159 Bloody Terror: The Shocking Cinema of Norman J Warren 1976-1987

[MichaelB]

Full specs announced:

Satan's Slave



Prey



Terror



Inseminoid



Bloody New Year

[Adam X]

All those extras and the Vinegar Syndrome releases still have interesting exclusive extras! Very much looking forward to this set.

[MichaelB]

Mondo Digital:

Easily one of the more lavish sets assembled for any genre filmmaker, this impressive collection will likely be the last word on this key figure in British horror for quite a long time to come.

[Adam X]

Indicator continue their thankless work as one of those labels that keep fluking quality releases. Very much looking forward to this set. Even if the films fail to live up to expectations, I'm sure the accompanying extras will more than make up for it. Cheers to those who are clearly working hard on this release.

We're sorry to inform you that we have encountered a problem with our release of BLOODY TERROR: THE FILMS OF NORMAN J WARREN 1976-1987.

At check-disc stage we discovered framing discrepancies with both PREY and TERROR. These have now been rectified, and we have reinstated the full image area, whilst maintaining Norman J Warren's preferred grading and restoration choices. This discovery has meant that there will be a short delay [...]. Whilst we recognise that there will be disappointment at the delay, we sincerely hope that our unwillingness to compromise on quality will act as some compensation.

[HitchcockLang]

They also said folks who preordered (though having their orders delayed) will receive items about a week before other retailers and that they are sending them both the corrected and rejected discs (calling it an “instant collector’s item”) so you can see the framing discrepancies for yourself.

Indicator has become one of my absolute favorite labels.

[domino harvey]

I don't understand, they didn't call their customers idiots even once-- amateurs! Maybe KL Insider can host a webinar for the Indicator team on how it's done

[tenia]

I considered my upside-down cover of the book included in the Six Gothic Tales boxset an "instant colllector item" so this made me laugh more than it should have.
Still, this is indeed exactly the kind of longet explanation everybody is likely to be OK with.

[Boosmahn]

For those wanting a specific day, the release date is now August 12th.

[Boosmahn]

From the Blu-ray.com forum (more on Indicator's Facebook page):

[What A Disgrace]

I suspect Dietrich and Sternberg will also be Digipak'd.

[HitchcockLang]

Aw, I’ll kinda miss the boxes of Scanavos. I hope they at least revert to the old format for future Hammer sets for consistency.

[swo17]

I'm sure this was driven by them not having a template yet for a release of this size (every other set has been either three or four cases wide). Maybe the five digipaks take up the same width as four Scanavos so they can still use their large outer box template?

[rapta]

I'm sure this was driven by them not having a template yet for a release of this size (every other set has been either three or four cases wide). Maybe the five digipaks take up the same width as four Scanavos so they can still use their large outer box template?

Yes, in which case the Dietrich-Sternberg set could still be 3x 2-disc Scanavo cases. I'd prefer if they described the packaging beforehand so people could make a choice. That said these look like good quality digipacks, from those photos at least.

[MichaelB]

DVD Beaver on Satan's Slave.

[MichaelB]

...and CineOutsider on the same.

[Adam X]

I'm sure this was driven by them not having a template yet for a release of this size (every other set has been either three or four cases wide). Maybe the five digipaks take up the same width as four Scanavos so they can still use their large outer box template?

I got this in the mail today & I'd guess you're correct swo. The above photo makes it look a lot bigger than it really is - the individual digipaks are slim ones much like a standard CD digipak. The slipcase is about the same width as one of Arrow's 3-case releases like The Taisho Trilogy or the American Horror Project sets.

[HJackson]

The digipaks are absolutely gorgeous and unlike Criterion equivalents in eg the JvS or David Lean sets, they sit perfectly flush to the edge of the box. Think this is the most attractive release yet from a line that really has not hit a single bum note.

[HitchcockLang]

I'm sure this was driven by them not having a template yet for a release of this size (every other set has been either three or four cases wide). Maybe the five digipaks take up the same width as four Scanavos so they can still use their large outer box template?

Upon receiving my copy, I'm not so sure this is simply a case of needing a new template. The box is the exact same size as the 3 Scanavo case boxes (Harryhausen, Five Tall Tales) and has the same number of discs as Five Tall Tales (which put two discs in two double Scanavos and one disc in a single Scanavo with reversible cover art for the double feature cases). Since this could have been done with the exact same template as Five Tall Tales, I think this was a conscious effort to change the way things are done rather than being motivated by necessity.

Personally, I miss the Scanavos but I'm not going to get bent out of shape over it. I recognize that is a personal preference which may not be shared by all. Also, there are some noticeable pros to this new style: cover art that's easy to see and enjoy for each individual title instead of reversible art, and digipacks that (as someone said above) are very high quality, sturdy, and sit flush in the box unlike similar Criterion boxes. My OCD will rebel a little if the Hammer vol. 4 box uses digipacks because I love the consistency in a series, but I'll survive.

In other news: I popped my Inseminoid disc into a standalone Philips 4K player and it loaded perfectly. I did not watch the whole film yet to see if I had any freezing or stuttering as I didn't have time, but so far, I'm very pleased with the release and continue to be a huge Indicator fan.

[M Sanderson]

Inseminoid plays perfectly on my Panasonic. And what a transfer it is.

Saw this in the old Anchor Bay dvd set, was surprised to enjoy - & still very much like it. The film is regarded as artless, mean-spirited and depressing post Alien opportunism - but I see it as a film that uses artificial style, camp outfits & setting and out of control performances - notably Judy Geeson - to explore the relation between horror and hysteria. Probably would play well with great Texan horror director Tobe Hooper’s grand folly Lifeforce, a film on a far bigger scale that carelessly races through several genres & likewise explores heightened emotional states.

Also watched Satan’s Slave and I’d say it’s a decent little devil worshipping occult horror, it’s also the lesser film of the set and the lesser transfer (still good) - after Bloody New Year.

Already seen the Vinegar Syndrome releases of Terror and Prey. These I feel represent the peak of NJW. Terror has one of the greatest metacinematic death scenes of all time, when the film set basically kills the photographer. This superlative, self contained set piece also seems to prefigure the Final Destination films and their set pieces of “accidental” deaths caused by the tension between objects and environment. Transfer of this film is also astonishing.

Prey’s a marvellous crossover of sci fi horror and unsettling chamber drama. It also looks extremely good. I love these rough, risky, strange movies. The sleaze, the strange structure, the feeling that anything can happen. There was something wild, arty, exploitive about ‘70s British film and Warren, as well as Pete Walker, displayed this perhaps better than anyone.

Got to say I’m struggling with Bloody New Year, however.

[MichaelB]

One of the reasons why the 1970s is one of my favourite film decades is precisely because of the sheer quantity of “rough, risky, strange movies” - following the dramatic liberalisation of censorship at the start of the decade, nobody really knew what the boundaries were any more, and it took some time to establish new taboos - so you get distinguished artists like Nagisa Oshima making Ai no corrida and Pier Paolo Pasolini making Salò, Walerian Borowczyk including footage of actual bestiality in a short film (creating legal headaches for Arrow 40 years later), Hollywood majors funding people like Dennis Hopper, Ken Russell and Nicolas Roeg in a way that’s unimaginable today (or at least not without stringent controls on what they can do in exchange for that funding), and the gap between mainstream, arthouse and grindhouse becoming blurred in a way that I don’t think has been the case before or since.

Prey being a fascinating case in point, because it doesn’t comfortably fit any of those categories, and every so often it goes out on a limb into the realm of the truly bizarre, such as that insanely protracted slow-motion shot of them thrashing about in the muddy lake to a screechingly avant-garde electronic score.

[tenia]

It is interesting though to note that within those examples, Oshima needed to get into exile in France, Pasolini was killed around Salo's release, Russell's most controversial movie is still unavailable uncut, Hopper's movies have only been visible again not long ago, etc etc.

I'd however add that having seen Prey through the VS release, I doubt this would be movies to make me decide of the 70s as my favourite movie decade.

[colinr0380]

Monte Hellman would be another good example, with Cockfighter remaining unreleasable in the UK even now due to animal cruelty issues.

The great thing about that slow motion sequence of the three characters wallowing about in the muddy lake in Prey is that it perfectly encapsulates the theme of the entire film of the characters in a perpetual tumult, dragging each other into the murk in their blind lashings out when if they were less on edge they might have been able to help each other climb out quicker! It is perhaps only being dragged out to such an insane extent that makes that point, even if it is quite silly on initial viewing!

[MichaelB]

CineOutsider has finished their disc-by-disc review of Bloody Terror: The Shocking Cinema of Norman J. Warren 1976-1987

• Satan's Slave
• Prey
• Terror
• Inseminoid
• Bloody New Year

Let's not mess about. As a Blu-ray box set, Bloody Terror: The Shocking Cinema of Norman J. Warren 1976-1987 is amazing. You get five films that few other distributors would seek out HD restorations for and put together in a single release, plus so many special features that I'm genuinely having trouble remembering what my life was like before I dived into this collection. If you somehow dislike everything that Norman J. Warren has directed then this is not for you. But even if you only like two or three of the films and especially if you're a fan of all five then the set is still an absolute must-have, for the movies themselves, for transfers that present the films in the best condition you've likely seen them, and for enough special features to occupy your free time for a month.

[Boosmahn]

I am blown away by the quality of this set. (Some members on Blu-ray.com or Amazon have issues with the digipacks, but they feel great in my hands.) Well worth the wait.

[headacheboy]

CineOutsider has finished their disc-by-disc review of Bloody Terror: The Shocking Cinema of Norman J. Warren 1976-1987

Gort's first review is what prompted me to buy this set. I'm not a huge horror fan, had never heard of Warren but his review was so interesting it made me excited for more information. Then the quality of the set and the obvious effort that went into this box all adds up to the fact that I'm way too curious to ignore it. I only just ordered it from Indicator and last week I received notice that it was being sent (I'm in the US). I look forward to its arrival.

(I've learned a great deal about horror from this site. I had never seen a Herschell Gordon Lewis film and had only heard of one of two titles when Arrow released their box. I'm almost always willing to gamble on a box as it seems a fine way to learn about someone's work.)

(edit: forever confusing its and it's)