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House of 1000 Corpses (2003)
[Blu-ray]
Blu-ray A - America - Lionsgate Home Entertainment Review written by and copyright: Jari Kovalainen (10th October 2007). |
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The Film
 There seems to be mixed opinions about director/writer/composer Rob Zombie as a filmmaker, but one thing is certain; He got guts. Remaking the “granddaddy of horror-films” is not exactly the safest way to gather new fans, but Zombie took the challenge and did his own “Halloween (2007)”. Re-creating something old in the new package was basically also the case with Zombie’s debut film “House of 1000 Corpses (2003)”. It’s highly influenced by the 1970’s horror such as “The Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974)” and “The Hills Have Eyes (1977)” and is not shy to show that. With the film, some people are confusing “homage” to “rip-off”, since “House of 1000 Corpses” is clearly homage - with some original ideas. The result is not a masterpiece, but the film is a quite effective and is a creepy grind house ride. On an ordinary night in 1977, two young couples stumble into the remote “Captain Spaulding's Museum of Monsters and Madmen”, run by the loud Captain Spaulding (Sid Haig) - the bald, bearded man with a clown face. Bill (Rainn Wilson - e.g. “The Office (2005-)” TV-series), Mary (Jennifer Jostyn), Jerry (Chris Hardwick) and Denise (Erin Daniels - e.g. “One Hour Photo (2002)”) are doing some research of strange, offbeat roadside attractions and now they’ve found a truly unique one. After taking the “murder ride” in the museum, they’re heading for “Dr. Satan´s tree”, a local legend. On the way there in the pouring rain, they pick up a blond hitchhiker girl, Baby (Sheri Moon) and from that point on, their biggest nightmare is slowly turns into reality. When they get a flat tire the group takes shelter with Baby’s family; Mother Firefly (Karen Black - e.g. “Five Easy Pieces (1970)”), Grandpa Hugo (Dennis Fimple in his last film), Otis (Bill Moseley - e.g. “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 (1986)”), Rufus “R.J.” (Robert Allen Mukes), and Tiny (Matthew McGrory). While it’s pretty clear from the start that the family is very strange and eccentric, their true intentions are still fairly well hidden. On Halloween Eve, all will be revealed. Five cheerleader girls are already missing… “House of 1000 Corpses” has had a troubled history. The film was ready in 2000, but eventually “Universal Pictures” rejected the first cut (some violence was trimmed to get the “R-rating” from the MPAA, which was particularly difficult with the film) and finally dropped the whole film (their official statement was: “…It was clear that the best version of the movie would end up getting an NC-17 rating, and we felt that would make the marketing and distribution of the movie impossible for us”). It was picked up by “Lionsgate” and released three years later. After that there has been some confusion as to the running time, mainly since the longer version was apparently shown in film festivals (rumor, perhaps?) and the “R-rated”-version is the one released on DVD and this Blu-ray. It seems that the “R-rated”-version is basically the version that Zombie approves and he doesn’t mention anything otherwise in the audio commentary. He has been a bit vague on this matter in past interviews (no time or energy to do another version - even when he has been interested? Some of the trimmed material might be lost, etc), but it’s safe to say that this “R-rated”-version is the final version of the film. Of course - you’ll never know, especially when Zombie is no longer a rookie and “Halloween (2007)” made some money. I personally enjoyed “House of 1000 Corpses”. While the film doesn’t reinvent the wheel, it captures the gritty and unsettling 1970’s mood and is visually a well crafted film (I didn’t particularly like the surreal “Super-8/home video”-footage, though). Zombie has created many good characters (especially Captain Spaulding and Lieutenant Wydell (Tom Towles - e.g. “Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer (1986)” and “Miami Vice (2006)”) and has chosen the right actors for the film (perhaps not counting his wife Sheri Moon). There are some very good cinematic sequences (the “robbery-scene” at the beginning, the “sheriff-scene” later on and also the “split screen Marilyn Monroe” scene) and the inventive use of music (now pretty much a Zombie trademark). The tone of the film also changes - keeping the film fresh, so you have exploitation, horror and eventually some surprises, since the last part of the film is not what you necessarily expect (and which actually might divide the viewers). Even some strange black humor is added to the mix. The film shows the talent of Zombie as a director, even when some areas in the film are a bit rough on the edges. The film is not as “smooth sailing” as it could’ve been and some of the pacing, editing doesn’t always work and you can tell that some scenes are probably somewhat rushed and sadly also a few scenes of “terror” lack the final push that was achieved in “The Devil's Rejects” (where the story continues). “House of 1000 Corpses” is still a tight and intense horror experience, where the good qualities definitely outweigh the few flaws of the film.
Video
The film is presented in 1.78:1 widescreen (1080p 24fps) and is using VC-1 compression. The transfer is sharp, detailed and clean, colors (which can vary from scene to scene and are quite dominating) are bold and vivid and the black levels are deep. In another words; an excellent, top notch transfer. I noticed mild edge enhancement in some scenes and the rough “home video footage” of course looks intentionally worse and murkier than the rest of the film. The general look of the film is a bit “edgy”, colours often non-natural and there’s also some grain (not that much as in “The Devil's Rejects”, though) and this Blu-ray-release captures the original look almost perfectly. The film runs 88:57 minutes, is using “BD-50”-disc and there are 16 chapters. Note, that the disc is confirmed to be “Region A” only. Review equipment: Sony Bravia KDL-40W2000 LCD (1080p) + Playstation 3, via HDMI cable.
Audio
Two English audio tracks are included; DTS-HD High Resolution 6.1 ES matrix, and Dolby Digital 5.1 EX (640 Kbps). There are also English and Spanish subtitles. I chose the DTS-HD track, even when only a few of the Blu-ray-players can fully decode DTS-HD High Resolution - I believe only Samsung BD-P1400 and Panasonic DMP-BD10A (nor that many of the current receivers). This means that like most of the current players at the moment, Playstation 3 supports the 1.5 Mbps “core” from the DTS-HD High Resolution-track (full track would use the constant bit rate of 6.0 Mbps). As most film buffs know, 1.5 Mbps is equal to “full bit rate” DTS from the selected standard DVD’s. My receiver also indicated that the track was ES matrix. The track is quite flawless to my ears, well balanced and solid surround-experience. It has some selected directional sound effects, loud and effective action/horror (and music) sequences and clear dialogue. Sure, the audio doesn’t necessarily reach the same level as huge Hollywood-productions, but for smaller films like this one everything seems to be in the right place.
Extras
Blu-ray-release ports most the extras from the R1 SD DVD-release (except Trailers and Isolated Music Score). All of them (except “Zombietron” interactive game) are presented in 480p standard definition. Extras don’t include any subtitles. While the original interactive menu (with cast comments) from the R1 SD DVD-release is not ported, it’s still pretty nice in the Blu-ray-release also. Note, that “Theatrical trailer” is listed on the back cover, but it’s not included. -Audio commentary with director/writer/composer Rob Zombie is quite easy to listen, but it’s less informative (or should I say “revealing”) than you would expect. Zombie is probably “moved on” from the experience and doesn’t want to delve in the problems that he faced with the distribution and MPAA. Zombie has stated in several interviews that he didn’t leave from Universal bitter, so that’s most likely one of the reasons why you don’t hear many comments about the issues with Universal (when they dropped the film). You still sense that the shoot itself wasn’t fully a pleasant experience and there were people in the crew that most likely didn’t get along with Zombie (there were e.g. several cinematographers and also editors). Zombie still tells about the locations (many scenes were shot in the Universal back lot - also a tourist attraction and the “rough Super-8 footage” was shot in e.g. Zombie’s own basement and various places), cuts that he made (it seems that plenty of footage was actually cut by Mr. Zombie himself, since some were “too funny”, “too long”, etc) and briefly also MPAA/gore (Universal wanted two “versions” of the bloody scenes - “blood” and “no blood”, but since there usually wasn’t enough time, Zombie just shot the “bloody” version). In the end, Zombie probably did what he wanted. The “fishboy” scene was originally gorier - that’s pretty clear, and the “stabbing scene” in the field longer. The “burning scene” was originally planned to shoot in the proper stake, but the fake dummy simply looked “too fake”. You’ll also hear about the various issues along the way, like shooting in the rain (difficult), working with extras (Zombie didn’t cared them very much), about the safety regulations (Zombie basically admits that some scenes were a bit dangerous and professional stunt men were not always used) and the story (which changed as the production went along). You also hear that Zombie originally planned to play the Dr. Wolfenstein in the opening of the film, but chose not to in the last minute (he was already in full make-up). Generally Zombie tends to go in the small details in various scenes, while explaining what’s going on in the story. His commentary might be a bit too “tidbit” - even a bit boring, to some, but it still can be interesting. Make sure to listen the commentary during the end credits, since Zombie’s sarcastic comments (“2 cars in the film, but 75 drivers” etc) are quite hilarious. -High Definition Exclusive Bonus feature: “House of 1000 Corpses Zombietron” Interactive Game is the only extra in HD - 720p. This is quite simple Java based game, where you control the sheriff, trying to free the victims from the ghouls and the main villain Otis before the time runs out. You can choose from the “normal” or “bloody” modes (I of course chose the latter one!) and there are different levels. I doubt that people spend that much time on this game, but in some simplistic and naďve way the game is actually quite fun. The rest of the extras are series of short featurettes, where you see the glimpse of behind-the-scenes footage and here some quick interviews. Quite frankly they don’t offer much information and are more like promotional stuff. Some rehearsal and screen test (Dennis Fimple) footage are also included and some quite useless “humor” like “Tiny Fu*ked a Stump”. No “deleted scenes” or such are offered: -“Making of” -featurette (4:15 min) -“Behind the Scenes” -featurette (2:35 min) -“Tiny Fu*ked a Stump” -featurette (3:08 min) -“Casting” -featurette (2:07 min) -“ Rehearsals” -featurettes: *Bill Moseley & Jennifer Jostyn (3:44 min) *Rainn Wilson & Chris Hardwick & Erin Daniels (2:15 min) *Chris Hardwick & Erin Daniels (0:56 sec) -“Interviews” -featurettes: *Actor Bill Moseley (4:30 min) *Actor Sid Haig (5:43 min) *Actress Sheri Moon (1:33 min) *Special makeup effects/special effects artist Wayne Toth (3:33 min) Bonus trailers include (they also run before the “Main menu”, but can be skipped) “The Punisher (2004)” - 2:32 min, “The Condemned (2007)” - 1:48 min, “The Descent (2005)” - 1:50 min, and “Saw III (2006)” - 0:44 sec. The disc is packaged in a standard Blu-ray case.
Overall
“House of 1000 Corpses” is like the “murder ride” of Captain Spaulding’s museum; Loud and a bit dirty, not perfect or without any bumps, but still quite interesting, partly scary and colorful horror rollercoaster ride. And most of all; Entertaining. Blu-ray-release looks and sounds very good and some extras are included. For more info, please visit the homepage of Lionsgate Home Entertainment.
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