Mondo Macabro

[Adam X]

So Mondo have a flash pre-order on right now for their latest quartet of releases, currently only in a bundle ltd to 750 copies. The sale will end when they sell out. For those earlier wondering about more UHD releases, this round has two of them. Both UHD titles are limited webstore exclusives, with Death Squad's UHD disc being limited to this flash pre-sale only.

• (4K/BD) Death Squad (d. Max Pécas)
• (4K/BD) Dr. Jekyll and the Werewolf (w/both versions, d. Leon Klimovsky)
• Secrets & Mysteries: Films By Pedro Olea (incl. ‘The House Without Frontiers’ & ‘It’s Not Good For a Man To Be Alone’ & 2 short films. d. Pedro Olea)
• Special Silencers (d. Arizal)

Their annual Halloween sale starts on October 31st.
The latest newsletter has all the info.

Since Finch's last post, Mondo also released two '70's Japanese films:

• Curse of the Dog God (d. Shunya Ito)
• The Inferno (d. Tatsumi Kumashiro)

And coming next year...

Once we get passed the sale, we'll start thinking about what we have in store for next year, but expect great things like CAFE FLESH, the [Barry Prima] WARRIOR trilogy, upgrades of the Greek exploitation/gialli films TANGO OF PERVERSION and THE WIFE KILLER, and Vicente Aranda's arthouse horror film FATA MORGANA, among many other delights!

EDIT: Well, the bundle sold out in half an hour!

[therewillbeblus]

Death Brigade is an extremely weird movie, and I don't mean that as a compliment. The narrative constantly eschews opportunities to prime the audience to engage with the characters and activity propelling so relentlessly, so we're cued to treat this like a more passively absurd grindhouse pic. That's fine, except the tone is so unfocused. There's a lot of playful violence and some fun bits there, but the film turns on a dime many times to just carry out brutal, extreme violence and assault that serves no purpose other than to shock and disturb. The film treats its content incredibly seriously in these moments, but without that connective tissue between scenes and character and a sense of tone, it's hard to invest in some underlying utility that'll pay off later. For then we get silly violence again, and playful character jabs, and sexploitation inserts.. I dunno, I like acclimating to a rhythm when watching something like this, and it seemed to exist solely to disrupt a viewer from that comfort - which is just a bit ironic when your movie is squarely fit in the genre that seeks to provide that kind of comfortable cinematic 'ride'. Or maybe the movie had a different agenda and I just don't get it.

Max Pecas can capture some cool shots, but he can also over-edit or ignore significant script markers to help us get to where his mind is five steps ahead.

[jazzo]

Thanks for this. I'd never heard of this film, but many of the online reviews were comparing it to the Spanish film, MAD FOXES, which I have seen (with an audience in a theatre) and was easily able to dial into its particular wavelength of insanity and have a complete blast with it. This sounds less...that.

[therewillbeblus]

It is, in part! It's just the the other side is brutal and sustains that wavelength awkwardly before transitioning back to careless shenanigans. Feels like a dinner party where everyone makes light banter and then random people, anyone at the table at any moment, unpredictably initiate really aggressive uncomfortable topics and stare you in the face - then break back to the banter by laughing it off; rinse, cycle, repeat. I dunno, it's a somewhat uncomfortable feeling, but maybe that's the point? If so, it's not going far enough to make it.

[Finch]

Mondo Macabro's new announcements are Fata Morgana/Left-Handed Fate (1966) and Sex Acopalypse (1982).