 Originally Posted by MinionZombie
Fortunately I've not experienced any disc problems, but have heard of the odd thing in the past. The recent one was the cock up with "Shivers" (it was missing various moments of violence, a few seconds here, a couple of seconds there) - but they recently put up a replacement disc program for that. I heard about "The Beyond" having the error with the black & white intro rather than the sepia tone one, but fortunately that was already fixed on my copy (the steelbook edition, which had the replacement disc as it was a re-release). What was the error with Zombie Flesh Eaters? I got that over Christmas, but I'm pretty sure it was a re-release.
It was missing a couple of milliseconds at the very beginning. It's a really bizzare flaw. I never gave a crap, but some people on the Cult Labs forum went into melt down, expecially after the misfire with 'The Beyond'.
Arrow offered to send out replacement discs to everyone. I'd say that between the problem with 'The Beyond' and 'Zombie Flesh Eaters', they lost a shit ton of shillings. These issues were only on the first run discs. But it's made me wary of being first in the queue for their releases, I have to say, even though I love what they do.
Originally Posted by MinionZombie
Contamination - yeah, despite it's various flaws, it's just so gleefully fun. Likewise, I quite liked the look of the alien - it's just so damn creepy and weird looking, even if it broke on set and couldn't do anywhere near as much as it was intended to do.
I think in the end it's all about heart and expectation - the latter from you, the viewer, and the former from the filmmaker. Sometimes a film can be shit and it really should have been far better (i.e. no excuses regarding budget or stars etc, they just made a complete hash of it), whereas you can have one of these B-Movies and there's real love and care put into them, even if they're not necessarily always capable of pulling off what they want to achieve. There's always big ideas and intentions on the part of the filmmakers (particularly with a big film buff like Luigi Cozzi - you could see how much passion he had (and still has) for Contamination on that Arrow Video Blu-Ray), and they're always up against it (budget constraints particularly), but there was always good craft behind them, even if they didn't always pull it off. Sometimes you get real trash, but a lof of those classic Italian exploitationers of the 70s and 80s are brilliant - even the flawed ones have something to deserve some solid kudos. Sure, they had plenty of hacks in their time, too, but those films generally sunk away - many of the ones that have found new life (e.g. with Arrow Video releases) really deserve their time in the sun.
Plus, there's just something so infectious about that era and style of filmmaking. When you've got one of these 'intentionally shit' films, I really don't like them - it feels totally disingenuous and flat-out lazy (I'm looking at you "The Asylum") ... only a handful are worth bothering with. There's a fine line, something like "Zombeavers" really works, while all these "Sharknado" type movies generally irritate me. The difference there is, is that those filmmakers aren't trying to make a good film - they're deliberately making garbage - whereas these B-Movies, like Contamination or Zombie Flesh Eaters, were made by people with genuine talent who often cared quite deeply about what they were making despite the limitations they faced.
I've only seen a couple of Asylum pictures and remember just one.
I remember that it was utter shite.
This business of pretending to be a so-bad-it's-good film is truly lamentable as it misses the point of those type of films. That kind of vibe is arrived at completely by accident, not design. It's a dubious charm that comes out of a certain incompetence, budgetary constraints, bad luck or whatever you're having yourself.
What's more annoying are the wankers that are watching these Asylum films and missing the point too. People laughing at 'Sharknado' and thinking they have a certain trash film cache are blissfully unaware of real trash superstars like '2019: After the Fall of New York' or 'Rats: Night of Terror'. I'll throw 'Zombie Creeping Flesh' in there for good measure too.
I don't place 'Contamination' in with that lot though as it has a different edge. While it shares some of the charms of those films, largely because it was made in the same era, it's a different kettle of fish, as it were.
I agree with you, that those 70's/80's spaghetti exploitationers are a lot of fun, most of the time. But there are only a few that are really worth repeat viewings and a lot have some really dull parts in them too. There often more fun to talk about than to sit through.
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