Original subtitles

No! This film will introduce you to a world where the bizarre is not uncommon

and the normal seems out of place.

study of death been revealed to the motion picture audience an exploration

a bloody world where violence creates an image not soon to be forgotten

You have never thought about death.

It's time you started thinking.

Bases of Death.

Now a major motion picture.

According to the cover here, you can look forward to merciless beatings,

killings and multiple rape and unprintable happenings.

I wonder what they meant by that. I suspect that what they're driving at is

fact that the really shocking element in Fight For Your Life is the language.

And it's kind of unique amongst the video nasties in that the really

element that prevents it, I believe, from being released officially in this

country even now is verbal, not visceral.

It's verbal violence, specifically racial slurs and racial attacks, verbal

attacks.

The story is about a gang of reprobates who escape from prison and hide out in

the house of this extremely virtuous black family where the father is the

pastor, extended family, all very virtuous Christian, God -fearing people.

Louise? Do we have company?

You better believe it, bird. Now get your ass in here.

The leader of the criminal gang, played by William Sanderson, who's an actor

that gained attention a couple of years later for a role in Blade Runner. He's a

very respected character actor.

He's, in the film, playing an intensely racist, hostile, aggressive, racist

character who lets loose a stream of racial epithets and slurs and

attacks. It's the kind of film...

where you are made extremely uncomfortable by the way that the

speaking to, you know, the black characters. And it's led certain people

think, misread the film as a racist film. It's one of those situations

you know, because you're depicting a racist character, there's a fear amongst

people watching the film that you might be dealing with a racist director, a

racist kind of writer, the whole, you know, tainted by association with the

character in the film. The whole film gets treated as a racist film.

No, it's not. I don't believe it is a racist film. It's an exploitation film

that is willing to go the extra mile to be shocking and outrageous.

But if anything, it's more like a Black Panther recruiting film than a KKK

party favourite.

The theme of the film is that this black family who are trying to be dignified

and Christian and turn the other cheek.

are faced with mounting provocation throughout the film until eventually

they finally do crack and enact their vengeance on these interlopers these

attackers you've been waiting for about an hour for this to happen until

eventually it's almost sadomasochistic and it's kind of in the tension that's

created you know they're victimized for so long and they're given so much verbal

abuse that when they finally do when the worm turns you know the film is all

about the moment when the black family fight back

Don't move or I'll blow your balls off.

You ain't even big enough to cover.

And in that respect, it's a film which is intended, as much as anything else,

play very, very positively to a black audience in, say, blue -collar areas of

New York and Chicago, where you'd get a sizeable black audience.

And it's playing to the gallery, to the black gallery, I think.

It's a film that's out there saying, you know...

don't take any shit from Whitey. It's not actually kind of saying, it's not

siding with the sentiments expressed by its obnoxiously character.

The writer of the film, Straw Weissman, said that he specifically wanted to make

a story about the turn -the -other -cheek argument not holding water, that

said as a Jewish man, as a child brought up in a Jewish family, one of the

things that had always troubled him when his family talked to him about the

Holocaust

Why didn't they fight back? Why didn't they fight back? So in his story, he's

feeding some of that in. Invased with the terror of brutal killers, every cop,

every man knows that surrender is impossible. You must fight for your

Essentially a fairly sustained attack on the way that it seems to be saying that

the way that black communities in America have embraced evangelical

is holding them back and that it's a negative force, that it's depriving them

their true voice.

that the whole turn -the -other -cheek argument and the Christian forgiveness

and everything is not something that you can really kind of... that you could

understand them ditching the idea.

There's a particular key scene where the William Sanderson character beats the

father, who's a pastor at a local church, beats the father around the head

a Bible.

And they speeded the film up for that moment, so it's done... It's got a

kind of almost like...

surrealistic quality because suddenly it's, you know, extra violent. The film

technique has been used to make it feel more violent as well.

And, you know, the impression that you get from that is that it's just saying,

look, you know, this book is holding you good people down.

A story filled with unbelievable action, a movie of excruciating violence, a

saga of extraordinary courage that will leave you cheering.

The producer of Fight For Your Life was this guy called William Miskin.

And Mishkin was Andy Milligan's producer and was fabled in the exploitation

industry for being a cheapskate to the nth degree. He was notorious for being a

penny pincher.

One of the best examples that Robert Endelson, the director of this,

was that the grandmother in the film is in a wheelchair.

And Endelson contacted Mishkin and said, oh, we need to buy a wheelchair. I need

to get hold of a wheelchair.

Mishkin... dropped in at the set with a wheelchair, which was his wife's

wheelchair. His wife was disabled.

He said, here, use this one.

And so for the three or four days that they were shooting with the grandmother,

Mishkin's wife was laid up in bed, unable to move or go anywhere, whilst

used his wife's wheelchair for the movie.

So that gives you some idea of the lengths William Mishkin was prepared to

save a few dollars.

We are a nation wracked with violent crime.

You are about to see a small sample of an extraordinary gut -crunching film

vividly portrays the most sadistic of these criminals.

That's your baby?

That's right.

Shame to make her an orphan.

Just do like you're told.

Ain't nobody gonna get hurt.

together and shake up the hand.

It's done.

We're blood brothers.

Mind if we come in?

Who are you? What is this all about?

Jesse King, ma 'am, and I'll ask the questions. You understand?

Hey, Joey.

How are you, man?

Where the hell you been?

Louise?

Do we have company?

Now, you better believe it, bear head. Now, get your ass in here.

Well, I kind of decided not to come out, so I'll see you later, huh? Now, let's

go get some grub, y 'all. Get this!

a lesson they won't forget.

No guts, no nerve.

You might have it big between the legs, but you ain't got no balls.

Invased with the terror of brutal killers, every cop, every man knows that

surrender is impossible.

You must fight for your life.

All right, no more killing.

Throw the gun out the window, and then you come out.

This is your last chance.

A story filled with unbelievable action. A movie of excruciating violence.

A saga of extraordinary courage that will leave you cheering.

Fight for your life.

Experience it soon here.

Well, we've got Forest of Fear here, which is 1979, directed by Chuck McCran.

I think this is only credit.

In America, it was released as Blood Eaters. I think the trailer that you'll

is under that title.

Nothing will protect you from the terror of the Blood Eaters. See Blood Eaters.

In its presentation on British VHS, it's a bit of an unglamorous effort, really,

to say the least.

For some reason, the images are mounted on grass paper, which is a puzzle. You

can only assume that the person who put this together was like the 15 -year

-old... son of the video company owner who was given it as a project to do at

school or something, you know, that's really strange.

Yeah, the only ever video cover was mounted on graph paper, and it's an idea

that Peter Greenaway ought to have considered really, isn't it? I thought

would have been more his style.

They are coming, hunting, searching out for ice cray.

It's a zombie film.

It's a zombie film from a good period, late 70s, shot in Pennsylvania.

just down the road from George Romero's set -up. I believe they actually had

some of Romero's technical crew involved in the making of the film.

It has a bit -part role for John Ampliss, who plays Martin in the Romero

Martin, which, frankly, I think is just one of the best horror movies, period,

ever. You know, just incredible.

And the fact that he's playing like a second fiddle role, not second fiddle,

like fifth fiddle role, you know, playing a...

a cop sidekick in this is just like talk about squandering resources you know

this guy played martin in one of the best performances ever to grace a horror

film and there he is playing some dumb hit role it's just ridiculous the most

the violence that you see is kind of aftermath it's usually you know

attacked and then it cuts back a bit later and you see them on the floor with

their guts hanging out on the floor and that's That's nice, but you don't see it

actually happen. It'd be nicer if you actually saw it happen in real time.

So there's a lot of aftermath shots.

Nothing will prepare you for the power of these butchers of the dam.

And the zombie make -ups are kind of fun, but not...

as elaborate as you might hope, and it's certainly thematically got nothing very

important going on in it.

The main theme seems to be to do with environmental pollution.

The plot tries to finger the man for poisoning the environment with

illegal fertilisers or some chemicals to spray on.

Marijuana crops and one of the other titles that came out under as well as

bloody tears I think it came out in America as toxic zombies So on the face

it is a film about how the authorities are responsible for what's going on but

that kind of soon put to one side because what it's really about is a

Rampaging hippies foaming at the mouth running around attacking normal people,

you know So it doesn't quite know where it wants to live, you know in terms of

its, you know, whether it's being

subversive or not you know without feeling without mercy they tracked their

victims down charles mccrann the director now uh as far as i've been able

ascertain he uh became a businessman after uh attempting to get started in

movie industry forest of fear is his only film um my research indicated that

came to a very tragic end Apparently he was one of the people who died in the 9

-11 terrorist atrocity.

He was working as his business had a floor in one

of the Twin Towers and he died as one of the people who died in the attack.

Now, Blood Eaters are out there.

They are coming, hunting, searching out fresh prey.

Without feeling, without mercy, they track their victims down.

Nothing will prepare you for the horror of these butchers of the damned. Nothing

will protect you from the terror of the Blood Eaters. See Blood Eaters Rated R.

This is Flesh for Frankenstein. In Italian, it's il mostro è in tavola,

means the monster is on the table.

Flesh for Frankenstein came out in two formats, one where it was cut and the

other one where it sort of seemed pretty much intact from an American company.

However, eventually this became a video nasty.

Most people attribute the direction of the film to the Warhol factory creator

of... films such as Flesh, Trash and Heat, who was Paul Morrissey. And Paul

Morrissey also wrote the script. And on the back of the LP for Flesh of

Frankenstein, Paul Morrissey says that in the morning he used to sit in the car

and write the script for that day every day. And then he would give it to the

actors and he would write as the film went along every day. And he also did

for the film that followed Flesh of Frankenstein, which is Blood for

One of the stars of both Flesh of Frankenstein and Blood for Dracula was

'Alessandro.

so was in Flesh, Trash and Heat, the films directed by Paul Morrissey. So

if the rumours that Warhol only went on set once aren't true, there is still a

very hardcore Morrissey -D 'Alessandro -Warhol factory connection. This could

raise some issues about whether or not the films are arthouse films or whether

indeed they are the kinds of films that should be relegated to the visceral

bucket that is the video nasty.

Andy Warhol's Frankenstein, Gregoria, Sexes.

wildest Frankenstein ever filmed.

Fleischer Frankenstein is most known for the

seminal enunciation by Udo Kier's Frankenstein. To no death, Otto, you

fuck life in the gallbladder.

Aside from the obvious resonance with Last Tango in Paris, this film's most

famous scene, and obviously one of its most radical scenes, is where Baron

Frankenstein delicately clips open Dalila Delezzaro, who is his female

or Zambie, as the German Udo Kier pronounces it, and puts his...

hands into her entrails and pulls them out and describes each entrail that he

finds and then happily orgasms. But not enough. He also flips her up and gets on

top of her and penetrates her little aperture and similarly has a special

experience with her. One could argue that this is a kind of necrophilia

violation. However, personally, I don't understand it as such. What I think is

interesting about that scene in Flesh for Frankenstein is that...

Baron Frankenstein is reconfiguring the way that the body is used sexually.

And sometimes people miss the...

where the female zombie opens her eyes as if she'd been awakened to a new

sexuality through being frottaged internally.

And I think that that's why Flesh for Frankenstein offers a rather liberating

interpretation of sexuality because the only sexuality that is seen to be rather

violent and offensive is that of the traditional heterosexual stereotype

unsurprisingly, by Joe D 'Alessandro.

The first time I ever experienced or even heard of Flesh for Frankenstein, I

in Melbourne. I was a young, impressionable 16 -year -old, and it was

shown in 3D, which is how it was originally presented at a beautiful Art

cinema. So I went along, put on my grayscale glasses, so it was a very,

elaborate kind of 3D, and I was so enamoured of the film, I went back every

until the end of the run.

So the majority of people, obviously, don't see the film for the first time in

3D. However, you can see with the cinematography, there are very, very

particular elements where the 3D is being explored.

And the most marvellous example of that is the death of Baron Frankenstein where

he gets a barge pole through him and his gallbladder dangles elegantly on the

edge of the barge pole and then we see little bits of it drop off as he dies

the barge pole is literally eviscerating the audience's face.

The film still shows occasionally in 3D at places like the NFT, and it's also

available on DVD with a little machine and some glasses so that one can watch

in 3D if you still have an old -fashioned bubble TV.

So, again, Fleischer Frankenstein made a very unique contribution to the world

of gore cinema because it unadulteratedly presented this 3D.

It seems ironic now that the majority of films that we are seeing in 3D are

Pixar and Disney films, so perhaps it has a...

strange bedfellow in those kinds of modern day films.

Vipco advertised their release of Flesh for Frankenstein taking the American one

-sheet poster cover, which is the word Frankenstein stitched into flesh.

And Fleischer Frankenstein was banned in March of 1984, and it stayed on the

banned list right up until the end of the video nasty phenomenon.

Strangely, it was never banned in Australia, and it wasn't even cut in

Australia. It was simply part of the explosive village roadshow company.

Andy Warhol's Frankenstein is here.

Pass it!

Newsweek magazine calls it the first original Frankenstein in years. A

perversely fascinating movie.

Only close.

Oh! That... That was not so close! I can't... Stop it! What are you

doing?

Swooping bats.

Severed limbs.

Hideously capitulated devices.

And various spare parts.

They all slither off the screen in what Playboy magazine calls the most gruesome

epic ever unleashed.

Andy Warhol's Frankenstein. The

goriest, sexiest, and wildest Frankenstein.

Every film.

Gestapo's Last Orgy, again, is one of the nasty Nazi or eroticized Nazi films.

But it does stand out a little bit from the rest, with the other half dozen or

so movies made in Italy.

in the first half of the 1970s.

They really are, many of them, barely distinguishable one from another, and

of them even use the same stock footage. But this one is a little bit different.

This one has got certain kinds of artistic pretensions about it, I think,

it's also the one which is closest to The Night Porter, because the film does

fact begin.

in the present day era and then flash back to the Nazi era. And again, it's

about the relationship of a woman in the present day to her former Nazi

captors. So there's quite a lot in that film which does...

in a typically kind of Italian way, rip off another movie, and that movie is The

Night Porter, even though The Night Porter is by no means the only root of

nasty Nazi films.

And the film, as I say, does have some pretensions to seriousness.

I mean, there are quotes from Dessard, for example, and things like that.

But the film does contain a particularly nasty and unpleasant scene, which no

doubt helps to explain why the BBFC...

has refused to pass it where a group of high up Nazis have a

feast at this big dining table and it's revealed at some point that one of the

ingredients of this feast is a Jewish baby and then there's another scene a

later on in the feast where this woman inevitably of course naked as she would

be in these films is doused in cognac and then

set alight. I think this is kind of pretty sub the Sardian stuff but

I think the film does have certain kinds of pretensions to seriousness which the

other films do more or less lack.

Whether that makes the film any more acceptable I think or less acceptable is

to viewers to judge.

Gestapo's Last Orgy was one of those films that actually circulated in

Britain in the pre -video recordings that days in a cut copy.

But of course, the fact that it was cut didn't save it from prosecutions.

And this was put out by a company called Video Film Promotions, who I think put

it out twice, actually, the second time with a warning sticker on the back. And

then it was put out again by a company called Video Shack.

And I believe that nowadays the video shack version changes hands for

between £500 and £1 ,000 amongst video collectors.

Amor et mortus. Love and death, the poet's dream.

Amor et mortus.

Love.

I might say that your work has been appreciated till now at the High

I trust we will not be obliged to revise that opinion.

The front lines are now being sent nothing but babies. Quite right.

Babies. Obey orders and do not discuss them.

Rebecca was very beautiful.

She was 20 years old. The Nazis cut all the tendons and ligaments in her legs so

that she was unable to walk.

Why did they do that?

She was trying to avoid the...

attentions of two of camp's officers.

She ran away.

Two officers got the idea.

Without the use of her legs, Rebecca could only crawl at their feet.

So from then on, all the men had to do was pick her up from the floor, throw

on the bed, and use her.

To make a rose bloom, you only need a few grains of earth.

And you found your few grains.

Someone who loves you.

Someone who will help you.

Life.

Now I want life.

Life.

Life!

Men like Commandant von Stein represent the last hopes of Germany.

They... are the evil that infects everything it touches but maybe one day

will be built on the ruins of the cruelty of nazi germany and those past

atrocities will serve as a warning for the future and an enticement to keep the

peace forever you're marvelous lisa in this

place which means only death you are life yes because you taught me a

of death

Lucho Fulci had three movies on the Video Nasties list.

The Beyond, Zombie Flesh Eaters, and The House by the Cemetery, also on the

video media label under the Vampix title.

which of course I used to work for at the time, hence the reason why my review

from Starburst magazine is featured prominently on the back cover.

It was the ex -certificate version, had lots cut out of it anyway, but

nevertheless it was still successfully prosecuted, probably because it was

lumped in with a lot of other titles at the same time.

It was of course the third time out for...

Fulci star Catriona McColl, or Catherine McColl as she was called, because she

also appeared in City of the Living Dead and in The Beyond.

Dagmar Lassander also joined her, Paolo Malco, had a good sort of like

exploitation Italian cast.

This was Lucio Fulci's version of the Frankenstein myth.

The Doctor, of course, was Freudstein.

We're there!

We're in this house!

Dr. Freudstein!

It always bothered me that he never actually was too literal with that.

could have been so interesting, but no, you don't get that. You just get the

usual bog -standard Lucio Fulci gore, which, of course, you didn't see in this

version because it was all taken out.

Oh, have you been to Mrs.

Peterson's? What do you say to a widow who finds out her husband butchered his

mistress and then took his own life?

That's where Peterson hanged himself, from that iron railing.

I'm here behind you.

You've come.

However, I told you very clearly. I tried, but my mother wouldn't listen.

said Daddy had to do some research here. You shouldn't have come, Bob. You

shouldn't have.

In your opinion, why would a man like him slaughter the woman he loved and

hang himself?

Well, I don't know.

The human mind.

Yeah. A research project on suicide with a researcher who commits suicide.

Don't go inside, whoever you are.

Don't go inside!

Keep away from the door. Yes, I will.

Don't worry, Bobby.

I'll get you out.

Why? Who's there?

Who's in this house?

Dr. Freudstein.

You should have listened to what I said.

Well, 1980 was clearly a bumpy year of brutality for Ruggiero Diodato.

Not only had he released Cannibal Holocaust, the most notorious of all the

nasties, but it also directed House on the Edge of the Park, which was also

banned on video.

Both films were released in the UK in 1982 to a storm of controversy.

Essentially, House on the Edge of the Park is a home invasion movie in which

disco -dancing serial killers run amok with a cutthroat razor in a bourgeois

house party.

It has to be said the theme of the home invasion movie had become extremely

popular in the 1970s, particularly in Kubrick's A Clockwork Orange.

Some of these home invasion movies tended to be extremely brutal, though it

to be said that the body count in House on the Edge of the Park is actually

relatively low. We only see two people on screen being killed, one of whom

the key villain Alex, played by David Hess.

However, it was the scenes of a young female partigo being stripped and

brutalised with a cutthroat razor that led to the film's instant notoriety. At

one level, the obvious motivation for Diodato's film is Wes Craven's 1972

splatter epic The Last House on the Left, and both films do make use of the

theme of class conflict to underscore the violence that unfolds within their

narratives. They also both make use of David Hess, who's cast as a serial sex

killer. I guess it would be easy to just kind of dismiss Diodato's film as a rip

-off of Wes Craven's source material, but I do think it stands on its own two

legs.

I do recall that David Hess once told me in an interview that he's particularly

proud of his performance as Alex in Diodato's film, and he sees it as the

accomplished. of all his Byronic sex -themed roles that he undertook during

1970s.

Also, I think Diodato is very skillful at using some of this source material

his own interests.

For instance, the theme of class conflict is far more elaborated and

here than in Wes Craven's original, where it retains a kind of cartoonish

element. And it's not the first time that Diodato had...

underscored the kind of class dynamic that leads to conflict in his movies.

There's a

number

of scenes in the movie where The working class guests at this house party are

kind of made to feel very vulnerable and humiliated. One scene in particular is

a kind of goaded disco dancing scene with the Giovanni Lombardo Radice, which

far more horrific than any of the murder scenes in the actual movie.

Although House on the Edge of the Park does have the reputation as a video

nasty, it's far from being mindless violence.

I think one of the things that Diodato is particularly skilled at is setting up

problematic relationships between the spectator and the violence that they're

viewing. Obviously Cannibal Holocaust is the most accomplished example of this.

It kind of imbues a moral ambiguity in our relationship to what we see.

And I think House on the Edge of the Park also attempts to do this.

It's interesting to note that... in the pre -credit scene is a particularly

gratuitous rape scene but Diodato prevents us getting too attached to this

having these sudden black masked cutaways which prevent you kind of

involved in the gratuitous enjoyment of this rape scene equally in the most

violent scene of the movie where a young female is stripped and then attacked

with a razor blade Diodato frequently cuts between Alex's heinous actions and

the horrified onlookers at this party, who kind of stand in for our own level

shock and disgust at what's happening.

If House on the Edge of the Park makes for uncomfortable viewing, it also makes

for uncomfortable listening.

And that's because the soundtrack is very, very important in this kind of

scenario of problematic horror viewing that Diodato's trying to create.

Central here is the role of veteran composer Ritz Ortolani, who previously

worked on Cannibal Holocaust.

And what was so problematic about that movie is that Ortolani developed this

very, very soft and gentle theme to sit against the most extreme images of

torture and suffering that the film displays, which really kind of sets up

very... very problematic relationship between what we see and what we hear.

strategy is also going on in House on the Edge of the Park where Ortolani uses

almost like a romantic ballad to sit under the scenes of sexual violence that

take place.

So it really again makes it problematic for us to watch this as viewers.

And I think people often say that Diodato is a director who glorifies

against women. But it seems to me he's more interested in unpacking and

questioning the role of sexuality.

and violence and how we relate to them as viewers.

I think House on the Edge of the Park has a very interesting horror history,

you like. I mean, it was actually refused a certificate on its original UK

theatrical release and then came out uncut in the early 80s by Skyline Video.

And that was the version that was promptly banned on grounds of sexual

Subsequently, in later years, the film did have a video re -release or a DVD

release, but it's still missing over 11 minutes of footage. So it shows just how

sensitive the border is. to presume themes of sexual violence within this

you

I Spit on Your Grave, which is a very, very bizarre movie.

I was actually growing up in Birmingham when I first saw this movie.

And I saw it in the Bullring, and I thought, my God, what an incredible

And little did I know at that time that this was one of the most, or seemed to

be one of the most controversial video nasties ever released here.

For some reason in America in the 1970s, we had a whole slew of very

controversial but significant rape and revenge movies. We're talking about

like Lipstick.

Death Weekend, Miss 45.

But by far the most controversial rape and revenge film made in this decade was

Miyazaki's debut movie, I Spit on Your Grave. I spit on your grave.

What you are about to see did happen.

We're well aware of the controversies that surround I Spit on Your Grave in

UK. It's also interesting to note that it already had a wave of controversy in

the US, particularly scathing reviews from American film critic Roger Ebert,

called it a vile bag of garbage, a diseased and depraved product.

And what had been so traumatic to Ebert were the kind of pivotal rape scenes

that occupy the central part of the movie.

Ebert's comments were very much overshadowed by the controversy that

the film's release in Britain in the early 1980s. And I think central to the

effect of the movie were the very, very salacious marketing campaigns that Astro

Video effectively imported, which show a very bloodied, partly clad woman

seeking revenge on the men that have violated her.

So it's quite surprising to find that Azarki's film is actually far more

interesting than the video nasty label would imply.

Take off your clothes.

I don't like women giving me orders.

The original title of the film was Day of the Woman, and I think the movie was

then retitled by distributors to pick up on the Grindhouse audience.

But The Day of the Woman as a title is far more significant because this is a

movie about the day of one woman, a very powerful woman, Jennifer Hills, who's

played, I have to say, very, very well by Camille Keaton in the movie.

Now, in the movie, Keaton's character leaves New York to go to a rural ideal

during the summer to write her first novel. And it's here that she falls foul

four redneck males that include an overbearing gas attendant.

his two unemployed sidekicks, and a retarded delivery clerk named Matthew.

Well, these four redneck males first stalk Jennifer when she's trying to

complete her manuscript, and then in the most gratuitous and gruelling scene in

the film, they kidnap and assault her before raping her in a 20 -minute long

ordeal. Stop it!

And it was this central scene which I think caused so much offence,

understandably, so it's very, very distressing.

What's interesting, however, is when you look at the scene itself, it's

uncomfortable, but it's actually quite revealing in many respects because

there's so little visual content to it.

Many of the shots of the rape scene are either in long shot or Jennifer's body

is concealed behind objects such as rocks. So more than that, I think it's

endless duration of the rape scene that is so unnerving.

Moreover, she's released three times, recaptured and...

then raped again so it's the idea of the scene lulling both the character and

the viewer into a false sense of release and optimism this woman will soon cut

chop break

In his very, very cutting review of the movie, Roger Ebert said that I Spit on

Your Grave was a movie without a shred of artistic distinction.

But what I think is missing here is the director uses sound and soundtrack in

very, very interesting ways.

far more distressing than seeing jennifer's rape scene which we see kind

relatively little is what we hear her horrendous screams of terror and pain

which lasts the full 20 minutes so i think sound is used in a very very

interesting way here both in the rape scene and the revenge that follows

The most controversial revenge scene is where Jennifer castrates the ringleader

of the redneck group in a bath.

But even more distressing than that brief scene of bloodshed is the fact

have an elongated series of cries and screams as he slowly, slowly dies. So

distressing that she has to go downstairs and put on music to smother

cries. The soundtrack is used in a very, very interesting way in the movie.

Why do you feel this?

Oh, yeah, that's fantastic.

No. No, not that.

And this scene, I think, is also unusual because it's one of the few moments

where you have score in the film. I mean, I think the director's clearly

to get as realistic an image of violence and its consequences across as

possible. So there are brief elements of a harmonica soundtrack which indicate

that Jennifer's about to be violated earlier in the film. There's a church

which underscores her visit to a church to ask God's forgiveness for the revenge

she's about to enact.

And this kind of scene. of classical music, ironically, being played while a

castrated victim is dying in a bath upstairs.

I'll give you something to remember for the rest of your life.

It's no surprise to me really that in recent years, I Spit on Your Grave has

actually been the subject of a feminist reappraisal.

It's interesting to note that the movie came out during the 70s when a lot of

feminist groups were asking women to discover their own female voice or

language. And this female voice or language is coded in the movie through

Jennifer's writing.

And in that respect, I think one of the violations that she has to endure is

when the redneck group not only beats... and rape her but they also parody the

word she's written before ripping up her manuscript and assaulting her further

so if there's a recovery for jennifer It occurs through her writing. We see her

piece together the manuscript and begin writing again, and this gives her the

trigger to go out and fulfill her revenge motif.

So I think it is a very, very interesting film, and it's far more

more interesting than the tag of Video Nasty would imply.

And there isn't a jury in this country that will convict her.

There's no doubt that I Spit on Your Grave remains...

uncomfortable viewing um but i do feel it is a significant movie and

significantly it's still cut here in the uk and i guess in a final irony both

this movie and the equally raw and ready last house on the left have both been

the subject of new hollywood glossy remakes which indicates that times have

indeed changed so in this case perhaps we do need to go back and reassess that

original

I don't like women giving me orders I spit on your grave

What you are about to see did happen

your grave this woman will soon cut chop

break and burn five men beyond recognition and

there isn't a jury in this country that will convict her

I spit on your grave.

Relax.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

I'll make you feel like you've never felt before.

God bless your hands.

Wait till you feel this.

Oh, yeah, that's fantastic.

No, no, not that.

I spit on your grave.

What do you want?

The shoe I want.

Your grave.

and it certainly fosters the image of Greece as a place where men are men and

sheep are scared.

This is a very kinky movie, as you might guess.

There's a sequence in it at the beginning which really sets it up to

how perverted it can be, and that is a brother and sister having sex in a phone

box, and they phone their mum up just to let them know what they're doing, so

that pretty much sets the tone.

It was directed by Nico Mastarakis, who apparently wrote the script in a single

week, and we have to ask, what took him so long? But I will say this.

it is one of those weird little movies which is so kinky that you can see why

they put it on the nasties list for example there's a sequence where a guy

sex with a goat and then he sits his throat and this same particular

is rather less tolerant of homosexuals and he makes a gay guy fillet a gun

barrel with particularly messy outcome which really gave the clue to the people

who put the video sleeve together to do the cover saying the lucky ones got

their brains blown out. It's a nice and sleazy movie just the way we like them.

Last House on the Left. To avoid fainting, keep repeating, it's only a

It's only a movie.

Only a movie.

Only a movie.

Probably the most notorious and much banned, censored, withdrawn, argued

of all the films on the Video Nasties list.

Wes Craven's first overground film as a director, the foundation of his career.

It had a mainstream remake last year, which is a sort of some...

guarantee of pop culture immortality it's actually of the films on the

list it's one of the ones that's still quite unpleasant to watch but in a sort

of challenging way rather than you know a trash exploitative way just what did

happen in the last house on the left i would argue

for it as a as a real film a film worthy of sort of debate and discussion and

that But there is no denying that it still contains lots of disembowelment

rape and chainsaw torture and the kind of gory stuff that really ticked off

the censorious.

If your idea of horror was a Hammer film or even The Exorcist or something like

that, then seeing a movie like this, it's kind of raw, aesthetic, in -your

-face, grimy look.

particularly in the degraded video version, was genuinely shocking.

There was really genuinely a sense of, what have we rented out here?

Sights and sounds far beyond anything you've tested.

The last house on the left.

I saw this film for the first time at the National Film Theatre in rather more

elevated circumstances.

And even there, it seemed to have a kind of grimy charge that...

rendered it different even from accepted hardcore classics like Night of the

Living Dead or the Texas Chainsaw Massacre. There's still something

unpleasant about this picture that sticks in the memory nearly 40 years on.

To avoid painting, keep repeating to yourself, it's only a movie.

Which is actually quite important for me because I wrote a review of it after

that, and that was the...

sample piece i sold to the monthly film bulletin which is my first published

work and actually got me a job and therefore a career so yeah so i've

felt fondly about that on the left because it was one of the first things

that sort of got me into the business i doubt if anybody else has a sort of

nostalgic feeling of warm cuddliness about it it's not that kind of a movie

it here is the first motion picture to offer to the daring a look into the

Maddening space between life and death.

Some fun facts about Last House on the Left. It was, in theory, a remake of

Ingmar Bergman's The Virgin Spring, which has a similar plot line. But you

find a bunch of Westerns that have very similar plot lines. Hanny Calder, a

Raquel Welch movie, in which she's raped and then tracks down and murders the

people who raped her.

has a very similar idea.

I Spit on Your Grave is kind of a Last House on the Left imitation.

And there are a few very close Last House imitations from Italy, Late Night

Trains and House at the Edge of the Park, which also landed up on the

list. I suppose the idea was that once the plot got tarred, I mean, we were

lucky that The Virgin Spring wasn't out on video. I'm sure that would have been

on the list as well. Only a movie.

Only a movie.

Only a movie.

If it's shocking and upsetting, well, that was what it was trying to do.

But you can't help but sympathise with the, I rented it out for my kids, or,

know, my granny in Rotherham happened to see this by mistake. Because it's not

actually called, you know, cannibal gut -munching, atrocity, eyeball -bursting.

Last House on the Left is sort of a classy title for a film like this.

So... And the cover, of course, doesn't give anything away.

I mean, there's some sort of unpleasant pictures on the back.

But even so, it doesn't quite tell you what you're getting. And I think that to

bend over backwards to be sympathetic to people who were shocked and wanted to

ban stuff that I think is important that people should be allowed to see, it's

still kind of a hand grenade of a movie.

It rests on 13 acres of earth.

Over the very center of hell.

Here's the first motion picture to offer to the daring.

A look into the final maddening space between life and death.

The last house on the left.

To avoid fainting.

Keep repeating.

Sights and sounds far beyond anything you've tested.

The last house on the left. To avoid fainting, keep repeating.

Take as much as you can.

Love Camp 7 is an early example of Nazi exploitation movies, which became

prevalent in the 1970s. As it was made in 1968, Love Camp 7 is actually the

first Nazi nasty.

Try saying that after you've had a few drinks.

It's often thought that the nasty Nazi or the sexy Nazi movies all had

their roots in the night porter.

But that simply isn't the case. The roots go much, much, much further back

that. What in fact it is, it's our old friend the women in prison movie, but

within a Nazi prison camp.

And nor is it the first film by any manner of means to have a kind of sexual

theme. although set in the Third Reich. You can think of movies like Hitler's

Children, for instance, or Women in Bondage, which were made, in fact,

World War II.

The mixture of kind of sex, violence, prison -like institution is actually not

that new, but this was the first time that a film was made which I think had

serious intent whatsoever.

and was set within a nazi prison camp and the main purpose of the film is

titillation and nasty things basically being done by by men to women so

it's some kind of it is some kind of first but the film does actually have

certain kinds of antecedents welcome ladies to love camp number

It's nowhere near as gory or nasty as the later movies like Ilse, She -Wolf of

the SS, but it is a particularly sleazy example of its kind, with plenty of

softcore gropings and Jewish women being harassed by sex -mad Nazis.

One of my favourite scenes in the movie has this Alsatian dog being set on a

line of naked female prisoners.

But you can see the dog's more interested in playing in the jet of

they're hosing the prisoners down with than he is in actually attacking the

women. Producer R .W. Kress plays the commandant in the movie, and another

familiar face to exploitation fans is David Friedman, a legendary producer of

films like Blood Feast, who also turns up in the movie in an acting role.

Love Camp 7 was...

one of those films that did circulate on video in the pre video recordings act

days distributed by market and and abby but of course once the video recordings

act came in the the video disappeared but eventually it was

submitted on video or dvd to the british board of film classification in

2002 and interestingly they refused to pass it so this is one of the nasties

that does in fact remain banned the bbsc's last word on the subject and the

reason they banned it in the first place was they said that the whole purpose of

the work is to invite male viewers to relish the spectacle of naked women

humiliated just for their titillation well that's true so prepare to be

titillated because here's the trailer

This motion picture is not a figment of the writer's imagination.

It is based entirely on actual fact.

Be prepared to let us take you inside the barbed wire gates of love.

Camp 7.

Both of these officers, having full knowledge of the assignment, have agreed

volunteer to help us.

Your arrest and your subsequent imprisonment into the women's camp has

prearranged by Captain Kelly.

Perhaps your mission has not been clearly explained to you. For the next

days, you are going to be whores for the Third Reich.

There, ladies.

I trust you'll find yourself entirely refreshed after your little shower.

I want to welcome you once more to Love Can't Accept.

You may find it difficult to believe that this motion picture is true.

You may find it incredible that two young American women would volunteer to

throw themselves into the unspeakable indignities and horrible humiliations of

Nazi love camp in order to serve their country.

You will follow the factual story of two American girls who are taken prisoner

by the Nazi Gestapo and placed in love camps.

A camp where women were used like cattle entirely to service the pleasures and

perversion of the Nazi frontline officers.

Love Camp 7 is actually filmed on location where the story took

place.

It is without a doubt the most total and complete study in reality this theater

has ever had the privilege to present to its patrons.

You may not find

this story amusing.

You may find it horrifying.

Disgusting. Certainly, you will not find it light entertainment.

But we guarantee that you will not live long enough to ever forget

the things you will witness and experience inside Love Camp

7.

The only video nasty to quote George Bernard Shaw in its credits, Madhouse is

not to be confused with the 1974 Vincent Price Peter Cushing movie of the same

name. In fact, it was released as There Was a Little Girl.

The main character, played by Trish Everly in her only screen role, is a

whose mad, disfigured sister escapes from a home for the criminally insane

sets about murdering various people with the aid of a killer dog.

The big contentious scene that seems to put this on the nastiest list was the

scene where a dog gets drilled in the head. But looking at it nowadays, the

sequence itself is so obviously fake that it makes you wonder what they were

looking at. The director of the movie was Ovidio G.

Athenitis, one of the greatest filmmakers of all time. Well, he thought

anyway, because he goes down in the record books as the guy who fired James

Cameron from Piranha 2 because he thought he could do a better job.

Now, what happened to James Cameron anyway?

Anyway, I'm sure you'll enjoy There Was a Little Girl, a .k .a. Madhouse.

Help me get out of here.

We can start over, just the two of us.

Our party is just beginning.

You can't leave yet.

You're not still afraid of her after all these years? The stories you used to

tell. They were not stories.

And you're afraid?

What of?

On our birthday.

She had a special ceremony.

Soon it will be our birthday again.

Remember? Remember how we used to celebrate?

Sister dear.

No.

Remember what I did? How it hurt?

I'll make it hurt again.

I'll make you suffer what I've suffered.

Ron,

you'll never get away from me.

Judy, what is it?

I told you I shouldn't have come. I told you. Now what is it? What's happened?

She tried to do what?

What are you talking about?

I know there was a dog in my apartment last night. Are you sure it wasn't a

nightmare?

Now, you know how you used to have them, those dreams about dogs attacking you

the way you'd wake up screaming.

Sweetheart, the idea that your sister would sig her dog on your friends is a

little bit off the wall.

They keep acting like I'm seeing things, like I'm making it all up, like I'm

crazy. Look, honey, do you think I'm crazy, Helen?

A light on him.

And camera.

I'll get it.

Okay.

Good night. Good night.

I'll call you tomorrow.

Okay.

Mardi Gras Massacre.

And as it says on the cover, it's an American splatter movie.

And with a cover like this, it's hardly surprising it fell foul of the dreaded

DPP's list.

It actually circulated on video from two companies, first from Gold Star, part

of Duran, and then later there was a re -release for Market Video.

There's a warning on the back too, advising that it contains disturbing

Well, it does, but they're disturbing in a different way, as it's without doubt

one of the most ineptly made films to make the Nazis list.

The editor must have been working nights and dozed off when working on it. In

some things, actors literally disappear before they left the scene, as if they'd

been beamed up.

Or they even jump from one place to another. It's really, really dreadful.

It's set in New Orleans with the Mardi Gras fast approaching.

A wealthy guy in a suit is on the search for evil hookers, so he can take them

back to his pad for sacrifice. In fact, he has a purpose -built sacrificial

altar to take them to, before slaughtering the unfortunate young

Once he gets them back through his pad and tied up, he rubs oil onto them,

they quite like, and then he promptly disappears behind a red curtain, only to

reappear moments later wearing this weird hippie cult leader type outfit and

mask. He then proceeds to cut the girls up first at hand, which accepted the

money, then the feet which carried her to his door, and finally he cuts them

open and rips out their hearts.

Only it's obvious we've just cut to a rather cheap looking latex body double

a sheep's heart pounding away.

And all the while we witness to God we're subjected to this most dreadful

-of -context disco music. It really is hard to imagine.

All I can assume is it was given to the production company for free to promote

the album of some sort.

Beautiful women are dying, and so are the New Orleans cops.

The usual inept cops are assigned to the case, and on a visit to one of the many

strip clubs and generally seedy joints, one of them ends up shacked out of a

prostitute who owes him a favour.

we then get a really soppy series of hand -in -hand lovers gazing into each

other's eyes amidst the continuing slaying and stripping.

So what do we know about the director, Jack Weiss? Well...

Before making Mardi Gras Massacre, he did another cheap over -reduction called

The Crypt of Dark Secrets, which also naturally bombs, just like this one.

However, Scotland Yard have given him the fame he so missed out on back home

the USA.

Mardi Gras Massacre appeared on the DPP's ban list in October of 83, and

remained there till the bitter end.

Here's a really rare trailer that sums things up quite nicely.

New Orleans, Mardi Gras, masks and murder.

The Mardi Gras Massacre.

Beautiful women are dying, and so are the New Orleans cops.

As they battle a bloodthirsty madman, a masked monster, Mardi Gras Massacre.

Night of the Bloody Apes by Rene Cardona.

This little 1968 Mexican gem is almost indescribable. However, I'm going to do

my best. It's the story of a mad scientist whose son dies and he has to

reanimate him. But of course, the only thing available is a gorilla heart.

One man challenges nature on the Night of the Bloody Apes.

And so what we get is the age -old story of...

my child is dead, I must make him alive again, but I don't have anything to hand

that I can use.

And so because he transplants the gorilla heart, we have the very

element of this film, which is really why the film was probably banned, which

stock footage open heart surgery.

So we have these traditional kind of shots of very...

uh intrigued looking faces doing something with their hands and then

will cut to a very grainy kind of open heart surgery and an incredibly visceral

one you see the heart wrenched out and jumbled around in people's hands for a

little while as far as i can tell the human heart and the ape heart aren't

necessarily different possibly because the stock footage is from the same body

there's also another lovely element in the film which is the I think, seemingly

random and arbitrary story of a female wrestler and her wrestling with her

career. And so we have an opening scene of two female wrestlers and then the

female wrestler has a vague relationship with the person who is investigating

the murders.

Yet we never really have an understanding of why we get this

think that's quite a lovely thing because it's almost like the director

said, well, here's a little story of a woman grappling with her relationship

with her work and her job and things like that.

And so in that sense, it's quite intriguing because, of course, the

of wrestlers is men wrestlers and we have the female with the mask and

everything. Some other little tidbits that occur in this film, when the son,

course, becomes the ape, the bloody ape.

He's a very hairy man, the son, and he becomes an ape, and suddenly he's got no

hair but a huge buff body and a hairy ape face. So I think there's a lovely

little exchange going on that one of the best ways to get rid of your body hair

may be to become an ape, and therefore you may have an ugly face. However, your

body will become super buff. The lust of a man in the body of a beast.

Also, the Bloody Eight doesn't really know what to do in the sex scenes. He

of violates women, but he seems to get a little confused. And so before he

actually does anything to them, he tears them apart a little bit and then runs

away. Except for, of course, when he abducts the little girl. And I'll leave

that up to you to discover what happens in that circumstance.

But Night of the Bloody Eights is quite an endearing film, ironically.

I found myself feeling quite tender towards the characters. And it is a much

better film than it...

possibly sounds.

My only concern is that the English title, which is Night of the Bloody

a little bit misleading because as far as I can see, there's only one ape. So

maybe we're waiting for the sequel or the uncut footage of the apes that we

never saw.

of a bloody apes. Creatures born of madness.

Half man, half beast. All one.

It's the monster!

The might of a bloody apes.

One man shares their terrible secret.

One man challenges nature on the night of bloody apes,

sharing their bloodlust for the name of science, daring divine will with his

bizarre creation.

But a horrible half -beast has you.

They strike again.

And again, and again.

The lust of a man in the body of a beast.

What can stop them?

What can appease them?

Half man, half beast.

bloody apes.

They rip, they tear, they claw you to pieces. It's an orgy of

terror.

Beware, it's the night of the bloody apes.

They claw you to pieces. It's an orgy of terror.

Beware. It's the night of the bloody apes. And the creatures of hell

are loose.

The night of the bloody apes.

Now, see if you can guess why Night of the Demon made it to the Nazis list.

Some bright spark at either film services thought it would be a good idea

on the cover, warning this film contains scenes of extreme and explicit

violence. Talk about giving the game away.

Anyway, not to be confused with the 1957 Jacques Tournier movie of the same

name, which of course is a classic of its kind. This is a low -budget American

movie directed by James Wasson, which is all about Bigfoot, you know, the hairy

monster of the boondocks.

There is a demon.

a creature and this creature goes on the rampage and it goes ripping people's

arms out and beating them to death with the soggy end shoving people's faces on

hot plates but the bit that gets talked about the most well in my

household anyway is the bit where this biker stops beside the road for a pee

gets his wedding tackle hoisted off oh brings tears to your eyes and i remember

once a friend said to me chris you've got to see night of the demon And I

oh, why? What's it like? He goes, this bloke gets his cock pulled off. And I

went, well, two things, really. I don't want to see a man's cock, and I don't

want to see a man's cock pulled off.

But I still think I watched it. I think I went and hired it.

It's not one of those movies that's ever going to live long in the memory, but

it's pretty much a classic example of low -grade, low -budget 80s slasher

movies.

film that probably makes a better trailer than it does a movie Those

stories are heard about in the forest They're true.

They're all true officials found a camera with this film in it, but no

the people We

believe that there is a creature living in these mountains

and possibly a close relative to man.

We're already in Bigfoot territory, where all those people were killed.

Not far from here, a motorcyclist was found.

There was no trace of the thing that killed him.

Bigfoot's not playing games anymore. Maybe next time he won't be happy just

scare us.

Arguably, the most controversial video nasty of them all is this one.

Romano Scavolini's Nightmares in a Damaged Brain.

Now, why is that?

Well, mainly because the distributor of this film, David Grant, got put in

prison for releasing a version that was actually slightly longer than the BBFC X

-rated cut.

In any form, it was terrible.

The gore was unconvincing. You could see it was appliances.

And the blood is too red. It's got that sort of lipstick gloss colour.

It wasn't just us who thought it was all really fake. Tom Savini did too.

I mean, he was down as special effects make -up artist on the credits, but even

he got really upset because he was only like a consultant and actually really

did complain long and loud when the film was released in America as just plain

old nightmare.

It's quite misogynistic.

It's very trashy.

That's one of the reasons why I think this got leapt on as well.

Where do you go?

There's no place to hide.

I actually didn't see this on video. I actually saw it at the very first press

show ever. And here's the actual ticket that I've got from that night.

It was at the Prince Charles.

And it was on a Monday, 19th of April, 1982, at 11 .15.

I remember it well. We were given a vomit bag and we were asked to guess the

weight of the brain that was actually in the foyer.

Apparently you'd win £50 if you guessed it right, which David Grant thought

would actually get a bit more publicity mileage.

Unfortunately, he got the wrong sort of publicity.

The following preview trailer is not suitable for viewing by persons of a

nervous disposition.

Switch off your television set immediately unless you are prepared to

terrified.

Nightmares in a damaged brain.

Prepare yourself for the most intensely shocking motion picture of our time.

The motion picture everyone is talking about.

Hello?

Hello, Steve?

Nightmares in a damaged brain.

Kathy?

Kathy?

Tara will surround you.

Pray

you

survive the night.

Listen to me, George.

It's only a dream, and dreams can't hurt you.

Are you there, George?

Daddy!

George, don't hang up!

Where do you go?

No place to hide.

The dream you can't escape.

Alive.

Nightmares in a damaged brain.

Right, this is the Antichrist in a video box here.

Snuff, one of the most notorious of the titles on the Video Nasties list. Ladies

and gentlemen, the bloodiest thing that ever happened in front of a camera.

It's actually even in America a notorious film. It's basically an

foist off something that was utterly unreleasable on the public by whipping

ridiculous fake controversy.

It was originally an Argentine -based movie called Slaughter, which was a

cheap version of the life of Charles Manson.

Utterly uninteresting, without merit, and totally ridiculous.

Even in the 1970s it couldn't get a theatrical grindhouse release in

So Alan Shackleton, the distributor, did this thing of shooting an extra scene

which purported to show the on -camera murder of one of the actresses in

the movie.

slaughter and re -releasing it with the line, you know, shot in South America

where life is cheap.

The film that could only be made in South America where life is cheap.

And saying that this really happened and then hiring protesters to stand outside

the cinema saying that this shouldn't be shown.

And then after that, some real protesters came along saying it

shown. They, of course, bought entirely into the notion that it showed a real

person being murdered for entertainment purposes on screen, which I think

anybody who actually sat through the hour and a half of slaughter...

among the more boring examples of his genre, to get to the gruesome bit at the

end, realised it was laughably fake. It was people throwing sausage meat around

and trying not to laugh, although conceptually quite horrible. I've got to

as a depiction of the making of a snuff movie...

The one aspect I find funny is the idea that a snuff movie would have a full

crew and a continuity girl taking notes, saying, when you do the reverse shot,

make sure the entrails are in this position or it won't cut together

But she gets excited and starts holding the victim down.

It has no end credits because, of course, all these people would be

it came to that. So anyway, when it came to being released in Britain...

This crowd, Astra Video, licensed it from Wizard Films, Charles Band's

for release and mocked up this thing. A few hundred copies went out to the

trade, but then they caught on that this was going to be a hot potato.

And they originally said they were only going to put it out for a month because

they knew that it was going to be controversial, but their lawyer kind of

advised them not to do it.

And so after they sent out the...

The preliminary copies, they actually took trade ads out saying, no, actually,

we're not going to release this after all, and backstabbed completely and

essentially buried it.

Bootleggers, however, got hold of this and put it out with a blankish sleeve,

again trying to hype up the suggestion that this showed a real, actual murder,

and it then became as ridiculously controversial here as it was in America.

was sort of hauled in, and many, many...

press stories about video nasties would claim that they included so -called

snuff films, actual films of people being murdered as a form of pornography.

And it always turned out to be this or Cannibal Holocaust, you know, films

are obviously fictional and have a fictional context and special effects

proper actors and stuff like that to this day.

actual snuff movies seem not to have turned up, which I find amazing because

myth has been around.

so long and it would seem particularly in the modern era so easy to do if you

just happen to be unscrupulous and murderous and the world isn't short of

like that it may well be that things like martyrdom videos or execution

which you can find on the internet satiate whatever tiny market there

for the notion of the snuff film that They don't need to

exist anymore.

Snuff, the bloodiest thing that ever happened in front of a camera.

I doubt if even, yeah, I think back then probably bootleggers were making more

of E .T. and Saturday Night Fever than they would from a marginal, if

controversial, title like Snuff. But it was around, it was available, people saw

it in brown paper labels and all that kind of stuff, which only added to...

it's sort of legend you know the fact that it was distributed in this sort of

underground way made people you know some of whom really ought to have known

better think that oh maybe it was real um but then i think people saw

it and realized oh no it's not and the waters closed over. It's one of those

films where the story behind its making and marketing is so much more

interesting than actually watching the movie that you think the only way to re

-release it would be with a really good feature -length documentary about the

ups and downs of snuff, which certainly I'd be interested in watching. I would

not be interested in watching snuff ever again.

That said...

I would kind of like to know how Slaughter ends, if anybody out there has

the actual ending, because the snuff scene replaces the climax of Slaughter.

So for the five of us who are actually following the story, we'd like to know

Sutan, the Charles Manson figure, gets caught or not.

Warning.

You are about to see scenes of a film said to be the most controversial in the

history of motion pictures.

The movie they said could never be shown.

In fact, you have read the headlines across the newspapers of this country

the world, and you have heard the news.

This is the movie that could only have been made in South America, where life

cheap. It will shock you and astound you.

It is not meant for weak hearts or weak stomachs.

Because of the highly controversial and violent nature of this movie, We are

only able to show you some selected, edited scenes at this time.

But the complete, unexpurgated, unedited, uncensored version will be

to this theater.

Ladies and gentlemen, the bloodiest thing that ever happened in front of a

camera.

Snuff.

This is the true story of four innocent young actresses who thought they were

making just another movie.

But didn't know they were making the ultimate movie.

Snuff, the film that could only be made in South America where life is cheap.

What starts as a simple story of love and sexual passion ends in an orgy of

diabolical bloody lust.

A movie so controversial you will find it difficult to believe it was actually

filmed.

Snuff.

Then you two go and die!

Snuff. The bloodiest thing that ever happened in front of a camera.

It's one of those films whose cover, rather like that of Driller Killer and

Cannibal Holocaust, caused an enormous furore.

As you can imagine, really, if you look at the cover.

But the interesting thing is, with this cover, that although it looks pretty

tasteless, doesn't it?

Originally, on this artwork, the woman had no clothes on at all.

But for the video box, she was given this little... painted on g string and

when the adverts appeared in the trade press they also painted on a bra as well

and you can imagine with this in the video shop windows and this in the trade

press even with bra and knickers um people thought my god what on earth is

video industry um producing now very very often it was the covers and the

advertisements

for these so -called video nasties which caused all the trouble.

People didn't actually need to see the videos themselves. All they had to do

look at the covers and say, oh, my God, this surely must be banned.

It's not surprising that SS Experiment Camp was one of the early videos to be

prosecuted under the Obscene Publications Act because, again, Obscene

Publications Act up until now had only been used for...

pornography for videos and films containing sex, whereas what the

Public Prosecutions wanted to do was by bringing these test cases against

certain video nasties like SS Experiment Camp, he wanted to see whether violence

could be caught under the Obscene Publications Act as well, and it was.

Help me, help me! Oh, God, let her die!

Now, in point of fact, if you know anything at all about either women in

movies, of which SS Experiment Camp is one, and if you know anything at all

about the specific Nazi versions of women in prison movies, you'll actually

know that this film is actually pretty tame by comparison. I know when you hold

up the box and say this film is quite tame, people think you must have very

standards.

Actually, there's nothing particularly ghastly about this.

You are going to serve a victorious cause for our Third Reich.

An awful lot of SS experiment camp, like a lot of the Italian -made Nazi

horror movies.

consists of endless films of partisan warfare and war footage.

Yes, of course, there are a few of the obligatory scenes where women are

undressed and given medical examinations and where a certain amount of violence

is carried out towards women, but SS Experiment Camp is one of the tamer of

these films, and I think very tame compared to, say, the Canadian film

-Wolf of the SS.

So...

I think the reason why the nasty Nazi films, or the erotic Nazi films, or call

them what you will, ran into trouble with the BBFC was for the

same reason that other women in prison movies ran into trouble with them. It

wasn't so much the Nazi aspect that was a problem, it was the mingling of sex

and violence and kind of eroticised torture, which was and is the problem

them.

I've already sacrificed too many prisoners, experimenting with these

Yes, I've noticed your undue concern over the necessary death of some of

prisoners. They are humans.

Have you considered, Dr. Steiner, they are against the Third Reich?

Repeat it to her again.

I swear my allegiance to the supreme ruler, our Fuhrer. Say it.

Past and future no longer exist for you.

You are going to serve a victorious cause for our Third Reich.

This is just the beginning, you frigid, puritanical bitch!

You're a political prisoner.

He's a German soldier.

I'll never get that man out of my thoughts.

Turn one full atmosphere.

Not yet.

Okay, now here's where I out myself.

Yes, I used to work for Video Media, the company who released Tenebrae on video

in 1983.

Here's the actual video release announcement from Video Media. As you

20th June 1983, and it cost £33 .95.

That's like...

A million pounds in today's money, isn't it? How expensive were videos back

then? How could we afford it?

The reason why I worked for them was because my best friend Maureen Bartlett,

who was a writer of photo play at the time, decided she wanted to enter the

video business.

And I was one of the people she employed.

Naturally, we were looking for titles, and one of them was Dario Argento's

Tenebrae.

beyond belief.

I was desperate to meet the man.

I'd been such a big fan.

And when he came over and we met, it's the reason why we became so close and

I went on every single film set after that, which led to my book, Profondo

Argento. The book deals with a murder committed with an old -fashioned open

razor, right?

This girl, too, was killed with a razor, and your book's pages stuffed into her

mouth. Eagle -eyed among you will notice that all my reviews are actually on the

back of the video sleeve. I mean, I worked there.

I put them in there.

This is one of those famous

cases where the DPP pounced on a film after it had got a BBFC certificate.

So really, it was on very shaky ground.

And the main reason why they didn't like it was for this scene of

the act's dismemberment.

Now here, which is like a special effects scene that I actually had taken

on the set, you can see how fake it is. I mean, there's the gun actually sort of

like nailed into the table, and there's her arm, which looks so extended and so

fake, it's unbelievable, which makes it completely ludicrous, the fact they cut

this scene out of the video in the end.

The reason why this film is now quite infamous...

not just in England, where it was a video nasty, but in Italy, is because

girl in that photograph is Veronica Lario.

And, of course, she became Mrs Silvio Berlusconi, the Prime Minister of

wife. For years, he actually stopped this movie going on Italian television.

And all the scandals that you're hearing about now is all due to her.

read all your books, Mr. Neal. The book deals with a murder committed with an

old -fashioned open razor, right?

This girl, too, was killed with a razor, and your book's page is stuffed into

her mouth. Can I ask you something?

If someone is killed with a Smith & Wesson revolver, do you go and interview

president of Smith & Wesson?

Peter, Peter, you can't let me down now. We're within two days of making a deal.

Please, stay just until Friday.

My life is in danger. There's no deal in the world worth risking my life for.

Listen don't hang up. We have to talk

Peter?

Come on, hurry.

You'll be okay.

We've got to get out of here.

The guy, the guy, the guy has an axe.

Could it be somebody I know?

Yeah.

I wish I'd never written that book.

You don't mean that. I've made charts. I've tried building a plot the same way

you have.

Tried to figure it out, but...

I just have this hunch that something is missing.

A tiny piece of the jigsaw.

Somebody who should be dead is alive, or somebody who should be alive is already

dead. Explain that.

You know, there's a sentence in a Conan Doyle book.

When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable,

must be the truth.

The Werewolf and the Yeti. What a title. And it's certainly well worth watching

as you won't find anything else on the DPP Nazis list that's quite as downright

demented. Spanish actor Paul Nashi, whose real name is Jacinto Molina, wrote

stars in this one. Sadly, he died in 2009, but remains a Spanish horror

He was most famous for playing a character called Voldemar Duninsky,

you'll be pleased to hear he does in this film.

It begins in London with the sound of Scottish bagpipes.

Hilarious. After being informed about a rare sighting of a yeti in the

Himalayas, the intrepid Voldemar sets off with a group of explorers in search

the mythical beast.

Sadly, all doesn't go to plan.

He loses sight of his group and ends up lost in the mountains. He's miraculously

rescued from certain death by two rather sexy young ladies.

You may be asking what these scantily clad young ladies are doing in the

mountains of the Himalayas, right?

Well, they're actually guarding a tomb, but all is not what it seems.

He quickly recovers and finds himself romping naked with the pair of them.

However, he realises that one is actually a vampire and the other who

is a werewolf.

Unlucky. He staggers out of the cave and as it's a full moon, yes, you've

guessed it, does a bad dissolve effect transformation into a werewolf.

The rest of the explorers, including his main squeeze, Sylvia, get attacked by a

group of thugs who cart them off to the dungeon of a sadistic Betty Page, Susie

Wong lookalike called Vandessa, and an Anton LaVey lookalike called Sekka Khan.

One of the hapless young ladies is bound, and in the scene that most likely

the film banned, has the skin painfully peeled off her back for transplanting on

the evil Khan's back.

The film ends with a fight between the werewolf Valdemar and the Yeti, who is

about to attack sexy young Sylvia.

All's well that ends well, however, as she cures him of the werewolf's curse

they head off into the sunset.

It does all sound rather silly, doesn't it? But isn't that what exploitation

films should be?

Fun, sex, werewolves, torture, nudity.

It was issued to American cinemas as Night of the Howling Beast, and it's a

that it hasn't been issued here since this canon video release, which,

incidentally, is highly collectible indeed.

It remained on the final DPP -39 list right up to the very end. Here we have a

rare theatrical trailer.

The full red moon will soon shine in the sky.

The demons will come out of their hiding places.

and their howls will be heard in the night announcing death.

My men are afraid and do not wish to go.

What mysteries lie hidden in legendary Tibet?

What horrible demons terrorize men who don't think twice about risking their

lives?

Frightened men pray to their gods with their ritual dances against the evil

spirit, the werewolf and the yeti.

Tarakoram is a land of corruptions and brutal men whose law is violent crime.

Shut up. Death is the kindest end to those prisoners in the dungeons of the

palace of the Sarkar Khan, where a beautiful and evil woman submits her

to the most diabolical tortures.

And he wasn't killed by a wolf.

It was you.

In The Werewolf and the Yeti, there is terror, eroticism,

and adventure.

Bringing together the audience and the actors in a nightmarish atmosphere.

The Werewolf and the Yeti.

The Yeti, the mythical being of the mountains of Tibet, meets the werewolf

bestial and diabolical battle.

No!

Paul Nashie, in his most recent creation of the werewolf, with Grace Mills,

Sylvia Solar, and a great supporting cast.

Only I know of a remedy for your illness.

A remedy?

What is it?

There exists a magic plant with red flowers on it.

When its petals are mixed with the blood of a young girl, they can cure those

like you who have been contaminated by the demons of Karakoram.

Love.

The Werewolf and the Yeti.