As technology continues its steady march forward, movies adopt new techniques for filming. Old movies, meanwhile, make the leap forward to better, more realistic formats, jumping from VHS to DVD or DVD to Blu-ray. Grainy film is replaced with crisp digital images, and while some connoisseurs may prefer the old techniques, others dream of their favorite film making it to Blu-ray.
Some films have yet to make this leap, however, and perhaps never will. Whether due to a lack of popularity, critical lambasting, financial constraints, or some other consideration, some movies have yet to make the jump to Blu-ray. Many such movies, especially in the horror genre, have cult followings despite the older technology used to make and preserve them. Here are some horror films that are still awaiting the Blu-ray treatment.
8 Night Terrors
Directed by Tobe Hooper (the man who brought audiences The Texas Chain Saw Massacre and Poltergeist) and starring Robert Englund (iconic for playing Freddy Krueger in The Nightmare on Elm Street), Night Terrors had the potential to be a truly special horror movie.
What it was instead was the half-baked story of a young American visiting her archeologist father overseas only to fall into the clutches of a cult leader descended from the Marquis de Sade. Crippled by budget cuts and horror cliches,Night Terrors never became the horror mainstay that Hooper and Englund's other work did, but it still deserves a Blu-ray adaptation, if only as a "what-if?"
7 Iced
Skiing and slasher films don't exactly go hand-in-hand, but that didn't stop 1989's Iced from trying to make the connection. A group of childhood friends attends the opening of an upscale ski resort, only to be set upon by a mysterious figure with murder in mind.
Iced even commits one of the cardinal sins of the slasher genre by keeping its kills mostly off-screen. Psycho can get away with that style of filming, but teenage audiences had different expectations for a low-budget murder-fest the likes of Iced, which is perhaps part of the reason the film never took off. Despite that directorial choice, Iced is a fun, wonky, thoroughly '80s film that would be great to relive in higher definition.
6 976-Evil II
A 1992 supernatural horror slasher that would feel right at home in the mid-'80s, 976-Evil II is, like the original film, rarely discussed outside of cult horror buff circles, but its niche nature doesn't make it any less great. Centered around a hotline to hell, the film is decidedly tongue-in-cheek, with the cast and crew well-aware of the kind of film they were making. That's for the best.
There's no pretension here, just a silly and unpredictable follow-up to the equally silly original. Some ideas on display are genuinely fun and engaging, even if their execution often leaves something to be desired, and it would be a shame for such a weird piece of media to remain relegated to older technology forever.
5 Midnight Offerings
Rob Holcomb's 1981 made-for-television horror flick stars Melissa Sue Anderson, Mary Beth McDonough, and Patrick Cassidy in the story of a teenage witch who is only too happy to murder people in order to keep her boyfriend David from flunking out of school.
Unfortunately, David has eyes for the new girl in school, Robin. Even more unfortunately, Robin also has magical powers, and soon enough the two teenage witches find themselves in violent conflict with one another. Midnight Offerings is exceptionally cheesy, but lead-witch Vivian is a genuinely interesting character, in part because of the choice to cast Little House on the Prairie's "Mary" as Vivian.
4 Prom Night III: The Last Kiss
Prom Night III: The Last Kiss is about as garishly wince-inducing as one could expect from a direct-to-TV movie. It's a comedy-horror film, with more emphasis on comedy, though more horror might have been wrung from the story if the script and performances had been a few notches less off-kilter.
The moral of Prom Night III: The Last Kiss might be "don't befriend the ghost of a murdered prom queen," but that's not a lesson that the protagonist is capable of taking to heart. It's the side characters and the villain who really command the show here, anyway. The weirdness on show here holds up. Viewers looking for an over-the-top blast of DTV goodness will find it here, but unfortunately not on Blu-ray.
3 Silent Night, Deadly Night 3: Better Watch Out
The Silent Night, Deadly Night franchise is longer than many fans remember, featuring five numbered entries as well as a remake. Silent Night, Deadly Night 3: Better Watch Out features Bill Mosely (Chop Top in The Texas Chainsaw Massacre II and Otis in House of 1000 Corpses) as Ricky the killer Santa.
There's only so much that even a massive horror talent like Bill Mosely can do, and the film is not without its faults. Surviving the finale of the second film, the third film finds Ricky alive, in a coma for the last six years, and with a glass dome affixed to his head in an effort to repair his damaged skull. Should Ricky have received this treatment? Probably not. But since it kept the franchise alive, one can hardly complain. The third film should receive a Blu-ray adaptation if only to keep Bill Mosely's sinister brand alive.
2 Cast A Deadly Spell
1981's Cast a Deadly Spell is a strange mashup of the horror and film noir genres but a classic in every way. It's 1940s Los Angeles, and everyone has supernatural powers, except for investigator Harry Philip Lovecraft (played by Fred Ward). Wealthy client Amos Hacksaw recruits Lovecraft to track down an ancient text.
Lovecraft soon realizes, however, that the text contains curses that Amos intends to use to achieve world domination. Cast a Deadly Spell captures the look and feel of old LA, which is one of the major reasons that this film deserves to be on Blu-ray. Anything that looks and feels so satisfying deserves to be preserved with newer technology.
1 Evil Laugh
The depth of cheese on display in the 1986 horror film Evil Laugh is second to none. When some medical students and their dates discover a cackling slasher while repairing an abandoned building over the weekend, things turn bloody. The gore is solid, but just about everything else is questionable. The addition of dancing didn't exactly help elevate the film either.
Lambasted by many critics as empty and derivative, Evil Laugh nonetheless appeals to a certain corner of the horror audience for whom "cheesy slasher" are magic words. Nothing so awkward should fade into obscurity.