Following difficulties in his career Mario Bava happened across an idea that would enable him to compete with the younger directors lighting up the Italian box office such as Dario Argento and Sergio Martino.
Rabid Dogs begins as $70,000 of wages are being transferred when the Ajaccio gang hit. With a hail of bullets in a quick raid they speed off in their waiting getaway car. Tough, violent and realistic, Bava’s film ramps up the tension and doesn’t stop as hostages are added and the film builds to its dizzying finale.
Unfolding in real time, a rare device seen only in earlier films such as High Noon and 12 Angry Men yet totally unheard of in Italian cinema at the time, Rabid Dogs is a singular film in Bava’s filmography and one of the greatest crime films of the period.
SPECIAL FEATURES
High Definition (1080p) and Standard Definition DVD presentation of two versions of the film; ‘Rabid Dogs’ – Bava’s original version posthumously completed from his notes & ‘Kidnapped’ – the re-edited, re-dubbed and re-scored version, supervised by Bava’s son and assistant director Lamberto Bava, and producer Alfredo Leone
Original Italian mono audio (uncompressed PCM on the Blu-ray)
Newly translated English subtitles
Audio commentary with Bava biographer Tim Lucas
End of the Road: Making Rabid Dogs and Kidnapped – Featuring Lamberto Bava, Alfredo Leone and star Lea Lander
Bava and Eurocrime – An interview with Umberto Lenzi
SPECIAL 3-DISC EDITION FEATURES:
-High Definition Blu-ray (1080p) and Standard Definition DVD presentation of two versions of the film; ‘Rabid Dogs’ – Bava’s original version posthumously completed from his notes & ‘Kidnapped’ – the re-edited, re-dubbed and re-scored version, supervised by Bava’s son and assistant Lamberto Bava and producer Alfredo Leone
This, at a minimum, is what Kino should have offered on their Kidnapped Blu-ray and they couldn't/wouldn't even put forth the tiny bit of effort to include Bava's original version. Thankfully Arrow has these in the UK, so someone is putting some effort into releasing Bava's titles on Blu-ray.
Even the Anchor Bay DVDs had both cuts of Kidnapped Rabid Dogs.
But the question is, what language is the audio? I assume Italian (I don't recall any versions with an English language track) yet the press release states English SDH subtitles, so that would mean English for English dialogue, wouldn't it?
Unfortunately no suitable material for the new HD transfer of RABID DOGS has been uncovered. Lamberto Bava (assistant director) and Alfredo Leone’s (producer) re-cut of the film, KIDNAPPED has been transferred in High Definition. This version of the film has many differences not common to RABID DOGS so it cannot be simply re-edited to the RABID DOGS version.
After communicating with Lamberto Bava we have discovered the original negative of RABID DOGS was used to edit KIDNAPPED and the off-cuts could not be located and are now presumed either lost or destroyed. Unfortunately the negative was not transferred to another source suitable for HD transfer, no 35mm exhibition prints are known to exist and no other pre-print sources such as an internegative or interpositive have been recovered or known to exist. The original transfer for the Standard Definition RABID DOGS Anchor Bay DVD was a Standard Definition transfer only and the source for that transfer is unknown as the original lab is no longer in operation and whatever material that may have been transferred may have gone with it.
In light of this information from Mr Bava regarding the negative and the lack of suitable materials we have taken the decision to continue with our release of the films. Therefore RABID DOGS will be presented in a mixture of High Definition and Standard Definition in order for the film to be presented in the best quality possible.
RABID DOGS will now be released later in the year so please do keep checking back for a confirmed date which will be announced soon. We thank you all for your understanding and patience with this release.
Commendable of them to reconstruct this into a HD/SD hybrid, instead of just giving us the SD master as an extra (the Kino disc didn't even have the latter!).
I'm absolutely horrified that Lamberto Bava conformed the original negative to his version of the film without preserving his father's original rough cut. Rabid Dogs is a far superior film to Kidnapped, and the differences in editing are such that Arrow will have to either keep entire scenes in SD, or sometimes switch sources from shot to shot. Sadly, the last shot of Rabid Dogs (one of the major omissions from Kidnapped) exists in the current SD transfer in noticeably poorer quality to the rest of the film, closer to VHS than DVD. It's also likely that Arrow will have to use the entire audio track from the SD source due to the awful score Stelvio Cipriani composed for Kidnapped to replace his excellent original cues.
It's almost as bad as if Lisa and the Devil had to be cobbled together using an HD transfer of House of Exorcism. That may be something of an exaggeration, but not as much as I'd like it to be. If the film elements for Mario Bava's original version of the film are really gone it will be a tremendous loss.
I'm sure Arrow will do the best they can with what they have, but it's a very disappointing development to say the least.
We finally signed off RABID DOGS today (woohoo!) but we can't confirm a release date til the BBFC confirm the rating. But in the meantime here are the final specs, don't under estimate the booklet, at 8,000 words it's a real corker and contains a nice surprise!
SPECIAL 3-DISC EDITION CONTENTS:
- High Definition Blu-ray (1080p) and Standard Definition DVD presentation of ‘Rabid Dogs’ – Bava’s original version posthumously completed from his notes & ‘Kidnapped’ – the re-edited, re-dubbed and re-scored version, supervised by Bava’s son and assistant Lamberto Bava and producer Alfredo Leone
- Original Italian mono audio (uncompressed PCM on the Blu-ray)
- Newly translated English subtitles
- Audio Commentary with Bava biographer and expert Tim Lucas
- End of the Road: The Making of Rabid Dogs – A documentary featurette including interviews with Lamberto Bava, Alfredo Leone and star Lea Lander
- Bava and Eurocrime – An interview with Umberto Lenzi
- Alternate Semaforo Rosso version opening title sequence
- Collector’s booklet featuring new writing on the film by Stephen Thrower, Peter Blumenstock on the history of the film’s first distribution and more!
I'll be very interested to see how they've cobbled together an HD presentation of the Rabid Dogs cut. I dearly hope that usable film elements come to light one day. For the film elements of Mario Bava's edit to be lost within a decade of their recovery from limbo is an absolute travesty.
