Severin has released a video showing Argentinean director Gaspar Noe visiting its famous closet and picking up some of its favorite films on Blu-ray. Noe is best known for directing the controversial drama Irreversible.
Description: From subversive Spanish writer/director Eloy de la Iglesia comes the international hit and DPP 39 'Video Nasty' that remains among the most notorious and misunderstood shockers of the '70s: When a slaughterhouse worker (Vicente Parra of NO ONE HEARD THE SCREAM) accidentally kills a man during a fight, it will trigger a desperate descent into madness, mass murder and "the most horrific use of a single apartment since Polanski's REPULSION" (Mondo Digital). Emma Cohen (CUT-THROATS NINE) and Eusebio Poncela (LAW OF DESIRE) co-star in this "unforgettable mix of Euro arthouse and exploitive sleaze" (DVD Drive-In) – also known as THE APARTMENT ON THE 13TH FLOOR and WEEK OF THE KILLER – now featuring both the International and extended Spanish Version newly scanned from the original negatives for the first time ever.
Description: The most insane post-peplum psycho-sexual classic in Italian horror history just got even better: When the crew of a saucy photoshoot breaks into an abandoned castle, they will unleash the madness of the male-body-obsessed owner (muscleman Mickey Hargitay in the WTF? performance of his career) who is possessed by the vengeful spirit of a 16th century torturer. Walter Brandt (THE PLAYGIRLS AND THE VAMPIRE) and Femi Benussi (HATCHET FOR THE HONEYMOON) co-star in this hair-raising orgy of sadism -- also known as THE CRIMSON EXECUTIONER -- from director Massimo Pupillo (TERROR-CREATURES FROM THE GRAVE) and the screenwriters of KILL, BABY... KILL! with special effects by future Oscar winner Carlo Rambaldi (E.T.), now scanned in eye-stabbingly stunning 2K from the original uncut negative recently discovered in a Rome lab vault.
Description: As the body-count genre stabbed its way into audiences hearts in the early 80s, EuroTrash auteur Jess Franco (Sadomania, Mansion Of The Living Dead) was asked to create his own saga of slaughtered schoolgirls complete with gratuitous nudity, graphic violence, and gory set pieces. But just when you thought you'd seen it all, Franco shocked the world by delivering surprising style, genuine suspense and a cavalcade of depravity that includes incest, voyeurism and roller disco. The luscious Olivia Pascal of Vanessa fame stars in this twisted thriller that was banned in England yet is now presented uncut and uncensored including the complete stone mill power saw sequence -for the first time ever on Blu-ray.
Description: In this rarely-seen but always-surprising giallo – made between A QUIET PLACE TO KILL and KNIFE OF ICE – Golden Globe® winning/Academy Award® nominated Hollywood exile Carroll Baker (BABY DOLL, SOMETHING WILD) stars as the new bride of a wealthy British playboy (Oscar® nominee Michael Craig of THE ANGRY SILENCE and MYSTERIOUS ISLAND) whose three previous wives met with suspiciously accidental deaths. Marina Malfatti (ALL THE COLORS OF THE DARK) co-stars in this 1971 Italian/Spanish co-production directed by Eugenio Martín (HORROR EXPRESS) and co-written by Santiago Moncada (HATCHET FOR THE HONEYMOON) with a score by Piero Umiliani (FIVE DOLLS FOR AN AUGUST MOON) – also known as DEATH AT THE DEEP END OF THE SWIMMING POOL and THE LAST MRS. ANDERSON – now scanned in 2K from the original negative.
Description: This third feature from writer/director Dario Argento – the final film in his legendary 'Animal Trilogy' – has long been the least-seen of his giallo classics…until now: When a rock drummer (Michael Brandon) accidentally kills a stranger, he'll unlock a nightmare of blackmail, paranoia and grisly murder that climaxes with "arguably the most visually impressive sequence in any of Argento's movies" (Scream Magazine). Mimsy Farmer (AUTOPSY), Jean-Pierre Marielle (THE PERFUME OF YVONNE) and Bud Spencer (THE 5-MAN ARMY) co-star in this "horror holy grail and one of the great works of post-modern dread ever" (PopMatters) co-written by Luigi Cozzi and featuring a nerve-jangling score by Ennio Morricone, with both The Director's Cut and English Language Version now fully restored in 4K from the original 2-perf negative.
Description: The screenwriter of classics that include SO SWEET… SO PERVERSE, THE STRANGE VICE OF MRS. WARDH, ALL THE COLORS OF THE DARK and TORSO, Ernesto Gastaldi made his directorial debut with one of the most groundbreaking yet criminally underseen gialli of them all: When a small boy witnesses his father kill a woman during an S&M session, he'll grow into a disturbed young man (Oscar® nominee Giancarlo Giannini in his film debut) tormented by images of violence, perversion, madness and murder. Dominique Boschero (WHO SAW HER DIE?), Luciano Pigozzi (WEREWOLF IN A GIRLS' DORMITORY) and Gastaldi's beloved wife/muse/co-writer Mara Maryl (SCREAMS IN THE NIGHT) co-star in this Freudian gothic freak-out, now featuring a 2K scan from the dupe negative and an all-new interview with the writer/director.
Description: In 1981, director Sheldon Renan and Academy Award® nominated co-producer/co-writer Leonard Schrader (brother of filmmaker Paul) created a graphic and provocative examination of America's history with – and penchant for – senseless violence, mass shootings and cold-blooded murder. Piercing, brutal and at times, unflinchingly graphic, The Killing of America was exhibited briefly in New York in 1982...and subsequently shelved. While the ensuing thirty five years have – thankfully – seen the lowering of overall violent crimes in the nation, the documentary's themes about equating violence with economic & racial discrimination and the continued proliferation of personal firearms in our republic still echo in the national discourse during this election year. Sometimes, to solve a problem in front of us, we must look to the past... The Killing of America begins with the following cautionary note: "All of the film you are about to see is real. Nothing has been staged." Guided by interviews with criminals (including Robert Kennedy's assassin Sirhan Sirhan) and law-enforcement officials as well as incendiary newsreel footage of actual violent crimes, viewers are taken on a profoundly disturbing and still chillingly relevant journey into a uniquely American heart of darkness. Rock! Shock! Pop! proclaimed the film "a powerful experience," The Guardian declared it "austere and remarkable," and Vox Magazine showered praise via the warning "not for the faint of heart."
Description: Produced in 1960 as BODY IN THE WEB, it became a notorious Adults Only feature throughout Europe (though banned in the UK). Three years later and sheared of its nudity, it was repackaged for American audiences as a brain-melting monster movie filled with stripper catfights, skimpy lingerie and radioactive arachnids. Alexander D'Arcy – whose Hollywood career ranged from Leo McCarey's THE AWFUL TRUTH to Al Adamson's BLOOD OF DRACULA'S CASTLE – and 'The German Jayne Mansfield' Barbara Valentin (BERLIN ALEXANDERPLATZ) star in "the ultimate exploitation movie" (PsychotronicReview.com), produced by Wolf C. Hartwig of BLOODY MOON and SCHOOLGIRL REPORT infamy. Severin Films is proud to present both the complete uncensored version – scanned from the Düsseldorf dupe negative – as well as the alternate U.S. release – scanned from a pristine low con print – now together for the first time.
Description: One year after his international breakthrough with CANNIBAL MAN, defiant Basque filmmaker Eloy de la Iglesia co-wrote and directed this twisted thriller – his last under Spain's repressive Franco regime – that instantly made him "the father of Spanish giallo" (Spanish Fear): When a woman spies her neighbor disposing of his wife's corpse, she will cross the line from witness to accomplice to something far more depraved. Vicente Parra (CANNIBAL MAN), Carmen Sevilla (THE GLASS CEILING), María Asquerino (THAT OBSCURE OBJECT OF DESIRE) and Antonio Casas (THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY) star in "a must for all European film fans, with a final twist that will resonate with you for a very long time" (The Gore Splattered Corner), now featuring an HD scan from the original negative.
Description: Short for quincallero (delinquent) and pronounced 'kinky', it was a brutal sub-genre of juvenile gang dramas produced in '70s/'80s Spain. But for Basque writer/director Eloy de la Iglesia (CANNIBAL MAN, NO ONE HEARD THE SCREAM), these three Cine Quinqui classics would become the most successful, controversial and tragically defining films of his entire career. José Luis Manzano – the charismatic street kid discovered by de la Iglesia – stars in this graphic neorealist trilogy that depicts the crime, violence and drug abuse that ravaged the post-Franco nation, and led to the filmmaker and actor's real-life addictions to heroin – and each other – that would ultimately destroy them both. NAVAJEROS, EL PICO and EL PICO 2 are now scanned in HD from the original negatives with all-new Special Features created especially for this collection.
Description: From infamous producer Harry Novak - whose Box Office International Pictures brought the world such classics as AXE, MANTIS IN LACE and WHAM BAM THANK YOU, SPACEMAN - comes the still-startling sickie about a pair of L.A.P.D. detectives hunting a transvestite psychopath through a polyester jungle of massage parlor perverts, suburban sex fiends, violence-crazed cops and "one of the worst examples of cross-dressing ever filmed" (Digitally Obsessed). Joshua Bryant (ENTER THE DEVIL), Sandy Carey (DRIVE-IN MASSACRE), Linda York (CHAIN GANG WOMEN) and Sharon Kelly (aka '80s adult film superstar Colleen Brennan) star in this "garish display of rampant depravity" (Pulp International) directed by Carl Monson (PLEASE DON'T EAT MY MOTHER!).
Description: Tensions between America and Russia over the Middle East finally culminate in an exchange of atomic weaponry... and for the working-class community of Sheffield, England, the immediate horrors of the global warfare would become outstripped by the devastation of over a decade's nuclear winter to follow. Sobering BBC docudrama marked by it's groundbreaking depiction of thermonuclear war's aftermath stars Reece Dinsdale, Karen Meagher, David Brierley, June Broughton; Mick Jackson directs.
Description: Though he made two feature films – the legendary WHO CAN KILL A CHILD? and THE HOUSE THAT SCREAMED – the ultimate legacy of writer/director Narciso 'Chicho' Ibáñez Serrador remains his groundbreaking 1966-1968 Televisión Española series HISTORIAS PARA NO DORMIR. Serrador wrote, directed and introduced every episode, adapting stories by Ray Bradbury, Edgar Allan Poe, Robert Bloch and his own material under the pseudonym Luis Peñafiel, shocking Franco-era audiences with black humor, macabre themes and sharp social commentary while inspiring generations of Spain's greatest genre filmmakers as well as a 2021 reboot. This definitive 2-disc collection includes Serrador's complete classic series, 1974 special, 1982 mini-series and more that celebrates the Lifetime Achievement Goya Award winner Nerdist calls "one of the great Euro-Horror directors of all time."
Description: From acclaimed director Douglas Buck comes an unflinching, disturbingly beautiful look at the underbelly of American family. Three separate narratives (including the shocking film festival favorite "Cutting Moments" as well as "Home" and "Prologue") combine to create a unique trilogy of life today that will leave you devastating... and begging for more.
Description: A year before they stunned the genre with ALL THE COLORS OF THE DARK, director Sergio Martino, co-writer Ernesto Gastaldi, and stars Edwige Fenech & George Hilton made their collaborative giallo debut with this "incredible piece of cinema" (Flickering Myth) that is "every bit as thrilling as Argento's best" (Goomba Stomp): Fenech "at her most luminous" (Digitally Obsessed) stars as an unfaithful diplomat's wife who finds herself hunted by a razor-wielding sex maniac while simultaneously haunted by her own depraved desires. Alberto de Mendoza (HORROR EXPRESS), Cristina Airoldi (TORSO) and Ivan Rassimov (EATEN ALIVE!) co-star in the "daring shocker that set the pace for years to come" (Mondo Digital) – also known as BLADE OF THE RIPPER and NEXT! – newly scanned in 4k from the internegative and loaded with new & archival Special Features.
Description: Roman Polanski described it as the ribald adventures of an innocent girl. Critics called it an amoral, depraved disaster. More than four decades after its controversial release, it remains the most butchered, debated and least-seen film of the Oscar-winning directors entire career. The succulent Sydne Rome stars as an oft-naked American girl lost inside a Mediterranean villa inhabited by priests, pianists, perverts and a syphilitic pimp (a deliciously bizarre performance by Marcello Mastroianni) while indulging in madcap acts of gang rape, sodomy and ping-pong. Hugh Griffith (Tom Jones), Romolo Valli (Boccaccio 70) and Polanski himself co-star in this surreal and sexy comedy, now finally restored to its original running time from a vault print reportedly stolen from the wine cellar of producer Carlo Ponti!