New Cult Releases April 1st - April 15th

Keeping you up to date on the best in cult and genre cinema

Author

Nick Uttam
April 15, 2024

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Vinegar Syndrome Releases

For kids around the world, music is often the only salvation when the pain and anxiety of teenage life becomes too much to bear. Yuichi (Hayato Ichihara) is in the 8th grade and he worships Lily Chou-Chou, a Bjork-like chanteuse whose epic music is lush and transcendent. Yuichi only lives for Lily Chou-Chou's big Tokyo concert, where the lies and violence can be washed away by the presence of his goddess and her powerful music. But fate has yet another obstacle in store for Lily's devoted fan.

A troubled college freshman, Luke, suffers a violent family trauma. He then resurrects his charismatic childhood imaginary friend Daniel to help him cope, not realizing how dangerous Daniel is.

Extras:

  • Introduction by Director Adam Egypt Mortimer

  • Three Story Board to Scenes Featurettes

  • Four Deleted Scenes with Optional Commentary

  • Alternate Ending with Optional Commentary

  • 5 scenes Early Script to Film comparison

  • Behind the Scene Slideshow

  • Commentary with Writer/Director Adam Egypt Mortimer

  • Commentary with writer/Director Adam Egypt Mortimer and Co-Writer Brian Deleeuw

  • Commentary with Writer/Director Adam Egypt Mortimer and Grant Morrison

  • Extended Version of Intro scene: The Abyss with new original music

  • Animation Test of Daniel Fortress

  • Style and Visual Guide

  • Face Flicker BTS Slideshow

  • Demon Face 3D Model Slideshow

  • Trailer

  • Essay by Amy Nicholson; Film Critic, Writer

Jacqueline (Cynthia Erivo), a young refugee, lands alone and penniless on a Greek island, where she tries first to survive and then to cope with her past. While gathering her strength, she begins a friendship with a rootless tour-guide (Alia Shawkat) and together they find the resilience to forge ahead.

Armed with a sack of gold dust and five magic spells, kind-hearted dwarf Fritz (Twin Peaks’ Michael J. Anderson) leaves his fantastical home to test the intentions of humans. Soon after his arrival, he crosses paths with Flannigan (The Vindicator’s Ken Roberts), a shady hunter who makes off with the magical gold and starts plotting evil deeds. After forging a friendship with siblings Jenny (Karen Elkin) and David (Michael Blouin), Fritz takes them to the alternate dimension he calls home: The Great Land of Small. As the authorities search for the missing children, Jenny and David are wowed by a fantastical world of acrobats and a gold-spitting creature known as Slimo. But when the King and Queen plot to make these kids their own, Fritz must risk his own well-being to get them home – and stop Flannigan from wreaking magic havoc.

Extras: 

  • New audio commentary featuring film historians Nathaniel Thompson and Troy Howarth

  • The New World Pictures Podcast episode on The Great Land of Small

  • Small Actors, Big Roles (2023, 17 min.) - New interviews with stars Karen Elkin and Michael Blouin

  • The Great Land of Effects (2023, 10 min.) - New interview with visual effects producer Pascal Blais

  • Animating in the ’80s (2023, 9 min.) - Blais discusses the animation techniques used in the film

  • Beyond Vaudeville (1991, 27 min.) – Episode of the classic public-access TV show featuring actor Michael J. Anderson

  • Archival interview with Jasný from The Other Europe series (1988, 26 min.)

  • Bohemian Rhapsody (1969, 16 min.) – Jasný’s celebrated short about his home country

  • It’s Not Always Cloudy (1949, 68 min.) – Jasný’s feature-length student film co-directed by Karel Kachyňa

  • Theatrical trailer

In the 1990s, Something Weird Video gifted humankind with HEY FOLKS! IT'S INTERMISSION TIME—a series of six magical VHS compilations that preserved vintage movie and drive-in ads. HEY FOLKS! IT'S THE INTERMISSION TIME VIDEO PARTY is a loving tribute to those cathode-tube-fueled days. Featuring HEY FOLKS! IT'S THE INTERMISSION TIME MIXTAPE! (an exclusive feature-length mixtape from the AGFA team) as well as all six volumes of the original, uncut Something Weird VHS releases from the 1990s, this 2-disc collection serves as a mind-altering time machine to a beloved era in home video history. 

Extras:

Disc 1

  • Transferred from the original Something Weird S-VHS masters

  • HEY FOLKS! IT'S THE INTERMISSION TIME MIXTAPE!: A 70-minute mixtape from the AGFA team

  • Commentary with AGFA's Bret Berg & Joseph A. Ziemba

  • HEY FOLKS! IT'S INTERMISSION TIME Volumes 1-2: The original, uncut Something Weird VHS compilations from the 1990s

  • Insert with writing by Something Weird's Lisa Petrucci

Disc 2

  • Transferred from the original Something Weird S-VHS masters

  • HEY FOLKS! IT'S INTERMISSION TIME Volumes 3-6: The original, uncut Something Weird VHS compilations from the 1990s

Imagine Andrei Tarkovsky circa SOLARIS directing Douglas Adams’ The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy and you’ll come close to the existential weirdness of the wonderfully loopy Soviet-era sci-fi comedy KIN-DZA-DZA! Two average Muscovites – a plainspoken construction foreman (Stanislav Lyubshin) and a Georgian student carrying a violin case (Leo Gabriadze) – encounter an odd homeless man on the street who asks, “Tell me the number of your planet in the Tentura?” In a flash, they’re teleported across the universe to the planet Pluke in the Kin-Dza-Dza galaxy – a Tatooine-like desert world whose inhabitants are hilariously noncommunicative (their main words are “ku” for good and “kyu” for very bad) and where common wooden matches are tremendously valuable. A deadpan, absurdist mixture of Kurt Vonnegut, Monty Python, Samuel Beckett and Jodorowsky’s never-made Dune where alien cultures are even more haphazard and WTF?

Extras:

  • New hour-long video interview with lead actor Leo Gabriadze about the making of KIN-DZA-DZA! and the contributions of his father, co-writer Rezo Gabriadze, moderated by Dennis Bartok of Deaf Crocodile

  • New video interview about KIN-DZA-DZA! and the rich history of Soviet science-fiction cinema with comics artist (Swamp Thing), film historian and author Stephen R. Bissette, moderated by Dennis Bartok

  • New commentary track by film critic Walter Chaw (Film Freak Central)

  • New written essay by film historian Justin Humphreys (George Pal: Man Of Tomorrow)

  • "Got a Match? On Vodka and Vinegar at the End of History"- New video essay by journalist and physical media expert Ryan Verrill (The Disc Connected) and film professor Dr. Will Dodson

Take a nostalgic trip back in time to the hallowed halls of your favorite rental shops with Mom N’ Pop: The Indie Video Store Boom of the ‘80s / ‘90s; a wistful new documentary chronicling the meteoric rise and gradual fall of the independently owned, neighborhood video store. Tucked within strip malls, tanning salons, gas stations, and grocery stores around the country, the mom & pop video store became the Mecca for budding film and video game fanatics to satiate their burgeoning media obsessions. Hear video store owners and employees, as well as filmmakers, podcasters, and collectors discuss the eccentricities of the regional video spots that left an indelible imprint on their lives forever.

Extras:

  • Audio commentary with director Bobby Canipe Jr.

  • Bonus interviews with Michael Devlin & Stephen Kessen

  • Extended interviews with James Rolfe &

  • Michael Morris

  • Behind the scenes still gallery

  • The Creature Preachers music video

  • Trailer

Closing the gap between dreams and reality, Fabio Salerno's films are the missing link between Dario Argento and George & Mike Kuchar. THE OTHER DIMENSION AND THE FILMS OF FABIO SALERNO is a 2-disc set that presents the late Salerno's complete filmography for the first time in North America. From the accomplished anthology THE OTHER DIMENSION to the fan-favorite short ARPIE, these D.I.Y. arthouse horror films from Italy are true discoveries for adventurous horrorheads.

Extras:

DISC 1: THE FEATURES

  • Preserved from the only 16mm film elements in existence

  • Italian language with newly created English subtitles

  • THE OTHER DIMENSION (1992, 78 mins)

  • DEEP NIGHT (1991, 69 mins)

  • FABIO: A 48-minute documentary by Oblivion Films

  • The Making of DEEP NIGHT: A 69-minute archival documentary

  • Photo gallery

DISC 2: THE SHORTS

  • Preserved from the best available VHS & digital masters, as film elements are lost

  • Italian language with newly created English subtitles, or partial English subtitles due to audio elements

  • ARPIE (1987)

  • OLTRETOMBA (1987)

  • MEZZANOTTE (1986)

  • EXTRA SENSORIA (1985)

  • TRE SAGOME IN NERO (1985)

  • VAMPIRI (1985)

  • INCUBO (1984)

  • NOTTE (1983)

  • CADAVERI (1982)

  • LA PAURA ESISTE GIÀ (UN NATALE ROSSO SANGUE) (1981)

  • MAGIC (1981)

  • LA SIGNORA DEL 5 PIANO (1981)

  • The Making of OLTRETOMBA: A 12-minute archival documentary

  • MAGIC: Commentary by Bleeding Skull’s Joseph A. Ziemba

OUT IN THE RING explores the rise and history of LGBTQ+ professional wrestlers and representation in the sport. Using a combination of interviews with LGBTQ+ wrestling talents (past and present), allies & historians, archival footage, and rare photos, OUT IN THE RING uncovers the history of the pro wrestling industry and the rise of visibility for performers and fans worldwide.

Extras:

  • Trailer

  • Exclusive clips/outtakes

  • Commentary track with Director Ry Levey and Editor Brad Webb

  • English SDH subtitles

Two hapless drifters, Frank (Kiowa Gordon) and Bruno (John Way), team up with Linde (Lily Gladstone) to recover her land and trek across 1870's Southern Arizona to find an elusive frontier musician. The complex quantum time theory is blended with philosophical musings about art as the way we understand our history and memories, with gunfights, horses, dance halls, cacti, and saloons!

Extras:

  • Deleted Scenes

  • Alternative live action scenes

  • Alternative animated sequences

  • Actors talk Quantum Physics

A powerful, unabashedly pro-socialist documentary of England’s postwar transformation from a working-class hellscape in the 1930s. Endemic poverty and Dickensian squalor are upended by Clement Attlee’s 1945 Labour Party landslide over the patrician Winston Churchill. What follows is the nationalization of the mines, railways, postal service — and the jewel in the crown, the National Health Service, which made medical care free of charge.

In 2007 the New South Wales government suddenly scrapped a plan to utilise the water in the disused underground train tunnels beneath Sydney’s St James Train Station. In 2008, chasing rumours of a government cover-up and urban legends surrounding the sudden back-flip, investigative journalist Natasha Warner led a crew of four into the underground labyrinth. They went down into the tunnels looking for a story – until the story found them. This is the documentary of their harrowing ordeal…

Extras:

  • The full feature length behind the scenes documentary The Tunnel: The Other Side of Darkness

  • Audio Commentary with director Carlo Ledesma, producer / writer / editor Enzo Tedeschi and producer / writer / editor Julian Harvey

  • The Tunnel: Beneath the Surface Documentary

  • Popcorn Taxi World Premier Post Screening Q&A

  • Alternate Ending

  • Meet the Cast

  • Timelapse Videos

  • Production Videos

  • The Tunnel at Screamfest LA

  • Press Sneak Peek Hype Reel

  • TV Crew Bootcamp

  • Music Videos

  • Trailer

Criterion Collections Releases

As newly minted lawman Pat Garrett (James Coburn) stalks the outlaw Billy the Kid (Kris Kristofferson) across the plains, their old friendship is twisted into rivalry, and mythic ideals of freedom come up against an emerging ruling-class order—all to the strains of a haunting soundtrack by Bob Dylan (who also appears as the mercurial Alias).

Extras:

  • New 4K digital restoration of the 50th Anniversary Release, supervised by editors Paul Seydor and Roger Spottiswoode, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack

  • New 4K digital restoration of the Original Theatrical Release, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack

  • Audio commentary for the 50th Anniversary Release featuring Seydor, Spottiswoode, and critic Michael Sragow

  • Two 4K UHD discs of the films presented in Dolby Vision HDR and two Blu-rays with the films and special features

  • New 2K digital master of director Sam Peckinpah’s Final Preview Cut, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack

  • Dylan in Durango, a new interview with author Clinton Heylin about the film’s soundtrack

  • Passion & Poetry: Peckinpah's Last Western, a new documentary by Mike Siegel about the making of the film

  • Archival interview with actor James Coburn

  • Trailer and TV spots

  • English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing

  • PLUS: An essay by author Steve Erickson

After killing his swindling boss, ranch hand Manoel (Geraldo Del Rey) goes on the run with his wife, Rosa (Yoná Magalhães). In the stark hinterlands, they join forces with armed bandits and pledge allegiance to a self-styled holy man who preaches revolt against rich landowners while perpetrating unspeakable acts of violence against the innocent.

Extras:

  • Audio commentary by restoration producer Lino Meireles

  • New interview with film scholar Richard Peña

  • Glauber the Movie, Labyrinth of Brazil (2003), a documentary on director Glauber Rocha

  • Cinema Novo (2016), a documentary on the Brazilian film movement

  • Memória do cangaço (1964), a short documentary on the origins of cangaço, a form of social banditry in northeastern Brazil

  • Trailer

  • New English subtitle translation

  • PLUS: An essay by film scholar Fábio Andrade

In a radiant, Cannes-award-winning performance of few words but extraordinary expressiveness, Koji Yakusho plays a public-toilet cleaner in Tokyo whose rich inner world is gradually revealed through his small exchanges with those around him and with the city itself.

Extras:

  • 4K digital master, approved by director Wim Wenders, with 5.1 surround DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack

  • One 4K UHD disc of the film presented in HDR and one Blu-ray with the film and special features

  • New interview with Wenders

  • Interview with actor Koji Yakusho

  • Some Body Comes into the Light (2023), a short by Wenders, featuring a new introduction by the director

  • Interview with producer Koji Yanai, founder of the Tokyo Toilet project

  • Trailer

  • PLUS: An essay by film critic Bilge Ebiri

Spanning fifty years of twentieth-century Chinese history, Farewell My Concubine follows aspiring actors Dieyi (a heartbreaking Leslie Cheung) and Xiaolou (Zhang Fengyi) as they emerge from a childhood of brutal training to become Beijing-opera stars, with life mirroring art as Dieyi’s unrequited love for Xiaolou and the country’s changing political tides engulf them in their own personal tragedies of jealousy and betrayal.

Extras:

  • New 4K digital restoration of the original director’s cut, with 5.1 surround DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack

  • One 4K UHD disc of the film and one Blu-ray with the film and special features

  • New conversation between Chinese-cultural-studies scholar Michael Berry and producer Janet Yang

  • Documentary from 2003 on the making of the film

  • Interview from 1993 with director Chen Kaige conducted by journalist Charlie Rose

  • Trailer

  • New English subtitle translation

  • PLUS: An essay by author and scholar Pauline Chen

Chicago suburban prepster whose college-bound life spirals out of control when his parents go out of town for the week and an enterprising call girl (Rebecca De Mornay) invites him to walk on the wild side.

Extras:

  • New 4K digital restorations of the director’s cut and the original theatrical release, supervised and approved by director Paul Brickman and producer Jon Avnet, with 5.1 surround DTS-HD Master Audio soundtracks

  • One 4K UHD disc of the film presented in Dolby Vision HDR and one Blu-ray with the film and special features

  • Audio commentary for the original theatrical release featuring Brickman, Avnet, and actor Tom Cruise

  • New interviews with Avnet and casting director Nancy Klopper

  • New conversation between editor Richard Chew and film historian Bobbie O’Steen

  • The Dream Is Always the Same: The Story of “Risky Business,” a program featuring interviews with Brickman, Avnet, cast members, and others

  • Screen tests with Cruise and actor Rebecca De Mornay

  • Trailer

  • English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing

  • PLUS: An essay by film curator and critic Dave Kehr

Alain Delon plays Jef Costello, a contract killer with samurai instincts. After carrying out a flawlessly planned hit, Jef finds himself caught between a persistent police investigator and a ruthless employer, and not even his armor of fedora and trench coat can protect him.

Extras:

  • New 4K digital restoration, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack

  • One 4K UHD disc of the film presented in HDR and one Blu-ray with the film and special features

  • Interviews with Rui Nogueira, editor of Melville on Melville, and Ginette Vincendeau, author of Jean-Pierre Melville: An American in Paris

  • Interviews with Melville and actors Alain Delon, François Périer, Nathalie Delon, and Cathy Rosier

  • Melville-Delon: D’honneur et de nuit (2011), a short documentary exploring the friendship between the director and the actor and their iconic collaboration on Le samouraï

  • Trailer

  • PLUS: An essay by film scholar David Thomson, an appreciation by filmmaker John Woo, and excerpts from Melville on Melville

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