Blood Money, Vol. 22
By on Jun 6, 2012
The big theatrical release of the week is Prometheus, Ridley Scott’s highly-anticipated prequel to the Alien series which he and everyone else involved keep insisting isn’t really a prequel to Alien. We won’t spoil any of the film’s surprises for you – read our review here – but when you have one of the great science-fiction and horror filmmakers of the last few decades revisiting hugely successful territory and exploring the few places where no one can hear you scream, our opening-day, front row tickets are already purchased. And with a cast that includes Charlize Theron, Noomi Rapace, Guy Pearce, Idris Elba, Logan Marshall-Green and our current favorite actor Michael Fassbender, our opening-night, front row tickets are also already purchased.
On home video, there’s a paucity of choices, but at least one high-profile one that everyone should absolutely check out: The Twilight Zone: The Complete Series. At almost $400 for the 24-disc set, it’s going to take a bite out of your wallet, but those discs feature almost 4500 minutes of high-quality content, along with audio commentaries, radio dramas, video interviews, conversations with Rod Serling, highlights from the Museum of Television and Radio seminar, isolated music scores, Twilight Zone billboards and stills, the bonus documentary “Rod Serling: Submitted For Your Approval, blooper reels, a Saturday Night Live clip, a comic book, and much, much more. The last time we really invested in Twilight Zone, distributors were releasing two or three episodes on one VHS tape, but this set might just make us diehard fans – not the least of which because we can watch it just about until we actually die.
At $15, the 10-Film Horror Pack Volume 1 is obviously a much better deal, but we warn you that the actual content may not be quite as consistently engaging. The set includes Howling IV: The Original Nightmare, Mortuary, Live Animals, Darkness, Paranormal Entity, Night Shadow, The Nurse, Cruel World, Inside, and Gingerdead Man 3: Saturday Night Cleaver, the latter of which, we admit, is inexplicably intriguing. Mind you, there are probably more stinkers in this set than there are winners, but again, its value more or less outweighs the relative quality of the films actually included in the set.
On the other hand, the 10-Movie Horror Pack Volume 1 features Bloody Mary, Passed the Door of Darkness, The Prophecy II, Dracula III: Legacy, Hellraiser III: Hell on Earth, Children of the Corn 666: Isaac’s Return, Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers, The Haunting of Marsten Manor, Bachelor Party in the Bungalow of the Damned, and Fist of the Vampire. While there aren’t necessarily any award-winners in this set, comparatively speaking the stuff included is at least recognizable, and as perhaps dubious installments of beloved franchise, you can’t beat that $15 price tag.
Finally, there’s Rogue River, a thriller about poor young woman subjected to unimaginable terror after her car is stolen during an expedition down the titular waterway. Star Michelle Page is best-known for a series of TV appearances, but she previously had small roles in Single White Female 2 and Dog, and in this she co-stars with Art Alexakis, who I admit I wasn’t aware still existed after Everclear disappeared from radio playlists. Available on DVD and Blu-ray, this is definitely a low-profile release, at least in the context of stuff like Prometheus, but who knows? Maybe it will keep you more engaged than Scott’s sci-fi opus.
