Bloody Birthday Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		2.0
Video		4.0
Audio		3.5
Extras		4.0
Overall		2.5

Bloody Birthday Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman December 8, 2018

When the Broadway sensation The Bad Seed made it to film in 1956, a couple of possibly predictable changes were made, in order to make the property about a serial killer little girl a bit more palatable to the “unwashed” masses who weren’t the intellectual elites supposedly frequenting The Great White Way. For those who haven’t yet seen the film, let’s just say that little Rhoda Penmark (Patty McCormack, reprising her stage performance) got a bit of comeuppance that the original version didn’t include, and a post credits sequence jokingly showed Rhoda’s mother (Nancy Kelly) indulging in a little bit of spanking of her errant daughter, as if to suggest that a bit more stern parenting may have helped to prevent the (implied for the most part) carnage Rhoda has wreaked. By the time Bloody Birthday came along in 1981, there were no requirements to make things “acceptable” to the public at large, and the film, while not especially graphic, doesn’t feel the need to sugar coat the fact that there are (in this case) three tot sized serial killers running rampant in an otherwise seemingly idyllic little town. A perhaps questionable attribution to astrological reasons “causing” this aberrant behavior is just one of several clunky artifices Bloody Birthday engages in, but as with many cult horror entries, this film does have a devoted fan base who may be interested to compare this release with Severin’s release from several years ago.

In perhaps one sign of how generic parts of Bloody Birthday are, I frankly had completely forgotten I had reviewed the Severin release when it came out over four years ago until I started poking around the site. For those wanting a plot summary, I therefore refer you to my Bloody Birthday Blu-ray review of the Severin release. That review can also provide opportunities to compare screenshots between the versions as well.

Bloody Birthday Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Bloody Birthday is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Arrow Video with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 1.85:1. While the back cover of this release features the generic "brand new 2K restoration from original film elements"* phrasing, commendably the verbiage in Arrow's insert booklet provides more definite detail on the transfer:

Bloody Birthday has been exclusively restored by Arrow Films and is presented in its original aspect ratio of 1.85:1 with mono audio.

The original 35mm interpositive element was scanned in 2K resolution on a Lasergraphics Director at EFilm, Burbank. The film was graded on Digital Vision's Nucoda Film Master and restored at R3Store Studios in London. The original mono mix was restored from the best existing audio material.

All materials for this restoration were made available by Janet Schorer and Jan Willem Bosman Jansen/Ignite Films.

As can hopefully readily be seen by comparing screenshots between Arrow's release and the old Severin release, this presentation is somewhat darker, but with what to my eyes looks like a much more natural and better suffused palette. There's still the same roughness I mentioned in the review of the Severin release with regard to the opening vignette, where shadow detail is minimal and contrast just looks slightly wonky, but the rest of this presentation is less yellow skewed than the Severin, and with overall better looking densities. There can still be very slight clumpiness in the at times heavy grain field, but the general appearance here is commendably organic.

*I recently had a reader message me, upbraiding me for not reading the press sheet that came with a particular release where it was "clearly" stated that the transfer had been culled from "original film elements", when my review stated the source for the transfer was unclear. When I asked the reader what "original film elements" meant to him, i.e., negative?, internegative?, interpositive?, print?, I never heard back. I have always felt that labels actually do themselves a disservice by not publishing a clear "provenance" for their releases. More information is always better in my opinion.

Bloody Birthday Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Bloody Birthday's LPCM Mono is arguably a bit clearer and sounding and with fewer of the clipping anomalies that the Severin release had, but it still is nowhere near what most audiophiles would prefer. There's just a slightly muddy sound, and some of the effects definitely show their age. Dialogue makes it through the gauntlet well enough, and there are no issues with dropouts.

Bloody Birthday Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Bloody Babysitter (1080p; 8:13) is an interview with Lori Lethin.


• Bad Seeds and Body Counts (1080p; 19:58) is a fun appreciation by Chris Alexander.


• Starships and Killer Brains (1080p; 21:15) features producer Ken Gord discussing Ed Hunt.


• Interview with Max Rosenberg (1080p; 17:26) is an archival piece with the film's producer.


• Trailers

  Theatrical Trailer (1080p; 1:59)

  Promo Trailer (1080p; 1:07)

• Audio Commentaries

  Audio Commentary with Writer-Director Ed Hunt

  Audio Commentary with The Hysteria Continues

As usual, Arrow has also provided a nicely appointed insert booklet.

Bloody Birthday Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Those who pay attention to such things will note that I've scored the film a 2.0 for this release, whereas I gave the original Blu-ray release a paltry 1.5 for the film itself. Guess what? I liked it better this time. It's still silly and more sinister than actually scary (and frankly, it's funny at times when it's trying to be scary, as in the junkyard car chase scene), but it has a certain baroque charm that I appreciated more this time around. Arrow's release improves the technical aspects, and the supplementary material is typically excellent per the label's tradition, for those who are considering a purchase.