US
Spain, 1975. Franco's death opens the door to the possibility of uncensored cinema. After two years of relaxed censorship, it is abolished in 1977, and the “S” rating is created to protect viewers from films that may “offend their sensibilities.”
Oct 2024
An exploration of the cinematic history of the folk horror, from its beginnings in the UK in the late sixties; through its proliferation on British television in the seventies and its many manifestations, culturally specific, in other countries; to its resurgence in the last decade.
Sep 2021
The story of the insane scandals related to the remake of “Island of Dr. Moreau” —originally a novel by H. G. Wells—, which was brought to the big screen in 1996. How director Richard Stanley spent four years developing the project just to find an abrupt end to his work while leading actor Marlon Brando pulled the strings in the shadows. Now for the first time, the living key players recount what really happened and why it all went so spectacularly wrong.
Aug 2014
Get ready to play a game of death… and another… and another. This wild documentary dives into the Bruce Lee exploitation craze.
Dec 2023
Brought to life through archival material and the reflections of over 40 colleagues, friends and fans, BLOOD & FLESH is much more than the story of a moviemaking life most unusual. It beautifully captures the worlds of outsider filmmaker communities that existed in California in the ’70s, and the weird ways they intersected with Hollywood mainstream and union indies. On Adamson shoots, regular Orson Welles crew and cinematographers like Gary Graver, Vilmos Szigmond and Lazlo Kovaks worked alongside Bud Cardos — and at one point, Charles Manson! Director David Gregory (founder of Severin Films, director of LOST SOUL: THE DOOMED JOURNEY OF RICHARD STANLEY’S ISLAND OF DR. MOREAU) spent years making this film, speaking to everyone down to the cops who investigated Adamson’s murder, vividly encapsulating both a bold life and tragic demise, with alien conspiracies, go-go dancers and Colonel Sanders coming in along the way. If you’ve got even a passing interest in cinema, you want to see this
Aug 2019
An American family visiting their Irish roots accidentally stumbles on a horde of bloodthirsty mutant children.
Apr 2009
A feature-length documentary film adaptation of the 1994 non-fiction book of the same name, chronicling the history of Mondo cinema and the "death film".
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Down a seedy city street in her neighborhood, young Enola Penny is obsessed with what appears to be a long abandoned theatre. One night, she sees that the front door is slightly ajar and impulsively decides to sneak inside. But there in the dark, decrepit auditorium, a show unlike any other unfolds before her eyes. Its host is an eerie human puppet named Peg Poett who will introduce Penny to six tales of the bizarre: A couple traveling in a remote part of the French Pyrenees cross paths with a lustful witch; A paranoid lover faces the wrath of a partner who has been pushed to her limit; The Freudian dreams of an unfaithful husband blur the lines between fantasy and reality; The horrors of the real world are interpreted through the mind of a child; A woman addicted to other people's memories gets her fix through the vitreous fluid of her victims' eyeballs; And a perverse obsession with sweets turns sour for a couple in too deep.
Jul 2011
Before the advent of modern-day pornography, a vast and rapidly-paced world of smut peddling was the norm, complete with its own secret history. This documentary reveals the untold story of American cinema's gloriously sordid cinematic past. Starting in the 1920s, expert exploiteer David F. Friedman and Henenlotter navigate us through more than five salacious decades of skin flicks. It's the true story of dirty movies, traced in elegant detail from the bizarre locations where these nudie shorts were screened to the ongoing legal battles fought by their promoters. And of course there are the stories of the innovators themselves, people who often risked their own security and livelihood to make these films, believing in some way that what they were doing wasn't a 'bad' thing - and that it could rake in some dough.
Jun 2013
A detailed look at the history of horror anthology films.
Oct 2020
A documentary on the making of Frank Henenlotter's Basket Case trilogy.
Sep 2011
After accidentally killing an opponent in the ring, a professional wrestler takes a job at a group home for youth offenders. But when a psychopath wearing a wrestling mask begins butchering the teenage residents, their rehabilitation will become a no-holds-barred battle for survival. Originally filmed in 1994 but completed in 2019.
May 2019
Love blossoms between Evan and Kim in the coastal town of Santa Cruz, California, but so does a flock of displaced sea eagles, who go on a rampage.
Sep 2022
Bikers, Nazis, Mafiosi, and the FBI all clash in this wild and wooly exploitation picture from director Al Adamson. Mark Adams (John Gabriel) is an FBI agent who has been assigned to infiltrate an organized crime ring that has obtained a set of printing plates that will allow them to produce nearly perfect counterfeit 20-dollar bills. The plates were made in Germany during World War II, and were discovered by a radical right-wing group hoping to restore the Nazi Party to power. The American gangsters are in cahoots with a group of wealthy American neo-Nazis sympathetic to the new German cause, led by fugitive war criminal Count von Delberg (Kent Taylor); the count has in turn recruited a vicious motorcycle gang, the Bloody Devils, to do his dirty work.
May 1970
A documentary which covers Splatterfest ’90, the notorious all-night horror festival held at London’s legendary Scala Cinema.
Dec 2024
Documentary released with Second Sight Films' Dawn of the Dead restoration featuring John Amplas, Roy Frumkes, Tom Savini, Christine Forrest, Tom Dubensky, Tony Buba, Taso Stavrakis and a whole host of zombies and bikers.
Nov 2020
Writer Adam Rockoff provides a basic overview of the slasher movie genre.
Jan 2011
Interviews with the filmmakers behind the 1996 film Wax Mask.
Sep 2019
After his dream project DUNE fell apart, visionary filmmaker Alejandro Jodorowsky took a break from cinema, only to return over a decade later with his most triumphant work: SANTA SANGRE.
Diabolical. Seductive. Immortal. Vampires have been an icon of evil in folklore and popular culture for more than three centuries, yet only one name still personifies the ultimate aristocrat of bloodlust. Now join the world’s foremost experts on Dracula – including academics, authors and horror historians – as they explore the untold story of the Transylvanian Count, from the legend of Vlad The Impaler and Bram Stoker’s celebrated novel through its landmark stage productions and classic movie adaptations.
Dec 2013