy's fingers, which had been smoothed together into one clumsy mitten in SD, or make out the buttons on her jacket.

2010 Japan Happinet blu top; 2018 US Criterion blu bottom.

And there's another nice long step forward between the blus ...most of the time.  As Criterion's booklet tells us, there are points they couldn't use the negative: "[f]or the few sections that proved impossible to scan from that element - approximately 1 percent of the feature film - a 35 mm fine-grain from 1968 was used."  But outside of those moments, the difference is stark.  I mean, just look at that last set of comparison shots.  The image is generally darker, and lower contrast, with the higher resolution confidently finding all the detail and film grain without needing any boosting to clarify it.  Grain was already clear on the Happinet, but it tended to get washed away in the light spots, which definitely doesn't happen on the Criterion.  It's a much more attractive image, and you really notice the gains in the expanded framing (corners aside).  Like, you don't even need me to write anything after seeing those two screenshots; it's the kind of distinction substantial enough to double-dip for.

Audio-wise, of course, we're basically talking about a big pile of mono tracks, except the 30th Anniversary Edition, with its new score and all, was given a 5.1 mix.  And actually, the Millennium Edition gave the original a 5.1 mix.  But pretty much all the blus have kept it nice and pure with just the original mono mix, because, after all, obviously the 1968 film was never made with anything like a 5.1 mix.  A bigger question might be about subtitles, which very few of the releases have, not even the Millennium Edition or 30th Anniversary Editions.  Almost no blu-rays do either.  Well, some, like the Happinet, have foreign language subs, but the ones on the Criterion are pretty much a first.  So that's a nice addition.

ltr: 2022 US Criterion BD; 2022 US Criterion UHD.

Of course, all this pettifogging over BDs feels pretty obsolete in this new age of 4k Ultra High Definition discs.  It's a whole new generation of media.  But it's not a whole new master.  This 2022 UHD is the same 4k restoration Criterion put on their 2018 BD, it's just no longer down-scaled to 1080p.  No, there's no HDR on this.  And it's the same LPCM audio track.  So the difference is all in resolution.  But that is a genuine difference.  Let's take a look at their photo of The Liberty Bell (boy, this really is a Pennsylvanian film) hanging over the piano up in that first set of shots.  Forget about highlights or shadow detail; again, they've done no HDR or adjustments to any of the levels.  But fine detail really is restored.  Not just specks of film grain, look at the flags, which break down to square pixels on the BD, but remain naturally curvaceous and life-like on the UHD.  Heck, look at the edges of the frame on the bottom and left-hand side; it's a real digital mess when you zoom in close enough, but is still so much more photo-realistic on the UHD.

Sure, even that image will break down if you keep zooming in far enough; and there's a serious question of how much you'll actually spot "in motion."  That's where it becomes more a question of your screen size and personal eyesight.  But if you're looking for the best presentation of the film, there's no question that this is now it.

And that brings us to the complicated world of special features.  Here's where some of those off-beat editions might be worth hanging onto, though naturally the bargain discs are all barebones.  The sole exception is an eccentric, patriotic bonus music video, unrelated to any of the films, called "One Nation" by Devon Scott Dicker on the Dreamline disc.  The Legend DVD is interesting, though.  An even bigger selling point than the colorized version of the film, for certain collectors anyway, was certainly the Mike Nelson commentary.  It's kind of an interesting story here.  Legend Films is the company that would go on to produce Rifftrax, but this is pre-Rifftrax.  Serious Rifftrax fans will remember that when they first started, it was just Nelson, and he recorded them solo.  Then, later on, Kevin and Bill joined, and many of those early riffs were re-recorded as "three riffer versions."  But the version on this DVD is neither of those.  Actual Rifftrax, contrary to their name, are written in advance by a team of writers and carefully performed.  The commentary here is literally Nelson riffing it, as in speaking off the cuff.  He jokes some, but it's only sort of a comedy track, half a serious track with info about the film, and a lot of long pauses.  You'll never forget the long stretch of him detailing the recipe for some zombie-themed drink mix.  It's sort of amusing, but I'd really only recommend it for hardcore MST3K/ Rifftrax fans who have to have everything.  It also has a silly "game" where it compares still frames of zombies from the film with stills of celebrities, some bonus trailers and an insert.  ...Then there's the official 2009 Rifftrax DVD, which is the "three riffer version" and a lot more amusing.

Karl Hardman in (outtakes from) The Derelict.

The Millenium Edition has a lot of great stuff that's also more standard fare, and all pretty much ported over from that special edition laserdisc.  There's two great audio commentaries, one by Romero and most of the cast, and a second by Russo and most of the crew.  These are the same commentaries you come across on subsequent releases, including the Happinet and Criterion blus.  It has an interview with Judy Ridley, an audio-only interview with Duane Jones, a clip from There's Always Vanilla, outtakes from a Latent Image film called The Derelict, some of Romero's old TV commercials, a whole ton of stills galleries, an insert with notes by Stephen King and a couple trailers.  Finally, there's a short parody film called Night Of the Living Bread, which is fairly self-explanatory.

The 30th Anniversary DVD has all unique special features, basically because they pertain to a unique version of the film.  There's a little behind-the-scenes featurette, a truly awful music video, and an audio commentary with Russo and the gang where they tell a lot of the same stories from their past commentary, but also throw in some stuff about the new version.  There's also trailers, a gallery, and a clip from Hinzman's horror film Flesh Eater.  It comes with a very nice, little 32-page booklet full of interviews, as well as a regular insert and, if you bought the limited edition, that soundtrack CD.

One For the Fire: The Legacy Of the Living Dead

Here's something really interesting!  The Happinet blu-ray, besides featuring the old laserdisc commentaries and Duane Jones interview, also features an original feature length documentary by Red Shirt Pictures.  It features most of the cast, revisits some old locations, and is probably the best of all the Night Of the Living Dead documentaries (and as you'll see, I've watched 'em all).  It's in HD, though unfortunately interlaced, and I'd say a pretty compelling reason to buy the Happinet release even now in 2018 if you've already got the Criterion.  Honestly, they would've been better off licensing this than bothering with the workprint.

Criterion doesn't have a documentary at all, though they do have a bunch of neat short stuff.  They've got original (silent) dailies, a featurette with Guillermo del Toro, Robert Rodriguez and Frank Darabont talking about Night's influence on them, a long Q&A with Romero at a festival, a really fun featurette interviewing extras who played zombies in the film, an interview with Russo about Image Ten, a "visual essay" on the look of Night, a vintage TV interview with Romero and Don Coscarelli around the time of Dawn, some brief vintage newsreel footage on the shooting of the film, intros to the workprint and dailies which basically explain what workprints and dailies are for the uninitiated, and a really neat featurette on the music used to create the score that goes so far as to show us the original records used.  They've got the Millennium commentaries and Ridley interview.   And one neat thing is that not only do they have the Duane Jones interview, they have a new, longer version of it with portions never before heard.  They've also got a whole bunch of trailers, radio spots, TV spots and even a little news clip about the Venus probe mentioned in the movie.

It doesn't completely replace the Millenium DVD, though, as it doesn't have Night Of the Living Bread or The Derelict's dailies.  So you might want to keep that disc if you have it, though I certainly wouldn't say it's worth double-dipping to go back and get it now.

I was expecting Criterion, if not to get the One For the Fire documentary, to include The Night OF the Living Dead 25th Anniversary documentary, often retitled as Reflections On the Living Dead.  It's not quite as good, but it's close.  They interview all the major players, but go the extra mile by including lots of big names in horror like Wes Craven, Tobe Hooper, Sam Raimi and many more to talk about the film, too.  And it's well edited; they're not just little soundbite cameos.  The one drawback is that it was clearly shot on old, fullscreen cameras in the early 90s, so it's pretty low-fi technically speaking.  I've seen some confused or erroneous listings online, by the way, where some sites mix this up with One For the Fire.  The Umbrella blu-ray features this doc, as well as some old Anchor Bay DVDs.  But the neat thing is now you can get it by itself as a solo release from Tempe DVD, which is a lot cheaper than tracking down the Umbrella disc in 2022.  It's a limited edition DVDR with... unusual reversible cover art.  It's also the longer cut, with a newer Judith O'Dea interview edited into it.  But just about every version you can find, including the Umbrella disc, also feature the longer cut.

Still in the market for even more Night Of the Living Dead coverage?  Well, if you listen to the old laserdisc commentaries (or even the 30th Anniversary commentary), you'll hear the gang refer to a "jamboree" over and over again.  Well, The Zombie Jamboree was a big 25th anniversary NotLD convention, hosted by the filmmakers, and SRS Cinema's Zombie Jamboree is an original documentary John Russo shot (and narrates!) about that convention. It starts out with some pretty standard stuff about the early Image Ten days (really, everybody shows that Calgon commercial!) and the making of NotLD, but then gets into more original material including footage of their panels and Tom Savini taking fans on a tour of the actual Dawn Of the Dead mall.  Then, because it's a big convention, they also wind up including some non-NotLD related stuff, like interviews with Linnea Quigley, Brinke Stevens, and Adam West.  The downsides are that it's only an hour long (I would've liked to see longer coverage of some of those panels!) and was shot on video tape, so it looks and sounds pretty cheap.

And I'd be remiss if I didn't talk about the latest, and surprisingly widely publicized feature length documentary about NotLD, Birth Of the Living Dead from First Run Features.  It's, umm... okay?  Frankly, I was pretty disappointed, and it's not like I came in with big, swinging expectations.  It's got a good interview with Romero, but none of the other cast and crew are interviewed.  Instead they get some pretty bland takes by a handful of critics, fill the gaps with cartoonish animation and feature some really weird footage of a NY school teacher who seems to have built his entire curriculum around showing this movie to young children (I mean, very little kids are shown and discuss all the graphic violence... some so young they can't speak in complete sentences yet.  He should probably actually be fired).  Probably the best part is Elvis Mitchell talking about Duane Jones, but even that doesn't have him saying anything you wouldn't anticipate him saying.  DVD extras include extensive footage of a zombie walk (Yawnsville, USA), a cool, vintage recording of Romero doing a Q&A after the film's premiere screening in the 60s and an extended interview with Romero, which I'd actually recommend instead of the documentary itself.

But actually, the best of these stand-alone DVD documentaries turns out to be one I hadn't heard of until recently, 2009's Autopsy Of the Dead.  One For the Fire is the best NotLD doc overall, with Reflections pulling a respectable second.  But Autopsy does something different.  It's a rather long doc (144 minutes) that focuses on all the minor players.  Sure, this could just be because they couldn't get Romero and the bigger names, but whether by choice or circumstance, they've created a fun, original doc that takes a different look at the same film.  The biggest gets are probably the actress who plays the little girl in the basement, or Hinzman maybe.  But the bulk of this film is dedicated to interviewing the people almost nobody ever talks to: the extras who played zombies and posse members, the locals who owned the property they filmed on, the helicopter pilot, the assistant to the sound mixer who made the cricket sounds for the film, the taxidermist who provided the animal heads in the main house.  What this means is that, after so many of these docs, commentaries and interviews all asking the same people and getting the same answers, this film is filled with all new anecdotes, and provides an even more grassroots insight into the classic.  It's fullscreen and shot in SD, so it isn't nearly as glossy as Birth Of the Living Dead, but that winds up playing into the spirit of this film anyway.  It's scrappy, independent and locally made.  DVD extras include bloopers, an additional interview with Rick Catizone (who animated NotLD's closing credits), an extended look at the filming locations, and an impressive archival collection of props, old trailers, articles and newsreels.

So, let's try to summarize all of this into something manageable.  The Criterion UHD is hands-down the best presentation of the film (though there's still something to be said for Happinet's framing).  The 2020 BD release is a 2-disc set packed with extras, including a lot of the classic DVD extras, and the 2022 UHD is exactly the same 2-discs but with the UHD added to it.  The two BDs, the booklet and everything are unchanged.  And that may well be all you need.  Still, the lack of a solid documentary has me recommending the Happinet disc just for that.  Ever since Criterion came out, you can get the Happinet a lot cheaper, so it makes for a nice supplement.  Just think of it as a One For the Fire blu-ray; you'd buy that for $10, right?

Then, if you still want more, I'd recommend stuff in the following order of most to least: The Rifftrax DVD.  It's funny and something different.  Honestly, the more you watch these NotLD documentaries and extras, the more you're going to hear the same anecdotes told the same way by the same people.  Pretty much all of them have something unique to them, too; but you're going to get pretty sick of hearing them explain over and over how the Duane Jones' role wasn't written with black person in mind, or how each of the Image Ten pitched in some of their own money to get the funding rolling over and over again.  But the Rifftrax is a wholly unique and entertaining supplement.

Then Autopsy Of the Dead, for being the last to really still be full of plenty of unique content.  That one featurette on the Criterion blu interviewing some of the extras does tread on its territory somewhat, otherwise I'd rank this even higher, but it still has a lot to offer you won't find anywhere else.  After that, you really start to get into completist territory.  Next I'd say: Reflections Of the Living Dead, for being the runner-up feature length doc with a bunch of unique interviews with other horror directors.  And you can probably stop there unless you're on a collecting binge.  You might be interested in the 30th Anniversary as an interesting historical artifact, especially with the behind-the-scenes footage and stuff; just be aware that it's terrible.  Zombie Jamboree is also pretty cheesy and crappy, but it's got different, not entirely unamusing, stuff; and the fact that Russo made it himself makes it a little interesting in a way the other NotLD docs can't match.  Then, if you're just throwing cheap stuff in your cart, maybe Birth (more for the DVD extras) and the Millennium DVD for Bread.  No reason to go as far down the road as I did, but I do think getting the latest Criterion release plus one or two other side documentary discs is the way to go for any fan.  After all, Night is a true classic, even if it's arguably a little creaky, and warrants going an extra step or two for.