31 days of horror Year 3 day 15

Nightmares in a Damaged Brain

1981
Code Red 30th anniversary edition first print DVD

Here's another film I have heard about for close to a 2 decades.First I heard about the controversy over if Tom Savini did the special effects work or not. He claims he didn't . But some of the production staff claims he did.Plus a behind the scenes photo has shown up that clearly shows Tom on the set. For years I have wanted to see it. But the VHS was going for way more than I am willing to pay for VHS. And sure plenty of people have a bootleg DVD for sale. But they are all ripped from VHS and every time I saw one the dealer wanted $20. Plus 4 or 5 years ago Code Red had announced they were gonna release it. Well earlier this year it finally came out. And plenty of message board "tough guys" started to complain. Saying it took too long for Code Red to get it out. And various other bullshit. Now since I know most of the Code Red DVDs have a very limited print run I ordered one as soon as it came out. I got lucky and got the first print. You can tell a first print from a later printing by looking at the bottom of the front cover. The first print has "Limited Edition:No more than 100,000 will be pressed" on it. The later printings drop this. I really doubt that the first print run was 100,000. Mainly cause the lead guy at Code Red has said how most of their releases are lucky to sell 3000 copies.

George Tatum is a very damaged man. He suffers from all kinds of mental illnesses. But a experimental new treatment is used on him. And he is declared safe to leave the mental hospital.

He starts off by wandering around the 42nd street area of NYC. He goes inside one of the many adult bookstores and goes back to the peepshow booths. He puts in his money and sees a nude woman masturbating. This triggers his violent tendencies and he goes out and starts killing people.

He gets a car and starts heading for Florida. It seems there is a mother who has a few kids down there that George has some kind of connection with. He finally makes it down there and goes on a killing rampage. But in the end good triumphs.

Now the story and acting in this film aren't anything special. But the gore FX are amazing for the time period it was done it. We get all kinds of bloody violence. The DVD is loaded with extras. It has two discs. The first disc has a 16X9 print created from the 2 best 35mm prints they could find. An audio commentary with the make up artist Cleve Hall and the main star Baird Stafford.We also get a full frame color corrected telecine approved by the directer.Then we get two featurettes. One is a interview with Baird,Cleve and the distributor Tom Ward. The other is an interview with the FX artist for the parts send in NYC. The second disc has a brand new telecine that is 16X9 from a better looking 35mm print. 2 different trailers. Plus some trailers for other films either out already or coming from Code Red. Then there is the one extra that has caught a bunch of shit online. It is a 95 minute interview with the directer Romano Scavolini. It is in Italian and has no sub titles at all. One of the movie forums I go to a guy has explained why this is. It seems he was sent the interview and was creating subtitles for it. But the first copy of the interview he was sent had a almost 20 minute segment that was wouldn't play. He got back in touch with Code Red and months later they sent him a DVD with just that part. But the 2 DVDs with the interview were encoded differently. And it would have taken a bunch of work and time to create subtitles for it. So he just gave up. But I bet soon someone will post a subtitle file so that we can watch the interview and find out what Romano is saying. Well if you are a slasher fan,ignore all the idiots online that are hating on this release without never seeing it and give it look. I would say rent it first. But Netflix isn't carrying it. I serious doubt you would find this in Blockbuster. I found it for around $18 on amazon. Nightmare in a damaged brain gets a A-.

31 days of horror day 15 extra 02

Sleepaway Camp series overview


I didn't see the original Sleepaway Camp until the early 90s. I had already seen part III. And when I finally found a store with the original for rent I had to see it. Thankfully no one had spoiled the original for me. Since then I have searched out and seen every film in the series.I find it to be one of the more under-rated series of films in the slasher sub-genre.

Sleepaway Camp-Made back in the early 80's this was one of the many films that copied the Friday the 13th formula. Basically have a bunch of kids/teens being killed off in the woods/a summer camp. But this film has a raw edge to it that makes it stand out among all the other Friday clones. Then there is the ending. Now warning I am about to spoil it. But I figure that most people reading this already know about the ending. We find out at the end that little Angela is not only the killer,but Angela is actually a guy. This ending has shocked people for years. A-.

Sleepaway Camp II-Made quite a few years after the original. Parts 2 and 3 were filmed back to back and went DTV. Angela is back,but now she is a young adult.We get lots of comedy and some great cheesy gore.And instead of Felissa Rose as Angela we get Pamela Springsteen. B+.

Sleepaway Camp III-Made at the same time as part 2,but released the next year. This entry isn't near as good as the first 2.You can tell they must have spent most of the budget on part 2. Plus the MPAA caused their to be many many cuts to this film. Thankfully the DVD release has most of the cuts as an extra. C+.

Sleepaway Camp:the Survivor-Rumored for years this is the uncompleted 4th entry in the series. As far as I know the only way to see what was filmed is to get the Sleepaway Camp boxed set that was sold only at Best Buy. This edition has an extra disc with about 20 minutes worth of footage from part 4. Since the film wasn't completed there really is no way I can rate it.

Return to Sleepaway Camp-Finally after many years the directer of the original film came back and made his official sequel to Sleepaway Camp. The film was finished back in the early 2000s. But sat on the shelf for what seemed like forever. Then finally sometime in 2008 it was released. What we got was a decent film,but it can't compare to the original. C+.