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“2020 Texas Gladiators” * (1983, Severin Films) Post-apocalyptic Western with stoic Al Cliver as a futuristic Texas Ranger protecting a band of survivors against jackbooted thugs led by Donald O’Brien, who wants the survivors’ uranium mine in order to make a ruined American great again as he sees it (read: a nightmare). Alarmingly prescient entry in the cycle of Italian-made “Mad Max” carbons in the 1980s offers little by way of variation on the subgenre’s tropes but is at least fast-paced and entertaining in a blowed-up-real-good way; Severin’s Limited Edition three-disc UHD/Blu-ray combo is loaded with extras, including interviews with Cliver, co-star Geretta Geretta (“Demons”), co-directors Joe D’Amato and colossal George Eastman, and assistant director Michele Soavi (“Cemetery Man”), as well as trailers and a full CD of Carlo Maria Corda’s score.
“Running on Karma” (2003, Radiance Films) Andy Lau, tricked out in a latex muscle suit, plays a former monk turned bodybuilder (and after-hours male stripper) who has the ability to see a person’s karma, and more specifically their past actions which brought them to their current state. This proves useful when he teams with a Hong Kong police detective (Cecilia Chung) to help track down a killer. Box office juggernaut from Johnnie To and Wai Ka-fai begins as a very odd comedy but blooms into a mix of martial arts action and sober rumination on faith and sacrifice. It shouldn’t work (the image of Lau in his brawny suit suggests as much) but it does, thanks in part to the cast and Cheng Siu-keng’s cool-tinged cinematography. The Radiance Blu-ray, taken from a 2K restoration, includes two commentary tracks by Asian film expert Frank Djeng (who’s joined by F.J. DeSanto on one), who detail To and Wa Kai-fa’s eclectic career and the censorship imposed upon the film when it was released in mainland China; “Asian Cinema” editor Gary Bettinson is interviewed, and there’s a making-of featurette and liner notes by David West.
“Crust” * (2024, Anchor Bay Entertainment) Sean Whalen, a familiar face from movies (“The People Under the Stars”) and television, makes his feature directorial debut with the curious but affecting drama-fantasy-monster movie “Crust.” Whalen also stars as a former child star reduced to living in a laundromat whose anonymity is brought to light by callous influencers (who capture him in an indelicate moment); his tears (and other fluids) give life to a pile of lost laundry which proves determined to reverse Whalen’s trajectory by any means necessary. Though undeniably cult-focused with its absurd monster, Whalen (who also co-wrote the film) aims for and largely succeeds at a mix of gross-out horror and melancholy rumination on missing the brass ring. He wisely brings aboard capable character actors like himself: Daniel Roebuck, Felissa Rose, Ricky Dean Logan, Rebekah Kennedy (a harrowing presence in “Two Witches” but charming here), and briefly, Alan Ruck, all of whom rise to the occasion. The Blu-ray from the revived Anchor Bay Entertainment includes commentary by Whalen, interviews from the premiere, and two amusing shorts featuring Whalen and Roebuck.
“Bluebeard” * (1944, Kino Lorber) Dressmaker Jean Parker discovers that her new client, artist and puppeteer John Carradine, is not only in love with her, but is also the murderer dubbed “Bluebeard” by the press after killing several women who worked as models. Thriller from talented director Edgar G. Ulmer (“The Black Cat”) was made for budget studio PRC, which is evident from the limited production design, but rises above these elements on the strength of Carradine’s performance, which helped to cement his status as a go-to villain/horror star in Hollywood; photography by Jockey Arthur Feindell and an uncredted Eugene Schufftan lends visual polish, as do the expressionistic painted sets, and the script crafts an intriguing psychological portrait of Carradine’s killer as well as a world that’s willing to look past a person’s deeds if they are making money for others. With Bob Baker’s marionettes as Carradine’s puppets; the Kino 80th Anniversary Edition Blu-ray is a vast improvement over PD presentations of “Bluebeard” and features two commentaries: one with Gregory W. Mank and Tom Weaver that focuses on production and Carradine’s career, and a second by David Del Valle, who knew both Carradine and Ulmer’s widow, and provides plenty of personal observations. Trailers for other Ulmer titles in Kino’s library, like “The Man from Planet X,” are also included.
“Hollywood 90028” (1973, Grindhouse Releasing) As an aspiring cinematographer in Hollywood, Christopher Augustine has progressed no further than X-rated loops for a scummy producer (Dick Glass), but if his encounters with various women are any indication, his second career as a serial killer is wildly successful. Complications arise when he meets Michele (Jeannette Dilger), an actress in Glass’s films who shares Augustine’s Midwestern background and the unshakable feeling that control of her own life has slipped out of her grasp. Their connection seems to point towards something like happiness for the pair, but fate and destiny and the city of Los Angeles itself have other plans, which culminate in a genuinely shocking finale. Long-lost feature from writer/producer/director Christina Hornisher is steeped in exploitation traditions and tropes, but these land with less impact that her study of the overwhelming loneliness that comes with living in a city like Los Angeles, where dead dreams pollute the air and despair can take ugly and even horrifying off-ramps. Though “Hollywood 90028” delivers both as a creepy psychological thriller and melancholy character study, it appears to landed without much impact in 1973 and remained lost, despite several retitlings and edits, until Grindhouse Releasing located the negative and reissued it on a Collector’s Edition Blu-ray. The three-disc set includes the original “90028” version as well as a shorter edit titled “Twisted Throats”; commentary by critic Marc Edward Heuck (an early champion of Hornisher) and Heidi Honeycutt delves deeply into production history and opinion on the film, while a second audio track covers the film’s many LA locations (downtown, West Hollywood, West LA), which are also covered in a short featurette with now-and-then footage. Extended unrated scenes, an hour-plus making-of doc, interviews with the primary cast and filmmaker Tom De Simone (who worked with Hornisher), footage from Augustine’s 2022 appearance at the New Beverly, a soundtrack CD of Basil Poledouris’s score, and several short films by Hornisher are also included along with liner notes by Heuck, film historian David Szulkin, and director Jim VanBebber. And if you dig around, you’ll find an Easter Egg featuring Augustine as a member of the ’60s pop band Every Mother’s Son (“Come On Down to My Boat”) in a clip from “Disc-O-Teen,” a music series filmed in New Jersey and hosted by none other than TV horror pioneer Zacherley (who appears to believe he’s talking to the Mothers of Invention).
