[go: up one dir, main page]

Saturday, January 17, 2026

Jess Franco's VAMPYROS LESBOS his 'magnum opus' and SHE KILLED IN ECSTASY the 'erotically charged revenger' get Worldwide UHD Premiere – 4K UHD/Blu-ray Editions arrive 30 March 2026


SEVERIN FILMS ANNOUNCES THE WORLDWIDE UHD PREMIERE OF JESS FRANCO’S ACCLAIMED 1971 SURREAL EROTIC THRILLER VAMPYROS LESBOS AND FRANCO’S 1971 EROTIC SHOCKER SHE KILLED IN ECSTASY

NEW 4K RESTORATIONS

TWO-DISC 4K UHD & BLU-RAY RELEASES
March 30, 2026

VAMPYROS LESBOS (1971)  

“JESS FRANCO’S MAGNUM OPUS...
a mind-expanding psychedelic experience”
- High Def Digest

“A DEEPLY EROTIC WORK...
Sultry, seductive, surreal... backed by one of the most
glorious scores of its or any other decade” - DVD Talk

Severin Films announces the Worldwide UHD Premiere of iconic director Jess Franco’s seductive 1971 feature Vampyros Lesbos. The film is set to arrive in a new restoration, scanned in 4K from the original camera negative and will be released as a two-disc 4K UHD and Blu-ray Edition on 30 March 2026.

The brand-new release comes complete with five hours of special features including an interview with Jess Franco filmed shortly before his death, The Red Scarf Diaries – a Jess Franco career appreciation by Academy Award-winning filmmaker Sean Baker – and much more. Please see full list below.

From Jess Franco – the filmmaker The Vatican called “the most dangerous director in the world” – comes his legendary “fever dream of blood and lust” (The New York Times), for the first time ever in 4K UHD. The film stars the eternally stunning Soledad Miranda as vixen vampire, Countess Nadine Carody, who lures women to a Mediterranean island to satisfy her insatiable hunger for female flesh in “a distinctive work of art and beautiful must-see” (Classic Horror), that seductively corrupts the Dracula mythos forever. Ewa Strömberg (SHE KILLED IN ECSTASY), Dennis Price (THEATRE OF BLOOD), Paul Muller (COUNT DRACULA) and the director himself co-star in “Franco’s masterpiece” (The Digital Bits).

For the ultimate seduction, sink your teeth into Vampyros Lesbos on 4K UHD and experience it in all its gory glory courtesy of Severin Films.

VAMPYROS LESBOS 2-DISC 4K UHD / BD Special Features:
DISC ONE: UHD:
• Audio Commentary with Kat Ellinger, author of Daughters of Darkness
• Audio Commentary with film professor Aaron AuBuchon and Oscarbate Film Collective's John Dickson and Will
Morris
• German Trailer
DISC TWO: Blu-ray:
• Audio Commentary with Kat Ellinger, Author of Daughters of Darkness
• Audio Commentary with Film Professor Aaron AuBuchon and Oscarbate Film Collective's John Dickson And Will
Morris
• Interlude In Lesbos – Interview with director Jess Franco
• Fever Dracula – Interview with Stephen Thrower, Author of Murderous Passions: The Delirious Cinema of Jesús
Franco
• The Red Scarf Diaries – A Jess Franco career appreciation by Academy Award-winning filmmaker Sean Baker
• In The Land Of Franco Part 12
• Sublime Soledad – Interview with Soledad Miranda Historian Amy Brown
• Jess is Yoda
• German Opening Title Sequence
• German Trailer
Feature Specs:

VAMPYROS LESBOS 4K UHD/BLU-RAY
Cert 18
Region Free
Run Time: 89 mins
Aspect Ratio: 1.66:1
Audio: German Mono
Closed Captions: English



SHE KILLED IN ECSTASY (1971) 

“A SINGULAR EXPERIENCE... One of Franco’s more accomplished and gratifying movies.
Soledad Miranda gives an intense and passionate performance.” - Genre Grinder

“A MUST-OWN FOR FRANCO FANS...
An erotically charged revenger laced with intoxicating visuals and the stunning beauty of Soledad Miranda, who fills nearly every frame.” - McBastard’s Mausoleum

Severin Films announces the Worldwide UHD Premiere of legendary director Jess Franco’s intoxicating 1971 revenge shocker She Killed in Ecstasy. The film is set to arrive in a new restoration, scanned in 4K from the original camera negative and will be released as a two-disc 4K UHD and Blu-ray Edition on 30 March 2026.

For his follow-up to VAMPYROS LESBOS, writer/director Jess Franco delivered the “hallucinatory descent into erotic insanity” (Mondo Digital) that remains his most perversely iconic shocker of the 1970s. In her greatest role – and one of her final performances before her tragic death – the exquisite Soledad Miranda stars as a vengeful widow who seduces and murders the men and women responsible for her husband’s suicide.

Howard Vernon (THE AWFUL DR. ORLOF), Paul Muller (LADY FRANKENSTEIN), Ewa Strömberg (VAMPYROS LESBOS) and Franco himself co-star in this Euro Cult masterwork “that truly shows what a creative genius Franco could be when he is at the top of his form” (Classic Horror). The brand-new release includes an archival interview with Uncle Jess, an all-new instalment of In the Land of Franco and more. Please see full list below.

Experience She Killed in Ecstasy – an extatically enthralling, erotically charged slice of iconic seventies cinema from the illustrious master of the genre, like never before thanks to Severin Films.

SHE KILLED IN ECSTASY 2-DISC 4K UHD / BD Special Features:
DISC ONE: UHD:
• German Trailer
DISC TWO: Blu-ray:
• Ecstasy In Rage – Interview with Stephen Thrower, Author of Murderous Passions: The Delirious Cinema Of
Jesús Franco
• In The Land Of Franco Part 13
• Jess Killed in Ecstasy – Interview with Writer/Director Jess Franco
• Sublime Soledad – Interview with Soledad Miranda Historian Amy Brown
• Paul Muller On Jess Franco – Interview with the frequent Franco star
• German Trailer

SHE KILLED IN ECSTASY 4K UHD/BLU-RAY
Cert: 18
Region Free
Run Time: 80 MINS
Aspect Ratio: 1.66:1
Audio: German Mono
Closed Captions: English


Posted by at

Friday, January 16, 2026

Grindhouse Releasing proudly presents Palmer Rockey’s SCARLET WARNING 666


YOU ARE ABOUT TO EXPERIENCE A RARE HAPPENING.

FIRST TIME EVER ON HOME VIDEO!

Grindhouse Releasing proudly presents
Palmer Rockey’s SCARLET WARNING 666

Be forewarned: You have never seen anything like SCARLET WARNING 666, the long-lost, made-in-Dallas masterpiece of outsider cinema written, produced, directed by, and starring weird music legend

PALMER ROCKEY!
Never released on home video and not seen in 40 years, SCARLET WARNING 666 is coming to Blu-ray in a limited collector’s edition, newly restored from the original 35mm negative and available for preorder at GrindhouseReleasing.com.

The deluxe 3-disc (2 Blu-rays + CD) release includes Palmer Rockey's SCARLET LOVE 'Movie Album' in a new CD remaster with bonus tracks from the original 1980 ROCKEY'S STYLE pressing of the rare cult classic LP.

Palmer Rockey boasted of playing 7 different roles on screen and 47 different roles behind the scenes in what is reputed to be the worst movie ever made. He expected Academy Award recognition for his efforts. 

SCARLET WARNING 666 stars Rockey as twin brothers in a story of Satanic skullduggery, bizarre occult rituals and “demonic assassination” on a country estate. The execution of this premise was so bewildering, insane, and incompetent that the film was laughed off the screen at its Dallas premiere in 1974. 

After audiences mocked his naive ineptitude, Rockey said, "You know what I think the meaning of this whole thing - the movie - is? Don't give anybody the right to make you unhappy, because, man, they will. People can laugh at what I do, but they can't laugh at me. I mean, man, I'm satisfied. I'm smiling inside."

Rockey spent decades obsessively laboring over his magnum opus, shooting new scenes and piling layer upon layer of cringe in a doomed effort to explain the incomprehensible plot. He distributed the movie himself, four-walling theaters to show his epic in various incarnations as IT HAPPENED ON SUNDAY, SCARLET LOVE, ROCKEY’S STYLE, LOVE IS DEEP INSIDE, and SCARLET WARNING 666.

In 1980 he released the film as SCARLET LOVE, with an original soundtrack album featuring his own vocal stylings. When this too met with audience mockery, Rockey attempted to frame the unintended laughs as “keen satire.” Rockey was still restitching his Frankenstein’s monster of a movie with new material at the time of his death in 1996.

"It seems to me that the real story is in the mental and to some extent moral decline of Palmer Rockey which is exhibited in the final version of the film," said Dr. Ron DiSalvo, who played opposite Rockey in scenes filmed decades apart.

The Rockey legend grew when Rev. Ivan Stang (The Church of the SubGenius) evangelized about the film in THE BOOK OF THE SUBGENIUS and Jello Biafra wrote about the SCARLET LOVE “Movie Album” in the popular RE/Search book series INCREDIBLY STRANGE MUSIC.

The ultra-rare LP became an obsession for record collectors, leading to a sold-out 2013 reissue in the UK. Carl Broemel (My Morning Jacket) covered one of Rockey’s songs and Broadway World called the soundtrack “a rare cult classic of oddball music.” Yet the movie remained missing for more than 40 years. Until now!

Although he never nabbed his Oscar, Rockey ended up Oscar-adjacent: his final cut of SCARLET WARNING 666 was found in the Academy vault and restored by Academy Award-winning film editor Bob Murawski, whose credits include THE HURT LOCKER, THE OTHER SIDE OF THE WIND, and Sam Raimi’s SEND HELP.

Grindhouse Releasing has painstakingly restored SCARLET WARNING 666 from the original camera negative, going beyond the limits of sanity to preserve every agonizing frame of Rockey’s cinematic tribulation and to document the bizarre story behind it. 

SPECIAL FEATURES
- Beautiful new master, lovingly restored in 4K from the original 35mm camera negative
- Provocative, in-depth interviews with producer Cookie Rockey, and co-star Dr. Ron DiSalvo
- Additional interviews with punk rock icon Jello Biafra and legendary rare record connoisseurs Paul Major and Jonny Trunk
- Audio commentary by Reverend Ivan Stang (Church of the SubGenius)
- Original theatrical trailer and extensive still galleries
- Glossy illustrated booklet with liner notes by exploitation historian Chris Poggiali
- Beautiful embossed slipcover with new art by esteemed painter Jerry Martinez
- Blu-ray cover painting by cult artist Dave Lebow
- BONUS CD - SCARLET LOVE MOVIE ALBUM by Palmer Rockey, newly remastered in stunning 24-bit/192Khz sound
-AND OTHER SURPRISES!

REVIEWS

“THE GREATEST WORST MOVIE EVER MADE…Palmer Rockey makes Ed Wood and Tommy Wiseau look like Stanley Kubrick and Martin Scorsese.” - Rev. Ivan Stang, Church of the SubGenius

“Mr. Rockey extracted a promise from us to not review the film, which was no great sacrifice, since it is, in some essential way, beyond judgment.” - C.W. Smith, Dallas Times Herald

“One of the most fascinating underground characters ever”
- Forced Exposure

"As exploitation holy grails go, few are more coveted than the lost outrage SCARLET WARNING 666…This is Palmer Rockey's song poem, and the ghosts of Rodd Keith and Fletcher Hanks howl in the bones of his face. Proceed at your own risk, America. And rock, rock, ROCK!" - Jimmy McDonough, author of BIG BOSOMS AND SQUARE JAWS and THE GHASTLY ONE

About Grindhouse Releasing
Founded in 1996 by Sage Stallone and Academy Award-winning film editor Bob Murawski (THE HURT LOCKER, Sam Raimi’s SEND HELP), Grindhouse Releasing has been called “the Criterion of cult cinema.” The company is dedicated to restoring and preserving exploitation films held in historically low regard.

In addition to Italian horror classics like THE BEYOND and CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST, Grindhouse has also released CORRUPTION, starring Peter Cushing; the spaghetti western THE BIG GUNDOWN, starring Lee Van Cleef; Duke Mitchell's GONE WITH THE POPE; and Frank Perry’s THE SWIMMER, starring Burt Lancaster, which received the 2015 Satellite Award from the International Press Academy for Outstanding Overall Blu-ray/DVD.

More recent Grindhouse Releasing Blu-rays include Peter S. Traynor's DEATH GAME, starring Sondra Locke and Colleen Camp; William Grefe's IMPULSE, starring William Shatner; and Christina Hornisher's HOLLYWOOD 90028, which won critical acclaim at international festivals including Sitges and Fantasia; and the 4K UHD release of Lucio Fulci's THE BEYOND, named the #1 physical media release of 2025 (The Movie Den).

Grindhouse Releasing’s film restorations have screened at theaters and drive-ins throughout the U.S. and Canada, and at film festivals around the world. For more information visit GrindhouseReleasing.com.

Posted by at

‘V/H/S/Halloween’ – ‘one of the best entries’ in the seminal found-footage anthology horror franchise arrives on Blu-ray, DVD & Digital February 9th in the UK

V/H/S/HALLOWEEN 

V/H/S/Halloween introduces a collection of wickedly watchable tales of terror from a host of renowned filmmakers including Bryan M. Ferguson (Pumpkin Guts), Anna Zlokovic (Appendage), Paco Plaza (Verónica, [Rec]), Casper Kelly (Adult Swim Yule Log), Alex Ross Perry (Her Smell), Micheline Pitt-Norman (Grummy) and R.H. Norman (Haji).  
 
Kicking off with Coochie Coochie Coo, written and directed by Anna Zlokovic – we meet two high school trick or treaters, dressed as babies who come face to face with a malevolent spirit known as ‘The Mommy’ – an urban legend who supposedly kidnaps children from their homes on the spookiest night of the year. 
 
Next up is Paco Plaza’s Ut Supra Sic Infra where Enric – the sole survivor of a Halloween party massacre – accompanies police to the original crime scene to try and help them reconstruct the events of that fateful night – but unbeknownst to them, evil entities await them inside. 
 
Halloween candy takes on a new life in Casper Kelly’s Fun Size, as four friends on the hunt for sweet treats are swallowed up by a candy bowl. They emerge in a parallel reality where sweets rule supreme and humans are turned into sugary snacks. 
 
Kidprint – from writer-director Alex Ross Perry – takes an even darker turn, feeding into the all too real fear of kidnappings. When disturbing secrets about a local video store that specialises in creating video IDs which can be used to help search for missing children come to light, every parent’s worst fears are about to come true. 
 
A homemade house of horrors comes to life in Micheline Pitt-Norman and R.H. Norman’s Home Haunt as a family construct their annual haunted house for Halloween. But the fun ritual takes a deadly turn when a spooky stolen record makes the decorations come to life, wreaking paranormal havoc on the guests. 
 
Bryan M. Ferguson’s frame narrative Diet Phantasma weaves through the feature, with each segment documenting a group of taste trial participants who face life-threatening side effects from a new kind of diet soda. 

Grab your sweet bucket and press play on V/H/S/Halloween for another round of truly disturbing found footage nightmares centered around every horror fiend’s favourite time of the year. 

Special Features:
• Filmmaker Commentaries
• Behind the Scenes: Diet Phantasma, Coochie Coochie Coo
• KidPrint Deleted Scene
• Diet Phantasma Uninterrupted Cut
• Diet Phantasma Commercial
• Diet Phantasma Gallery

V/H/S/Halloween Blu-ray 
Release Date: February 9, 2026
Cert: 18 
Running Time: 115 Minutes 
Available on digital to download and keep from 9 February


Posted by at

Thursday, January 15, 2026

LUTHER THE GEEK (1988) Tromatic Special Edition Blu-ray Review + Screenshots

LUTHER THE GEEK (1990) 
Tromatic Special Edition

Label: Troma
Region Code: Region-Free 
Rating: Unrated 
Duration: 80 Minutes 19 Seconds 
Audio: English DTS-HD MA 2.0 with Optional English Subtitles 
Video: 1080p HD Widescreen (1.78:1) 
Director: Carlton J. Albright
Cast: Edward Terry, Stacy Haidu, Joan Roth, Thomas Mills, Joseph Clark, Tom Brittingham, Carlton Williams

Luther the Geek (1988), directed by Carlton J. Albright (The Children), opens in 1938 where a young boy named Luther (the director's son Will Albright) witnesses a carnival "geek" (Tom Brittingham) bite he head off a chicken at a freakshow, During the performance the boy is knocked to the ground during the crowd commotion and his teeth are knocked out, seemingly traumatized he licks then blood of the decapitated chicken. Thirty years later Luther (now played by Edward Terry, The Children) is all grown up and incarcerated, but up for parole for good behavior despite having committed a series of grisly murders, as the liberal parole bard discusses his case we see scenes of the toothless Luther sharpening a pair of gnarly metal dentures with file. Despite his good behavior while incarcerated no sooner has he been released, Luther, who is non-verbal and only communicates with a series of creepy clucks like a chicken, begins a rampage of terror almost immediately. He steals clothes from a butcher, entering a grocery store and stealing sunglasses, and proceeding to raid the fresh eggs isle where he starts cracking open eggs and chugging the runny yolks, before being escorted out of the store by the manager. He then leaves the store and ends up at a bus stop where he attempts to engage with an elderly woman (Gail Buxton) who is waiting for her bus, offering her a raw egg, but when she refuses he attacks her and sinks his razor-sharp teeth into her, tearing out her throat! He then hides in the backseat of a car belonging to Hilary  (Joan Roth, Steel and Lace) and secretly hitches a ride in her backseat to her isolated farmhouse where he terrorizes her, tying her up to a bed before setting his gnarly metal chompers on her teenage daughter Beth (Stacy Haiduk) and her boyfriend, Rob (Thomas Mills), plus we have encounters with a State Trooper (Joseph Clarke) patrolling the area looking for the homicidal Luther, and a hapless hunter in the woods (Martin Widener) who is unfortunate enough to cross his path. 

Luthor the Geek is a low-budget flick but it's quite entertaining, the story itself is not shall we say, very plausible, I mean there's no way this metal-mouthed psycho gets paroled, let alone allowed to maintain a razor-sharp set of chompers while imprisoned. Believability aside the film is quite a romp, the performance of Edward Terry as the deranged geek is fantastic, he's quirky, his mannerisms and constant clucking and crowing is somewhat unnerving. The film also has some tasty gore and gore effects, throat ripping with those gnarly chompers sinking into flesh. There one scene where Luther attacks a hunter he comes upon in the woods, the attack is so vicious that his upper dentures become embedded in the flesh and he has to pull them out to reinsert them, that was a nice touch. It's just an interesting flick, the circus geek slasher twist is fun and the execution is surprisingly effective. 

Audio/Video: Luther the Geek (1988) gets a region-free Blu-ray from Troma in 1080p HD framed in 1.78:1 widescreen. There is no information about the source of the transfer, but I will assume that this is the same transfer prepared by Vinegar Syndrome for their OOP release, as was Troma's releases of Maniac and Frightmare. I am assuming that these titles licensed by VS from Troma did the scans and once the license expires Troma releases their own release using the same transfers. I do not have the VS or 88 Films Blu-ray for comparison but the source looks terrific, I can see the framing has been opened up to a screen-filling 1.78:1 versus the VS 1.85:1, grain levels look solid, and colors, depth and clarity impress. I am pretty sure the last time I saw this was on a dupey looking VHS, so the level of depth, clarity and detail here was rather stunning. Audio comes by way of English Dolby Digital 2.0 with optional English subtitles. The track is clean snd and well balanced, but the fact that Troma are still using Dolby Digital is a headscratcher.  

Archival extras from the original Troma DVD carried over include the 5-min Original Lloyd Kaufman DVD Intro, a 5-min Classic Interview With Director Carlton J. Albright, and 3-min Classic Interview with William Albright, the director son who played young Luther, and the 20-min Fowl Takes which are four video featurettes the director giving scene specific commentary on the making of a few particular scenes. 

Extras carried over from the 2015 Vinegar Syndrome release start off with a 38-sec Carlton J. Albright’s Blu-ray Intro, which is just long enough for him to curse the film's original distributor for their botched release. Next, the VS produced Director’s Audio Commentary with Carlton J. Albright moderated by Vinegar Syndrome's Joel Rubin, it's a solid listen all aspects of the making of the film are covered, location, cast and crew info, the gore effects, and the film reception and botched distribution and home video history.  
We also get the 7-min A Conversation With Carlton: An Interview With Carlton Albright from 2015 produced by VS for their release, as was the 10-min Fowl Play: An Interview With Jerry Clarke, and a 2-min Original Theatrical Trailer. 

Of course this is a Tromatic Special Edition so there's plenty on schlocky Troma crap thrown in as well like the Troma’s Freak Show, the 2-min Innards! Music Video, 1-min Radiation March, 1 -min TA in 4K promo, the 1-min Troma in Times Square, and selection of Troma Trailers for #Shakespear's Shitstorm, Eating Miss Campbell, Curse of the Weredeer, Sweet Meats, Kill Dolly Kill, The Toxic Avenger, Class of Nuke 'Em Hight, Tromeo and Juliette, Sgt. Kabukinan N.Y.P.D., The Children. The single-disc release arrived in a standard keepcase with a single-sided sleeve of artwork. 

Special Features: 
- Original Lloyd Kaufman DVD Intro (5:07) 
- Carlton J. Albright’s Blu-Ray Intro (0:38) 
- Director’s Audio Commentary with Carlton J. Albright
- Classic Interview With Director Carlton J. Albright (5:12) 
- Classic Interview with William Albright (2:40) 
- A Conversation With Carlton: An Interview With Carlton Albright (6:35) 
- Fowl Play: An Interview With Jerry Clarke (10:17) 
- Original Theatrical Trailer (2:26)
- Fowl Takes: Fight Between Luther and the Police Officer (8:50), The Old Woman Getting Attacked by Luther (2:38), Luther Gerting Shot (1:12), The Shower Scene (7:30) 
- Troma’s Freak Show: The Archery Freak (1:49), The Man Who Walks on Blades (1:11), The Sword Swallower (0:52), Tim the Torture King (1:41) 
- INNARDS! Music Video (1:50) 
- Radiation March (0:54) 
- TA in 4K  (1:10) 
- Troma in Times Square (1:01) 
- Coming Distractions: #Shakespear's Shitstorm (2:24) , Eating Miss Campbell (1:48), Curse of the Weredeer (1:50), Sweet Meats (2:06), Kill Dolly Kill (1:47), The Toxic Avenger (3:11), Class of Nuke 'Em High (2:56), Tromeo and Juliette (2:12), Sgt. Kabukiman N.Y.P.D. (3:42), The Children (0:56)

Screenshots from the Troma Blu-ray: 














































Extras: 














Buy it!
#ad 
Posted by at
Subscribe to: Comments (Atom)