Editorials
5 Arrow Films Releases You Need for Halloween
Throughout October I am going to highlight 5 releases from some of my favorite Blu-ray labels that every horror fan needs in their collection for October. Think of it as a Christmas shopping guide, but with a Halloween slant.
Arrow Films launched in the UK way back in 1991. It didn’t take long for the company to establish themselves as a premier player in the home video market thanks to their state-of-the-art in house restorations and overwhelming amount of expertly curated bonus features. After becoming the undisputed leader in the cult and horror home video spectrum on the UK, the company teamed with distribution mega-force MVD Entertainment and expanded their scope into the US in the early part of 2015.
With a collection of hundreds of titles, offering up something for every type of horror fan, it can be difficult narrowing down recommendations. I’ve taken on the task, however, and have chosen five of the more recent releases from Arrow’s US slate that every horror fan is going to want to get their hands on this Halloween.
Doom Asylum (1987)
I unabashedly love Doom Asylum. This is a silly, ultra campy, mostly bad slasher, but hidden somewhere, deep within all its faults is something charming and fun. Filmed on a real-life abandoned insane asylum, this story revolves around a lunatic should-be dead doctor that brutally murders teens that enter the asylum. Each gory murder is followed by a cheesy one-liner. Throw this one on at your Halloween party this year and I assure you that your friends will thank you.
The film is available to be watched in either 1.78:1 or 1.33:1. Both versions look awesome. In addition the two different framings, there are plenty of fun bonus features:
- Tina’s Terror – interview with the film’s star Ruth Collins
- Movie Mad House – interview with DP Larry Revene
- Morgues & Mayhem – interview with makeup effects creator Vincent J. Gaustini
- Archival Interviews with executive producer Alexander W. Kogan Jr, director Richard Friedman and production manager Bill Tasgal
- Stills Gallery
- Audio Commentary with screenwriter Rick Marx
- Audio Commentary with The Hysteria Continues
The interviews included fantastic, especially the ones with Collins and Gaustini. Collins discusses the cult status of the film and her career in general. Gaustini, who has since gone on to be a big name in makeup effects, recalls his experience working on Doom Asylum, which was his first film. At the time he hated, but has since changed his tune and remembers it fondly.
Killer Klowns from Outer Space (1988)
Killer Klowns from Outer Space is a staple of ’80s horror. I don’t think I need to tell you, but just to be safe I’ll remind everyone that the film is about a spaceship that lands in an empty field near a small town and out come killer klowns that turn people into cotton candy. I will forever be grateful to Stephen and Charles Chiodo for providing this film for me to grow up on. I feel like every night of every summer in my childhood was spent watching this on repeat on VHS.
Fortunately, I no longer have to watch it on VHS because earlier this year Arrow released a gorgeous Blu-ray. The original 35mm camera negative was scanned in 4K and the result is one of the best looking Blu-rays you’ll find. And a film like, with so many bold and vivid colors, was made for 4K Blu-ray presentation. And then you have the special features and they fall out of this disc like clowns coming out of a clown car.
- Let the Show Begin – interview with the Dickies, the band behind the film’s incredible theme song
- The Chiodos Walk Among Us – a retrospective on the brothers featuring clips from their early childhood films
- Chiodo Brothers Early Films – a number of the brothers early films are presented in their entirety
- Land of Terror
- Beast from the Egg
- Africa Danny
- Eskimo
- Sludge Grubs
- Free Inside
- Bringing Life to These Things – a tour of the Chiodo Brothers’ production facility
- Killer Interviews
- Grant Cramer
- Suzanne Snyder
- Chiodo Brothers
- Charles Chiodo
- Charles Chiodo & Dwight Roberts
- John Massari
- Behind the Screams with the Chiodos
- Klown Auditions
- Deleted Scenes
- Killer Bloopers
- Image Galleries
- Trailer
- Audio Commentary with the Chiodo Brothers
I told you there was a lot. Every interview is great, especially those with the Chiodo Brothers because those dudes rule. And the early films, those are fantastic and give you some insight on how the brothers got their start and honed their craft.
The Bloodthirsty Trilogy
Thanks to the success of Hammer’s string of films in the ’60s, Japan’s Toho studios decided they would take a stab at the gothic horror world and thus came three films — The Vampire Doll, Lake of Dracula, Evil of Dracula — collectively known as The Bloodthirsty Trilogy. They’re not likely to be anyone’s favorite vampire movies, but they’re strange, unique and at times kind of wild. It’s Toho doing Dracula and that’s very much worth seeing. If your plan for October is to watch new-to-you stuff, this is a good place to start.
Special features are a little light here by Arrow standards, but still good:
- Kim Newman on The Bloodthirsty Trilogy
- Original Trailers for all three films
- Stills Galleries
The Newman feature is great. In about 15 minutes he dives into the films while touching on Japanese horror in general. Newman always brings so much passion to the screen making it a pleasure every time he pops up.
The Crazies (1973)
A combat virus spreads throughout a small Pennsylvania town as the military desperately tries to contain it in this classic from George A. Romero. Everyone knows Romero built his horror empire on the backs of zombies and his Living Dead series, but he did a lot of other great stuff as well with The Crazies being maybe the best of the bunch and this new Arrow Blu-ray is the best release to date.
The Crazies comes with a brand-new 4K restoration from Arrow that greatly improves on past efforts. There are still a few small imperfections throughout, but generally speaking this is a very detailed presentation with quality film grain present. Included are the following special features:
- Audio Commentary with Travis Crawford
- Romero Was Here: Locating The Crazies
- Crazy for Lynn Lowry
- Q&A with Lynn Lowry
- Lee Hessel Audio Interview
- Behind the Scenes Footage
- Alternate Opening Titles
- Image Galleries
- Trailers and TV Spots
The Romero Was Here feature is a nice looking at some of the locations used in Pennsylvania.
Don’t Torture a Duckling (1972)
If you’re anything like me you can’t have Halloween without Lucio Fulci. Where you get your Fulci fix from can vary, but I’d suggest going with Don’t Torture a Duckling because it’s, well, awesome. The story revolves around a reporter trying to solve a series of child murders in a small Italian town. This doesn’t feature the same level of gore and Euro trash that Fulci is typically known for, but I’d argue that it may be some of his best directing and is still incredible provocative. This is an engaging thriller that keeps you glued to the screen.
I waited for this film to get a US Blu-ray release for a long time and the wait was worth it. The restoration is a 2K digitally restored version using a 35mm duplicate negative. It’s not the best work from Arrow, with some variations throughout, but unless you’re super picky you won’t notice anything significant. It’s an overall fabulous presentation.
- Audio Commentary with Troy Howarth
- Giallo a la Campagna
- Hell is Already in Us
- Lucio Fulci Remembers
- Cast and Crew Interviews
- Florinda Bolkan
- Sergio D’Offizi
- Bruno Micheli
- Maurizio Trani
The commentary is great because if you’re going to have a Fulci commentary track you need Fulci expert Troy Howarth. The winner here though is Luci Fulci Remembers, which are taped audio interviews from the late ’80s with Fulci himself. There’s nothing better than hearing Fulci on Fulci.
For more information and to purchase these US Arrow releases, please visit MVDEntertainment.com.
Some movies are just so beloved that you can experience them through cultural osmosis without ever sitting down to actually watch them. From loving parodies to meticulous recreations of iconic scenes, memorable filmmaking lives on even after the curtains close on the silver screen. And when it comes to horror, few films can compete with the massive impact that Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining had on popular culture as a whole.
Whether or not you think the flick is a good adaptation of Stephen King’s seminal novel, 1980’s The Shining slowly but surely grew into one of the most influential genre movies ever made, inspiring everything from surprisingly heartfelt sequels to classic episodes of The Simpsons. However, not all The Shining references are created equal, and today I’d like to shine a light on six unexpected homages to Kubrick’s iconic film.
In this list, we’ll be focusing on references and Easter eggs that either came out of the blue or came from creators that you wouldn’t expect to be fans of this classic ghost story. That being said, don’t forget to comment below with your own favorite references to the Torrance family and the Overlook Hotel if you think we missed a particularly memorable one.
With that out of the way, onto the list!
5. A Nightmare on FaceTime – South Park (2012)
Regardless of the brand’s iffy reputation among former employees, the death of Blockbuster Video was a serious blow to fans of physical media. Of course, some folks were more affected by this than others, and South Park’s Randy Marsh definitely took things a little too far in the twelfth episode of the show’s sixteenth season.
Titled A Nightmare on FaceTime, the main plot of this 2012 story is a surprisingly faithful recreation of The Shining where Randy purchases an empty Blockbuster store and begins to go mad once he realizes that his investment may not have been a very good idea due to the rise of streaming and the now-defunct RedBox storefronts.
4. The Overlook Hotel Level – Ready Player One (2018)
I was never really a fan of Ernest Cline’s Ready Player One, so I viewed Stephen Spielberg’s divisive adaptation of the novel as an improvement over the source material despite having its own narrative issues. In fact, I actually prefer how Spielberg changed the story by removing several references to his own work and replacing a lengthy Blade Runner detour with an over-the-top homage to The Shining.
A CGI-heavy recreation of the film’s most iconic moments that feels like a big-budget ghost train ride set within the Overlook Hotel, this intense sequence is more of a recreation of the freaky aesthetics of The Shining rather than its mind-bending narrative. However, it’s still fun to see Spielberg make a heartfelt tribute to a filmmaker that was once his close personal friend.
3. IKEA Singapore Halloween Ad (2014)
It makes sense that commercials don’t typically borrow from the horror genre, as it might be a bad idea to scare away potential customers, but some references are just too much fun to pass up.
That’s probably why the publicists behind this Ikea ad from Singapore were allowed to turn their commercial into a genuinely unsettling recreation of Danny’s tricycle scene from The Shining. After all, nobody cares if your store is haunted so long as it offers late-night shopping hours and a large selection of merchandise that you can become lost in forever and ever…
2. The End of ‘Bondage and Beta Male Sexuality’ – Community (2014)
Community is no stranger to recreating iconic movie moments within the show, and the series had previously tackled horror tropes in episodes like the fan-favorite Epidemiology. However, the most laugh-out-loud moment on this particular list comes from a brief gag towards the end of the season five episode ‘Bondage and Beta Male Sexuality’.
The majority of this episode has nothing to do with scary movies, but there’s a brief subplot involving supporting character Chang and a possible encounter with ghosts that leads him to question his own existence. This subplot culminates in the episode’s hilarious ending where the camera zooms in on a black-and-white photograph of Chang in period clothing at some kind of celebration, just like Jack Nicholson at the end of The Shining.
However, the picture’s subtitle eventually reveals that it’s merely a conveniently placed keepsake from the ‘Old Timey Photo Club’.
1. The Overlook Hedge Maze Sequence – Zootopia 2 (2025)
Disney movies are pretty far removed from both the gruesome horror of Stephen King and the heady filmmaking of Stanley Kubrick, so I don’t think anyone was expecting the climax of last year’s Zootopia sequel to take place in an animated version of the snowy hedge maze from The Shining.
In this unexpectedly intense sequence, friend-turned-villain Pawbert Lynxley (an unhinged lynx cat played by Andy Samberg) chases our protagonists through a creepy labyrinth in a loving recreation of Jack Nicholson’s icy demise outside the Overlook Hotel. The actual ending here might be a little more child-friendly than what’s being referenced, but it’s amazing that the filmmakers were able to push the horror elements as far as they did – especially since the scene doesn’t really have anything to do with the rest of the movie.
You must be logged in to post a comment.