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I Miss You, Hugs & Kisses (Severin Films) Blu-ray Review

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    Ian Jane
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  • I Miss You, Hugs & Kisses (Severin Films) Blu-ray Review

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    Released by: Severin Films
    Released on: November 25th, 2022.
    Director: Murry Markowitz
    Cast: Elke Sommer, Donald Pilon, Chuck Shamata, George Touliatos, Cindy Girling
    Year: 1978
    Purchase From Amazon

    I Miss You, Hugs & Kisses – Movie Review:

    Directed by Murry Markowitz and based on the real life case of Peter Demeter, a Hungarian immigrant who was accused of hiring a hitman to kill his wife thus causing a media frenzy that lasted quite a while, 1978’s I Love You, Hugs & Kisses (also known as Left For Dead and Drop Dead, Dearest) stars the beautiful Elke Sommer as a model named Magdalene Kruschen. She's murdered in the garage attached to the home she shares with husband, Charles Kruschen (Donald Pilon), who comes home to find her dead. He is, of course, understandably upset but as time passes and the court case plays out, you start to wonder if he's really a grieving widower or if he was the one responsible for her death in the first place.

    From here, much of the movie plays out in flashback as people take the stand in the court and share their stories of the events. We learn how Charles fled his native Hungary along with a friend named Gershen Isen (Chuck Shamata) and how, after immigrating to Canada, they became successful businessmen. We also learn how Charles met and fell in love with the woman who would become his wife when she was working as a model and how he had an affair with a woman named Cindy Girling (Pauline Corte), while Magdalene was also unfaithful, conducting an affair behind her husband's back with Gerhsen. This eventually leads to both husband and wife talking about, and even planning, the murder of one another and as the movie continues we see some of these different scenarios play out.

    While infamously one of the titles that made the UK’s Video Nasties list, I Miss You, Hugs & Kisses is much closer to a courtroom drama with a few scenes of violence and dead bodies thrown in to add a bit of sensationalism to the proceedings. Those expecting a trashy gore fest won’t find what they’re looking for here, but this does turn out to be a pretty interesting movie in its own right. Markowitz directs with a good eye for detail and if the pacing is deliberate, it isn’t especially slow, there’s enough happening throughout the movie to keep us intrigued throughout.

    The cast are generally pretty strong here. Sommer, who worked with Mario Bava on Lisa And The Devil, looks fantastic throughout, always very glamorous and sexy with her beauty standing in pretty stark contrast to her older husband’s less than handsome appearance (which would seem to have reflected the case that this was based on). She’s pretty good in her role and the camera loves her. Donald Pilon is also very good here, playing his part quite believably and handling the dramatic elements of the script well. Chuck Shamata (who appeared in three episodes of The Littlest Hobo) does decent enough work as his fellow immigrant, while Pauline Corte (who played Wendy in Meatballs!) does a nice job in her supporting role.

    Production values are solid. This didn’t have a massive budget but the cinematography from Donald Wild is pretty solid and the Toronto locations add some authenticity to the proceedings (there’s a very quick but interesting shot taken from inside the elevator of the CN Tower as it goes up to the observation deck). This is also the first feature film to have been scored by Howard Shore, a year before he’d start his collaboration with David Cronenberg on The Brood.

    I Miss You, Hugs & Kisses – Blu-ray Review:

    Severin's AVC encoded 1080p high definition issue of I Miss You, Hugs & Kisses which is framed at 1.66.1 widescreen and scanned in 2k from the only known 35mm print taken from The National Archives. The elements are stable but in less than perfect condition. Detail doesn’t hit the same sort of levels we’d get from a scan of a negative and colors are a little faded. Minor print damage pops up here and there. This is very watchable, however, and it always looks like proper film. There’s some depth to the image and this certainly always looks like a high definition presentation – it just looks like we’re watching a theatrical print, which we basically are.

    The 24-bit DTS-HD 2.0 Mono audio sounds fine. Range is a bit limited and things can occasionally sound a little flat but the score has some depth to it and the dialogue is always easy to understand and to follow. This isn’t a film with a load of sound effects but when they are used they have a bit of punch to them. Optional subtitles are provided in English only.

    Extras are spread across the two discs in the set as follows:

    Disc One:

    Extras start off with an audio commentary from filmmaker and historian Stephen Broomer. He starts by talking about the different elements that make up the movie, how it made the Video Nasties list in the United Kingdom back in the day, the alternate titles that the film was released under, the different Toronto locations that are used throughout the movie, details on the different cast and crew members, details of the real life case of Peter Demeter that inspired the movie and how the police handled that case, thoughts on Elke Sommer's performance in the movie and on her character, the importance of key sequences and how they affect specific characters, the use of violence in the movie, how Markowitz acts as a sort of defense attorney by building a case in favor of a wronged man, the film's release history and more. Broomer fills the track with plenty of information and details.

    Directing I Miss You, Hugs & Kiss is an interview with Murry Markowitz that runs fourteen minutes. Here, the director speaks about how he got his start in the film business in 1973 by producing and directing a documentary called More Than One, moving on to make a docudrama called August & July and then making Recommendation For Mercy, which was quite controversial. He talks about the details of the case that inspired the movie and then goes on to discuss I Miss You, Hugs & Kisses and the case of Peter Demeter that inspired it, nothing that he brought the movie in under budget and on time. He shares some stories about the different cast members he worked with, the locations, some of the problems that arose on set and how the police wanted to ban the movie, the film's score, the film's distribution in Canada and abroad, how the film was received and what happened to Peter Demeter after the movie was made.

    The True Nature Of Donald Pilon goes over the career of the actor who played the lead in the film for fourteen minutes. We learn about the various roles he took, how he got into acting and really just wanted to make money, how he landed his first role, getting cast in I Miss You, Hugs & Kisses, having to learn English as a kid and how it helped his career, how he was familiar with the Demeter case before getting cast in the movie but not being able to say the word "Demeter" while making it for legal reasons, working with Markowitz and Elke Sommer and more.

    Crimes Of Dispassion interviews film programmer Eric Perett on The Demeter Case and I Love You, Hugs & Kisses for sixteen minutes. He talks in quite a bit of detail about the film's status on the Video Nasties list in the UK, how the film is first and foremost a courtroom drama, details on Markowitz’s career, details of the case that inspired the movie and how the movie was rushed into production while the case was still fresh in the public's mind, a book that came out about the case and how it affected the movie, thoughts on how the film does a good job of not pushing a point of view as to the central characters' innocence of guilt and how the film is viewed today.

    Disc Two:

    The main attraction on disc two is the inclusion of a bonus feature film in the form of Recommendation For Mercy. Presented in AVC encoded 1.85.1 widescreen transferred from the best existing film elements (which was evidently a well-worn theatrical print using the alternate title of Teenage Passion – it seems that all pre-print materials for this film have gone missing) and with 24-bit DTS-HD 2.0 Mono audio and optional English subtitles. The movie was inspired by the case of Steven Truscott, a Canadian who was sentenced to death in 1959 for the rape and murder of his twelve year old classmate Lynne Harper but released before being executed as it turns out he was wrongly accused and he was cleared of all charges in 2007. This fictionalized account tells the story of John Robinson (Andrew Skidd), a boy who is just starting to notice the fairer sex. He falls for Fran Bailey (Michelle Fansett) and they get along quite well. When Fran is found dead and John is the last one known to have been hanging around her, he's accused of killing her and is put on trial. It’s a decent enough drama but the direction is a bit uneven at times, veering between documentary style and flashier moments. The acting is solid and the production values are decent. It’s a talky film and like the feature presentation, uses flashbacks to fill in a lot of the blanks in the case. It’s dabbles with exploitation in a few spots as well, with a surprising bit of nudity.

    Stephen Broomer provides an audio commentary over the film that talks about how the central theme of the film is loss of innocence. From here, he talks about the intercutting techniques used in the movie, details on the Steven Truscutt case that inspired the movie, details on the cast and crew and thoughts on their work in the picture, the influence of classical art like the painting Ophelia, the use of sexualized images in the movie, thoughts on the films that Markowitz had made up to this point in his career and how this was his first fictional film, how unusual and dream like specific scenes are and why, how the Toronto media reacted to the film and plenty more.

    A second commentary gets director Markowitz in conversation with Kier-La Janisse. He speaks about how his film career got started and how his early pictures were received by the critics, the court case that inspired the movie and where specific scenes use details from the case as inspiration, some of the themes that the movie explores, screenplays that he's written that were never made, how he quit law school to become a filmmaker, what sets this film apart from other pictures he's made, the use of music in the movie and how it can mirror the avant garde elements of the movie, the different editing techniques used in the movie and lots of other details related to the making of the movie.

    Tainted Love is an interview with actress Michele Fansett running twelve minutes. She discusses how she wound up getting cast in the film just before she was to go off to Ryerson for acting school, what Markowitz was like to work with as a director and how he had a pretty clear vision of what he wanted, not having to stick to the script and being allowed to be spontaneous during the making of the movie, how most of the other kids cast in the movie were a few years younger but fun to be with, how some of the locals weren't particularly impressed about the story being told in the movie shot in their town, being able to do nudity in the film because she was eighteen when it was made and being very prepared for it ahead of time, going on to work with Markowitz again on I Love You, Hugs & Kisses while she was in school and how she feels about these films years later.

    The second disc also includes the original Canadian release ending. The movie was originally made for TV broadcast in Canada but when it was re-cut and giving a new ending for its American theatrical release. That’s the ending that is included on the feature presentation so it’s nice to have the original ending preserved here.

    I Miss You, Hugs & Kisses - The Final Word:

    Severin Film’ Blu-ray edition of I Miss You, Hugs & Kisses, double featured with Recommendation For Mercy, presents two lesser scene Canadian true crime inspired pictures in decent presentations taken from less than perfect elements. Both films are quite interesting and worth seeing, though maybe not surprisingly the feature presentation is the more entertaining of the two. The extras are plentiful and generally very interesting, shedding a lot of light on the history of the two movies in the set and the real world events that inspired them. Overall, this is a pretty interesting package and worth digging into.


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