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Festival of Fright
Synergy Entertainment // Unrated // October 31, 2006
List Price: $14.98 [Buy now and save at Amazon]
The Collection:
I have to admit right at the start that I love trailers. They're like mini-movies, with some of the best scenes from a feature all cut together. While I'll admit that trailers never reach the heights that feature can achieve, it's also true that trailers can be much better than the movies that they're touting. (If you don't believe me check out the trailer for The Golden Child and then watch the movie.) There have been several trailer compilations released, but there's always room for more, that's why I was excited to receive Festival of Fright, the first in a trilogy of DVDs from The Monster Club and Synery Entertainment that presents some of the best classic horror and SF trailers around.
Running just shy of an hour and 15 minutes, this first disc (I'll be reviewing the other two volumes in the coming days) contains some great promotional films. From great films such as Carnival of Souls to some unintentionally comic movies such as Queen of Outer Space, this disc has them all. Some of the most entertaining pieces come from truly bad movies. My favorite is easily the trailer for From Hell it Came, a creature feature staring a half man- half tree monstrosity. AIP's Black Sunday was also a highlight of the set, probably better than the movie itself.
This also included the trailer for Macabre, one of William Castle's gimmick films. This one promises that people who attended the film will be insured by Lloyds of London for "death by fright". People who commit suicide are not covered however.
Unfortunately some of these have splices and missing short segment. Revenge of Frankenstein has a voiceover that states "You will see" and then it's abruptly cut off. Others trailers end abruptly though they seem complete. This isn't a huge problem, but it does mar the presentation.
The trailers included in this collection are:
Tales of Terror
Revenge of Frankenstein
The Unearthly
The Cyclops
Daughter of Dr. Jekyll
From Hell it Came (featuring the man/tree creature "Baranga")
She Demons ("for terror that has no equal")
The Bride and the Beast
Cosmic Man
The Fiendish Ghouls (featuring Donald Pleasence as a grave-robbing murderer)
The Raven
Queen of Outer Space (the title role played by Zsa Zsa Gabor)
Carnival of Souls
Tarantula (Leo G. Carroll was over a barrel...)
Black Sunday
The Mole People
The Masque of the Red Death
The Village of the Damned
Macabre
Dr. Cadman's Secret
Caltiki the Immortal Monster
Frankenstein 1970
Black Pit of Dr. M.*
Monstrosity (aka The Atomic Brain)
Daughter of Horror
The Vampire Lovers ("Perverted creatures of the night!")
The House on Haunted Hill
Diary of a Madman
The Projected Man ("Science runs amok when human beings tamper with unknown forces!")
The Mummy (Hammer version)
The Haunted Palace
A Bucket of Blood
13 Ghosts
Man of a Thousand Faces
Dr. Terror's House of Horrors
Dementia 13
The Curse of the Faceless Man
The Tingler
The DVD:
Audio:
The two channel mono soundtrack is fine. There's some background noise present in some of the trailers but the dialog is usually clear and easy to understand. Nothing to write home about, but not bad either.
Video:
These trailers are presented with a 1.33: 1 aspect ratio. That's the original ratio for a lion's share of the trailers, though a few are pan and scan jobs while others preserve the OAR but are non-anamorphic and letterboxed. Everything presented on this disc is in the public domain and none of it has been restored. The quality varies but is generally acceptable. Most, if not all, of these suffer from spots and scratches, sometimes excessively. The images are generally soft, the contrast is sometimes poor, the colors are usually faded, and the level of detail isn't spectacular. Some heavy handed edge enhancement is present in some scenes too. Even with that, these are all watchable and some of them look quite nice. The producers also resisted the temptation to add a water mark to the image, for which I'm grateful. While this disc won't win any awards the trailers are all watchable and the vast majority is much better than that. You should be happy as long as you don't set your expectations too high.
Extras:
The only extra included is a "scary music" audio track. Selecting this option plays somewhat eerie synthesizer music over the trailers instead of the original audio. That would make it nice to play it this way during a Halloween party.
Final Thoughts:
This was a fun disc. The less than pristine video quality even adds to the charm of these entertaining trailers. Definitely recommended for fans of classic SF and horror films.
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