Death Ship

It’s been a long time since Death Ship has been seen in the UK, but Nucleus Films Marc Morris and Jake West have pulled another blinder by producing a decent DVD with a scattering of special features and the crispest version of the movie money can buy.

 

Made in 1980 this incredibly low budget horror movie did reasonable business in the American box offices coming second place to the Oscar wining Kramer Vs Kramer. Despite doing good business Death Ship also managed to win out amongst the smaller “cult” theatrical cinemas like the grindhouse or drive in movie style.

 

On his final voyage Captain Ashland (George Kennedy) is showing rookie Trevor Marshall (Richard Crenna) the ropes, rather begrudgingly I should add. Over the course of the night tensions rise as the retiring captain grows increasingly impatient with events going on around him. This soon becomes the last thing on everyone’s mind after the ship is rammed by another vessel and begins to sink. A handful of survivors make it off the sinking ship only to find salvation on a passing deserted vessel, but it soon becomes evident that the deserted ship is the very one that sank their ship, and as time passes by it becomes apparent that the ship wants to kill its new passengers.

 

I cannot begin to pretend that Death Ship is a particularly good film, there is nothing wrong with either the cast or the special effects, simply the story feels after a promising build up to be a little hollow, amongst the hollow moments however are a few scattered moments that qualify to be classed as movie gems or at least gems in this movie. The biggest flaw I personally feel was that there was no opportunity to form any bonds with any of the characters, gigolo character Nick (Nick Mancuso) is practically nonexistent in respect of his story input, while Richard Crenna spends a portion of the movie with his head in his hands. George Kennedy turns in a dark performance, but again never at any point can you make a connection with the character.

 

The big fault I suspect is that the story was written by Blaxploitation director Jack Hill, then parts re-written by David P. Lewis in order to comply with requests from the producer, director and the budget requirements of the movie. It is quite often the case that too many cooks spoil the broth, and while Hill was at no point involved after the initial screenplay something was most definitely lost in translation.

 

Faults aside there are a couple of genuinely good points, one of the characters has a grisly end in a net full of sharp human remains, while another gets a little too close to the mechanics of the death ship. In with this is a hidden story about the holocaust and a Nazi controlled ship, that just so happens to be the “Death Ship” of the title.

 

Balancing the good with the bad Death Ship sits middle when it comes to rating the movie, I neither loved it or hated it, it’s just average. To be honest with you I have tried to watch the movie over several years and never quite have the patience to watch it to the end, its only real interest this time round was the fact that Marc Morris a master historian in the horror/cult genres does magnificent work when it comes to restoring movies for DVD.

 

While the movie is average the special features on this Nucleus release are far from average, there is an excellent documentary called Stormy Seas which is the best feature on the disc. Stormy Sea’s spends a lot of time talking with George Kennedy, Nick Mancuso, Jack Hill and director Alvin Rakoff. There are some great stories that are discussed, chiefly coming from the mouth of the incredibly interesting George Kennedy, while Mancuso’s comments are kind of cryptic, Kennedy elaborates and adds a great spin to stories. You really get to hear not just about the movie but about the way of life for the actors, both Mancuso and Kennedy talk about the water they are forced to swim in apparently said to carry Hepatitis B. While both talk about the joy of working with the late Richard Crenna (Best known as Trautman in the Rambo movies) and Kate Reid (Who played Aunt Lil Trotter in Dallas). This is not a short five or ten minute documentary as featured on most DVD’s but adecent length documentary nearly 50 minutes in length.

 

Other additions include deleted scenes thought not to even exist that were featured in a Canadian TV showing some years ago preserved from an old Betamax recording. A series of pages from Jack Hills original screenplay entitled Blood Star. There are also a series of trailers not just for Death Ship but for other Nucleus releases. Strange though it might see one of the most interesting special features is a simple page of writing that talks about the preservation of the movie, one thing you get the feeling about with this DVD is that the best stories all took place off screen.

 

Apparently there is also an audio commentary with Alvin Rakoff but to be honest with you my workload prevented me the time to investigate.

 

Death Ship is available to buy online from £12.99.

The Boys From Brazil

There are certain films that fascinate me, movies I would go as far as to say that I love. These movies generally get re-released time after time, after time; and me like the silly fool I am have to go out and purchase it just in case I’m missing something, or because I prefer the packaging, one such movie is The Boys From Brazil and the recent Blueray release proved too much of a temptation to let me pass by.

 

Beginning in Paraguay in 1978 Barry Kohler (Steve Guttenberg) an American Jew obsessed with the Second World War has arrived in the small South American country, acting on a tip off. Concerned with the heavy influx of Nazi war criminals arriving in the country Kohler worries about the possibilities of a new uprising. When Eduard Seibert (James Mason) arrives, he is convinced that things are going to turn very nasty; Seibert during the war went by the nickname “The Executioner”. Reaching out to famous Jewish Nazi hunter Ezra Lieberman (Laurence Olivier) for help, Lieberman dismisses Kohler as another kid on a wild goose chase. The next discovery however is far more distressing, as more Nazi’s pour into the country there is a final shocking arrival in the form of Josef Mengele (Gregory Peck), Hitler’s dubious surgeon. Having bugged an imperial looking chateau Kohler discovers that there is a sinister plan to assassinate ninety four 65 year old men, but for what means?

 

Why I enjoy The Boys From Brazil so much is all down to the cleverness of the storyline, this is very much the sort of film that starts one way and ends with something very different. Based on the novel by Ira Levin (The Stepford Wives, Rosemary’s Baby, Sliver) and directed by Franklin J. Schaffner (Papillion, Patton, Planet Of The Apes) Boys From Brazil is a strange synergy of war movie, tense thriller, and very real horror, it’s this alternating  genre turning that makes this an all-round winner. While not necessarily being the most action packed of movies a high body count and a series of rather striking images and situations burn a hole in your head and causes you to believe you have seen something far harsher than you actually had.

 

Boys From Brazil sort of marked the end of big British filmmaking, not long after Lew Grade’s movie company ceased making movies, and this is without a doubt a very worthwhile swansong. Not only does the movie have an impressive cast that also includes Denholm Elliot, Lilli Palmer, Michael Gough, Linda Hayden and Prunella Scales; but also offers some pretty impressive location filming which included Portugal, Austria, America and Great Briton. In between this the effects are pretty impressive, and the musical score by the late great Jerry Goldsmith is enough to send a pretty big shiver down your spine.

 

I won’t ruin the story by getting into the heart of what it’s all about, but I will say that like numerous other Ira Levin pieces of work it was way beyond its time in respect of ideas, the main focus of the movie surrounding something incredibly controversial now, as well as the ethical nature of it. I must say when I first saw the movie nearly 30 years ago, I was really struck by the story, and a little shocked by the revelation, while seeming incredibly farfetched back then it’s strangely obvious now days that someone would try such a thing.

 

There are two moments in the film that critics applaud, a rather sinister series of flashbacks that Mengele sees in his head while exploring an old derelict hospital, combined with a haunting Goldsmith score being the first and for me the most powerful image of the film. The second involves the final face of with Lieberman and Mengele involving a gang of hungry Rottweiler’s, while not so haunting is by far the most known scene of the movie.

 

Of our cast Gregory Peck performs rather well as the demented and devoted follower, looking more Charlie Chan than Nazi war criminal he wears his white suit with pride and has the most wonderful punch up with one of his assassins, while laying the boot into his wife with his tongue. Never much of an Olivier fan, I do really enjoy seeing the great actor here, this is the image I have in my head when I hear the name Laurence Olivier, an incredibly frail old man with a steel like resolve. Steve Guttenberg, on the cusp of his A-List status of the 80’s shows a little comedy that we are all familiar with but also at the same time giving his most serious and tragic role. But it’s the understated James Mason that kind of rules the day, laid back as Hitler’s faithful Executioner he emerges the strongest of all the cast in both performance and character, like Olivier this is how I always see Mason its his finest role.

 

So what difference does our latest technological revolution have on the film? I kind of had my doubts about this one, because in fairness older movies do not normally suit the wonder of Blueray previous discs of pre 80’s movies left me feeling like I had been done, literally getting a good DVD image for the extra five pounds on top of a normal standard DVD release.  One thing you don’t win on is value of content the only additional feature on the extra 30 odd gigabytes of storage is a theatrical trailer. There are also some subtitles, but to be honest with you lots of the words are missed out. What I cannot grumble about however is the beautifully rich image the movie rewards you with, from vibrant colours and a sharpness of image that really makes the movie look like it was made yesterday, not thirty years ago. The sound in fairness however is not much different to the last DVD release. The fact that special features are thin on the ground I guess could explain why the RRP of this DVD is just £14.99.

 

If you have not seen The Boys From Brazil, there has never been a better time (ordinary DVD is just around the £3 mark), in order to preserve the mystery of the movie I have had to keep my review a little thin on the ground, this is one of those movies that if you don’t really know what’s coming you’ll get the best reward.