The Bloodthirsty Trilogy 2-Disc Blu-Ray + Extras (Arrow Films)

Oh shit!  We're coming back with another Saturday Screamers and this one is huge!  Today we're going to be talking about Michio Yamamoto's The Bloodthirsty Trilogy 2-disc set that was lovingly sent to us from our friends over at Arrow Films.  So thank you, Arrow Films!

To catch you up on what The Bloodthirsty Trilogy is, from 1970-1974 Mr. Yamamoto combined Japanese and European vampire lore in order to create three movies.  Released by Toho films, The Vampire Doll, Lake of Dracula, and Evil of Dracula can be sited as one of the first instances of our modern gothic take on vampirism seeping into J-horror.  Their pale visages with golden eyes become wrapped in flowing white gowns or dapper gentleman clothing to create a mash-up previously unseen.  Shot and scored similarly to the U.S. Hammer Films with a dash of the Universal Monsters and, of course, Toho's style, this is a great collection of rare J-horror that may have been overlooked in the past.


The first film, The Vampire Doll (a.k.a. Legacy of Dracula) takes us to an affluent home where a man has come to visit his beloved, only to find that she died two weeks prior in a car accident.  He is still given room and board while he deals with his feelings but he begins to see his lady friend in the house or running through the grounds at night.  The product of a curse brought upon her family by her father, she can only rest once the her father pays for his crimes... and then she deflates like a balloon.

The second of the trilogy is Lake of Dracula which was the weirdest for me to watch.  When a woman was five years old she lost grip of her dog's leash and followed him to a strange house where she was almost attacked by a man with golden eyes.  She woke up safe later and it was assumed to be a dream.  Flash forward to the film's present day and she's now a full grown woman with a totally different dog that has the same name.  She is haunted by the golden eyes in her dreams and when a coffin is delivered to her town without any return address then vampire shit goes down.

The reason this one was the weirdest to me starts with the dog thing, but then the score and foley work.  At one point the music sounded like the composer was playing a slide whistle through a series of effects pedals or at least an odd theremin.  Then, when our main character is an adult and finally catches a glimpse of the vampire the sound cue right before her discovery sounds like a quick deep fart.  It's hard to stay in the movie moment when I assumed the vampire farted and that's how she found him.

Rounding out our trilogy is Evil of Dracula where a girl's school becomes terrorized by their vampire principal.  I'm not quite sure if he's been doing this all along and just upped his game or if this just all started because he was grooming a new man to be his replacement principal.  I watched all of these in a row and this one was probably the loosest and least attention grabbing of the three.

Despite my waning attention span with the third film, I definitely enjoyed this collection.  There is really only one big extra which is the journalist/horror author Kim Newman talking about the vampirism in the films.  Other than that you get the OSTs and film trailers but compared to something like The Addiction that I covered last week, there is less additional content.  Although if they brought Michio Yamamoto back from the dead for an interview then that would've been awesome.  Unfortunately I don't think Arrow has the money for that.  Anyway, you get three films with this, so it's a fair trade off.

If you like real vampires (not sparkly ones), J-horror, or just look and feel of Toho or Hammer then I recommend picking this set up.  Thanks again to Arrow Films for the hook-up with this.

Also, if you're interested in picking up this film you can do so here from Amazon.  It's currently running around $26, which for a blu-ray with three films on it is a steal.  Also, if you order by clicking that link then that means Amazon kicks a little back to us so that we can pay for this website and fuel it with canned energy drinks.

The Addicition + Extras (Arrow Films)

 Chalking up another entry with our Saturday Screamers is Arrow Films' release of the 1995 movie, The Addiction. Thanks to Arrow Films for hooking us up with this screener copy to review.

Shot entirely in black and white, The Addiction is a vampire film that makes no effort to hide the fact that this affliction is a metaphor for heroin addiction.  Kathleen (Lili Taylor) is working toward a doctorate in philosophy.  One evening Kathleen is pulled into an alley by Cassanova (Annabella Sciorra) and is given a chance to tell Cassanova to leave.  When she doesn't, Cassanova bites her and leaves while telling her everything is about to change.  From here Kathleen begins to fiend, injects blood she takes from homeless people, and starts dressing and acting like Lou Reed, just with intense philosophical monologues.

This film took a bit to grow on me.  Initially the philosophy was heavy handed and it made me feel like I was watching a Jim Jarmusch film that lacked any mirth.  The turn around here came when Christopher Walken was introduced in what may now be one of my top 5 Walken roles.  His character initiates this vacuum where everyone and everything start coming together for the climax.  The earlier philosophical exposition becomes justified when Kathleen is defending her dissertation and makes a point of philosophy being nothing more than propaganda of a single individual.  The very end in which spiritual salvation leads to freedom from the affliction might as well have been an AA/NA commercial, but seeing as how Kathleen is unable to control her habit, it's what works for her (and in this case, some people dealing with addiction issues).  So who am I to sit here and talk shit on something that works for people?

Aside from top notch casting in The Addiction, it's also directed by Abel Ferrara.  You may know him for his work on Body Snatchers, Bad Lieutenant, and Ms. 45.  Additionally, Russell Simmons of Def Jam records was a producer.  I have nothing against Mr. Simmons and everything Def Jam has done, but my biggest complaint with The Addiction is that the only non-score music we get is hip hop and it feels so incredibly out of place.  That, and the fact we get the same Cypress Hill song played twice for street shots is too much.

EXTRAS:

In comparison to some of the extras we covered with other Saturday Screemers, The Addiction is tamer and geared more toward the film geek side.  We have a new interview with Abel Ferrara as well as director commentary, an interview with Brad Stevens (film critic) who wrote Abel Ferrara: The Moral Vision, and a series of interviews entitled Talking with the Vampires.  The Talking with the Vampires was my favorite of the extras as it was made specifically for this release and features Lili Taylor, Christopher Walken, Abel Ferrara, cinematographer Ken Kelsch, and composer Joe Delia.  It felt very relaxed, like a conversation between friends.  You find out things like Lili was listening to Debaser by The Pixies a lot while making this film, or Christopher Walken singing a song for Abel.

First pressings of disc also come with an illustrated collector's booklet which has new writings on The Addiction by critic Michael Ewins.

If you're a fan of vampire films then I definitely recommend picking this one up.  I didn't know this film even existed until I was sent this disc but it's well worth the time.  Thanks again to Arrow Films for sending us this for review.

If you want to pick up this blu-ray then you can click here and get it from Amazon.  It's currently around $25 and if you want to get the collector's booklet then I definitely recommend getting it soon.  Also, if you click on that link or the link above for Brad Stevens' book and buy either from those links then we here at 30 Days of Plight get a small part of that sale and it goes towards paying for this website and energy drinks.

The Transfiguration (2016) 1h 37m

I don't think anyone can say that they never emulated (even a tiny bit) a character they saw in a movie or on TV.  To this day it still takes effort to not act like Razor Ramon if I'm using a toothpick, and he was just emulating Scarface!  Also, as kids, I'm sure we all ran around with plastic vampire fangs cutting our gums, drool running from our mouths, as we mumbled about sucking blood.  There is a line that most of us don't cross though.  We don't begin to believe we are who or what we are copying.  So when someone blurs that line between reality and fantasy, we get something like today's film.

The Transfiguration focuses on Milo, a teenage boy living in project housing with his older brother.  He's an outcast, friendless, and referred to by others as "freak."  His primary solace is found in his collection of dubbed vampire flicks and online nature videos.  Eventually he befriends a girl named Sophie and she gets close.  So close that she finds out that his obsession with vampirism goes beyond watching it on the screen.

I wasn't sure where this film was going while I was watching it.  It took elements that I normally find frustrating while watching a movie and turned them into art.  There are long periods of just ambient noise of the world around Milo, and rather than push me away from the film it pulled me into his isolation.  I kept waiting for the real supernatural element to drop and when it didn't come I felt as though I lost my footing.  Stumbling to understand Milo's actions more and more.

 There's also a great scene which reminds me of Taxi Driver, when Robert De Niro takes Jodie Foster on a date and it's to the porno theater because he doesn't have the social experience to know better.  In this, Milo hangs out with Sophie and he puts on one of those PETA-esq videos of how a cow is killed and processed.  He has this flat affect while watching it whereas she is revolted and leaves him wondering what he did wrong.

This isn't a film for just anyone, and I wouldn't recommend it for a movie night with friends, but I will say if you have some free time and can actively watch this film, then do it.

I give The Transfiguration 4 Barnabas Collins portraits out of 5: