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Frankenstein '80
[Blu-ray]
Blu-ray ALL - America - Cauldron Films Review written by and copyright: Eric Cotenas (26th September 2023). |
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The Film
 The region of Franconia is abuzz with news that Professor Schwarz (Redneck's Roberto Fizz) has perfected a serum that prevents the rejection of transplanted tissue and is ready to use it on a human subject. The opportunity presents itself when the casualty of a car crash proves a suitable donor for the ailing sister of local journalist Karl Schein (Black Sunday's John Richardson) to go under the knife. Unfortunately, the night before the operation, someone steals Schwarz's only bottle of the serum and Schein's sister does not survive the transplant. Schwarz gives Schein the authority to investigate the theft since Inspector Schneider (The Bird with the Crystal Plumage's Renato Romano) is busy investigating a series of murders of women who have had organs cut out of them by a culprit who wields lancet but no apparent surgical skill. Not having read Mary Shelley, Schein (nor apparently anyone else in the hospital) has cause to suspect Dr. Otto Frankenstein (Emanuelle, Queen of Sados's Gordon Mitchell) who became the hospital pathologist after his career was ruined by his part in a botched life-saving surgery. When not skulking around the hospital, Schein courts Frankenstein's medical student niece Sonia (The Pyjama Girl Case's Dalila Di Lazzaro) while her uncle is trying to control the violent sexual urges of his creation Mosaic (The Beast in Heat's Xiro Papas) whose rejected organs must constantly be replaced by Frankenstein with both donations from the morgue slab as well as those unfortunate to poke their noses into his work. By the time Schein and Schneider do realize that Frankenstein's monster is the motivation for the theft and the perpetrator of the killings, they race to capture him as he becomes more violent as his body starts to shut down. One of a handful of gory, sexualized Italian seventies takes on the Frankenstein mythos – along with Lady Frankenstein, the 3D Andy Warhol-presented Flesh for Frankenstein (which also featured Di Lazzaro), and Frankenstein's Castle of Freaks (which also featured Mitchell) – Frankenstein '80 is most certainly the run of the litter. The film is put together with absolutely no care or apparent ambition. Both Schein's and Schneider's investigations, as well as Schein's flirtation with Sonia, merely mark time in between stripping and killings – as creative as a bludgeoning of a female butcher with a ham bone and as unimaginative as an attack on a stripper in her dressing room – with absolutely no attempt to actually engage the viewer (although it is a pleasure to see Suspiria/Inferno cab driver Fulvio Mingozzi in a somewhat larger role as one of Schneider's underlings). One-time 007 hopeful Richardson has always been a bland presence and is no more charismatic here, Romano is merely grating as comic relief, and Mitchell is nowhere near as entertaining as his cannibalistic necrophiliac turn in the late Italian gorefest Blood Delirium. Although both cinematographer-turned-director Mario Mancini and operator-turned-cinematographer Emilio Verriano both worked under Mario Bava, the film is quite ugly, so flatly-staged and lit that the usually-stunning Di Lazzaro's only glamour comes from her wardrobe and one is uncertain whether the odd use of foreground objects in a composition is either intended to frame our glimpse of the monster's genitalia or a carelessly-staged attempt to hide it as Papas moves in on a prostitute victim. As with the former two of the aforementioned Italian Frankenstein films, Carlo Rambaldi (King Kong) provides gore gags, but even their grisliness is undercut by careless coverage (one male victim whose face is slammed against a wall in a restroom by the monster not only splatters blood but bits of the baggy holding the fake blood). While on paper Frankenstein '80 – not to be confused with the French midi-minuit light comedy Frankenstein 90 – sounds like a wonderfully lurid Italian adults only fumetto comic, its execution is subpar all around and its only real novelty value on Blu-ray is to finally see what a decent presentation looks like (more on that below). 
Video
Frankenstein '80 went direct to video stateside courtesy of MPI Home Video's "Gorgon Video" line in a dark and faded fullscreen transfer so cramped on all four sides of the frame that the credits were unreadable and there was speculation that it was a scope film as well as rumors that some more graphic footage of Mosaic's gonad transplant was cut. While a 1.85:1 or thereabouts transfer from a foreign tape source made the rounds in the gray market, the Gorgon master persisted on some unauthorized multi-film DVD sets. While we cannot comment on the quality of the limited edition German Blu-ray from 2017, Cauldron Film's 1080p24 MPEG-4 AVC 1.85:1 widescreen Blu-ray comes from a brand new 2K restoration of the original camera negative and looks as pretty as such an ugly film can look. The image is brighter, revealing just how flat the lighting is while offering up clothes, hair, skin (real and synthetic), and offal in fine detail apart from some careless camera moves and uses of a few insert takes any decent filmmaker would reject and reshoot. The opening shots have rather grayish contrast and look like poor day-for-night, but that appears to have always been the case (not evident on older video transfers that were too dark to see anything), but deep blacks and vivid reds make themselves known with the first killing and the bloody title animation soon after.  Due to an authoring error, the disc loads and starts at 2:30, and the main menu must be accessed with your remote's Top Menu button.
Audio
The disc offers up both English and Italian DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 mono tracks. The English track is poorly cast but gets the job done, while the Italian track reveals that the investigation scenes that unfold in long shot covered by music on the English track actually have dialogue, and we get both English SDH subtitles for the English dub and full English subtitles for the Italian dub. 
Extras
Cauldron Films' do more than merely satisfy the appetites of viewers who wanted to see the film on its best behavior with a couple substantial extras. In the audio commentary by film historian Heather Drain, she conveys a palpable affection for the film despite (or because of) its flaws, likening it to a "pulp novel come to life." She addresses both the film's combination of eros and horror as well as noting all of its plot holes, and also discusses the various participants including milquetoast Richardson (who became a photojournalist in later life) and Mitchell, a bodybuilder and high school counselor who became part of Mae West's all-male revue and then became a fixture of Italian peplum films and then a character actor in other Italian genres as trends shifted.  In "Little Frankensteins: History of Italian Frankenstein films with Domenico Monetti" (38:20), film historian Monetti provides us with a thorough overview of Frankenstein adaptations from the silent era to some dire comic ones in the wake of Young Frankenstein – including a healthy chunk of discussion to the aforementioned seventies Frankenstein films – noting the Italian preference for the carnal Dracula over the scientific Frankenstein, and how Italian genre filmmakers reconfigured the creature towards those ends. "Dalila Forever: The Recorded Memories of Dalila Di Lazzaro" (27:46) is an audio interview with the actress who could not appear in person due to health concerns. She recalls being discouraged about acting by her practical mother, getting married at a young age and having a child, and being encouraged by her mother-in-law to model, leading to her move to Rome where she started getting small roles in films and wound up in Flesh for Frankenstein after meeting Carlo Ponti at a party (where she also got hit on by Roman Polanski who had a cameo in companion film Blood for Dracula), her memories of the stressful shoot and the harassment endured by her co-star Srdjan Zelenovic. She only briefly mentions Frankenstein '80 in the context of her memories of Mitchell and her long friendship with Richardson (who she reveals appeared in films purely to raise money for a leper colony overseas and would stay with her when he was in Rome). 
Packaging
The only paper extra retained from the limited edition for this standard edition is the reversible cover.
Overall
While on paper Frankenstein '80 sounds like a wonderfully lurid Italian adults only fumetto comic, its execution is subpar all around and its only real novelty value on Blu-ray is to finally see what a decent presentation looks like.
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