* indicates that the film is also available to rent, buy, or stream from various platforms. Please note that streaming version may different from these discs’ presentations.
“Cutting Class” * (1989, MVD Rewind) Just who, wonders winsome Jill Schoelen, is dispatching the staff and students at her high school (played by Excelsior High in Norwalk) with ruthless efficiency and diabolical creativity? Is the culprit her athlete boyfriend (a pre-fame Brad Pitt)? The creepy principal (Roddy McDowall)? All fingers seem to point at new kid Donovan Leitch, freshly sprng from an asylum. The answer is, well, largely irrelevant in this curious late-entry slasher film, which lists heedlessly from straight-ahead body count thriller to weirdo comedy; the latter element is best summed up by a recurring bit involving Martin Mull as Schoelen’s father, whose struggles to get home after being skewered with an arrow hinge between slapstick and surreal. The tonal shifts in “Cutting Class” are, undoubtedly, one of the primary reasons for its enduring cult appeal (the others are, of course Pitt, who manfully shoulders his dopey role, and some absurdly gross murders), and in turn, MVD’s deluxe UHD/Blu-ray presentation. The two-disc set includes interviews with Schoelen and Leitch, who have kind things to say about the film’s eclectic helmers – frequent John Boorman scripter Rospo Pallenberg in his directorial debut and writer Steve Slavkin, who later penned lots of kid TV – and their castmates. Devotee will be pleased by the inclusion of the longer and gorier unrated version of the film, the bloody highlights of which are spotlighted in a short kill-count featurette.
