Barry Forshaw

THE INNKEEPERS, Ti West, director/Second Sight

Let’s start with a disc for which I wrote a booklet essay. The Innkeepers is a curious, mesmerising mélange of elements reminiscent of other supernatural outings. There is the blighted location from Robert Wise’s The Haunting (1963) – or perhaps directly from Shirley Jackson’s original novel The Haunting of Hill House. There is the chalk-white face of a spectral female figure that can move with unnatural speed. And there are the strategies of the ‘found footage’ genre: the shot of an apparently innocuous room is held for an audacious amount of time until the viewer begins to nervously scrutinise every inch of the frame, expecting something unpleasant to appear. The Second Sight transfer is exemplary.

SENSO, directed by Luchino Visconti/Radiance

Senso (1954) was, for many years the Holy Grail of Italian cinema – until recently, how many people under 50 had seen Visconti’s lush, visually stunning masterpiece, unavailable for so many years? Now available re-mastered and looking absolutely ravishing, Visconti’s film is set in 10^th century Venice and features Farley Granger and Alida Valli in a tragic drama. Wonderful to finally see it! Luchino Visconti had been a key contributor to the neorealist movement, produced his greatest work of personal cinema in The Leopard (Il Gattopardo, 1963), a massive, elegiac masterpiece (much mutilated in its day by its distributors), which enshrined wonderful performances by Burt Lancaster (as De Lampedusa’s doomed aristocrat), Alain Delon and Claudia Cardinale. The film, which is only now available in the form that the director intended can be seen as one of his greatest works, but this splendid new Radiance issue of Senso shows that the later film had impressive antecedents.

THE CONJURING, James Wan, director/Warners 4K

The remarkable success of The Conjuring franchise no doubt owed a lot to its initial impetus, launching one of the highest grossing horror franchises to date under the skilful direction of James Wan. In this first outing, a family with multiple daughters is menaced by an eldritch force. The director’s manipulation of tension and shock is assured, and the homages to earlier classic examples of supernatural terror are well integrated. Sceptics will not be persuaded by the fact that the film is supposedly ‘drawn from the (real life) case files of married demonologists Ed and Lorraine Warren’. But that hardly matters – in the same way the fact that the film of The Amityville Horror claimed to be from an actual case was speedily forgotten as the franchise proceeded. Those of us who love supernatural chills don’t really need to believe in them – except for the duration of the film. The Conjuring stars Vera Farmiga and Patrick Wilson as the Warrens, and Ron Livingston and Lili Taylor as Roger and Carolyn Perron, residents of the cursed house.

TALES OF ADVENTURE, COLLECTION 5, various directors/Imprint

There are many virtues to what may now be called to Blu-ray revolution – principally the making available once again of some films which cinéastes have been longing to see. But there is also what might be called icing on the cake: the anthology box in which a variety of movies may be found. Take, for example, Tales of Adventure: Collection Five from the always enterprising Imprint label. This set has an intriguing mix of classic and not-so-classic science fiction films, all of which will be tempting to the aficionado – particularly some little-seen items. There are two  clear winners: Joseph Newman’s This Island Earth is one of the most splendidly colourful SF films of the 1950s: intelligently written and intriguingly plotted (with a creative hand involved in its making – although it has been open to some dispute — of the greatest director of 1950s science fiction films, Jack Arnold). The other winner here is Devil Girl from Mars which is that unusual thing: a British science-fiction camp classic. It’s also a film for which Kim Newman and I provided an affectionate commentary, to be found on the film in this set. The complete list of inclusions: The 27th Day (1957), The Night The World Exploded (1957) — a worldwide first on Blu-ray, This Island Earth (1955), Devil Girl From Mars (1954), The Gamma People (1956) – another worldwide first on Blu-ray. There is also a bonus film, The Underwater City (1962, in standard-definition). There are also copious special features in a limited edition hard case.

THE HAUNTED HOUSE OF HORROR, Michael Armstrong, director/88 Films

Aficionados of the British horror film have an affection for an outing from producer Tony Tenser’s company Tigon which now resembles something of a harbinger of the latter-day menaced teenagers/slasher film, Michael Armstrong’s The Haunted House of Horror (1969), notably gory for its day, in which the ghost of another film may be seen imprinted on the DNA of the concept. A polyglot multi-national cast is headed by American pop star Frankie Avalon (playing a teenager at 30), with a slew of British actors later to make their mark in TV sitcoms (including Richard O’Sullivan) and another pop singer, the UK’s Mark Wynter (whose version of “Venus In Blue Jeans” may have been running through audience’s mind ashes as he is bloodily slaughtered in the film’s most memorable set piece) .As a group of youthful revellers are stalked and dispatched by an unseen knife-wielding psychopath, the talented Michael Armstrong’s instinct sometimes guide him in interesting directions (his original concept was apparently more surrealistic and non-linear, and the film was tampered with), although casting (such as the actor Julian Barnes – not the novelist — in a key part originally intended for David Bowie) did not please the director. The final tense confrontation with the soon-to-be-unmasked murderer (in which a phallic knife rises slowly between two survivors, with audiences uncertain as to who is holding it) is still memorable

HMS DEFIANT, Lewis Gilbert, director/Indicator

The actor Dirk Bogarde had shown himself more than ready to risk his image as a matinee idol in the groundbreaking Basil Dearden film Victim, playing a bisexual lawyer being blackmailed, and he was similarly ready to take on the unsympathetic parts — as in this full-blooded naval drama. In HMS Defiant, Bogarde is the sadistic second officer on the eponymous ship set against Alec Guinness’s more humane captain. To some degree, the film is a an inversion of the narrative structure of Mutiny on the Bounty, and it is Guinness who walks away with the final acting honours. But Bogarde still delivers exactly what is required for his martinet character. Indicator’s transfer of this powerful tale of mutiny at sea is directed by the respected Lewis Gilbert from a screenplay by Edmund H North and Nigel Kneale; the presence of the latter is further proof that there was far more to the writer than his signature Quatermass outings.

THE TAMING OF THE SHREW, Franco Zeffirelli, director/Indicator

Interest in the Elizabeth Taylor/Richard Burton offscreen romance was at its height when the director Franco Zeffirelli opted to make a film of Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew, and healthy box office was guaranteed for this lively, unnuanced take. It goes without saying Burton delivers the Shakespearean verse with panache – both he and Taylor were acutely conscious of his status as Britain’s leading Shakespearean and heir to Laurence Olivier (a destiny sidelined by his successful film career), but Taylor is not outshone and delivers a full-throttle performance as the combative Katarina. Zeffirelli fills the screen with energetic movement and colour. If the controversial aspects of the play are not touched upon, that’s fair enough – this is not intended as a radical modern production but as a full-blooded traditional performance. Icing on the cake is the cinematography by the celebrated Oswald Morris and a score from Nino Rota.

PERPETRATOR, Jennifer Reeder, director/Arrow

this is a very accomplished piece of work, and resounding proof that Jennifer Reeder is a director to be watched – even by male viewers, even though the ethos here is firmly feminist and directed against male predators. The narrative is in the form of a coming-of-age drama with elements of the serial killer and supernatural fantasy fields. In terms of the film’s colour palette, comparisons have already been drawn to the serial list colour schemes of the great Italian director Mario Bava strikingly realised by director of photography Sevdije Kastrati.

THE BEAST TO DIE, Toru Murakawa, director/ Radiance

The always enterprising label Radiance continues its excavation of cult cinema with this intriguing and unorthodox piece, sporting a sustained menacing mood cannily orchestrated by director Toru Murakawa. A mentally disturbed war photographer (Yusaku Matsuda) is seeking for an accomplice in in crime with – inevitably – dangerous results. Radiance never stints on extras, and they here include new interviews with director Murakawa and writer Schoichi Maruyama along with a fresh piece on the film from Jordan Harper.

ROSA LA ROSE, Paul Vecchiali, director/Radiance

The Blu-ray revolution continues to make available films which have been seen by far too few people – and this intriguing entry certainly deserves greater currency than it has heretofore enjoyed. With a remarkable central performance by Marianne Basler (best known for Va savoir), director Paul Vecchiali furnishes a view of Paris quite unlike anything viewers will have experienced before. This 2K Restoration includes pertinent interviews and the usual slew of intriguing extra material.