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Released by: VHSHitfest
Released on: October 29th, 2024.
Director: George Demick
Cast: Jason Petty, Melissa Young, Kerry Wade
Year: 1998
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Asylum Of Terror – Movie Review:
Teenaged dudes Dean (Jason Petty), Mark (Sixx Williams) and a few of their less memorable pals set out to visit Death Row, a one-time prison facility for the criminally insane that has been converted into a haunted house attraction. When they arrive, various non-player character types goof around, some people make out – you know, typical stuff that teenagers who are about to get killed off in a low budget slasher movie tend to do.
Anyway, after that they get in line for the attraction where the guy in front of them puts forth the idea that if a crazy person were to have decided to hide out in the haunted house, and start killing off attendees, no one would be able to figure out what was going on. This doesn’t cause anyone to pause or consider that maybe this was more of a warning than a slice of hokey dialogue meant to act as subtle foreshadowing. Later a blind woman who enjoys the sounds of haunted houses shows up with her boyfriend in tow as do a pair of younger boys whose mother decides to wait outside for them. Some employees of the haunted house are also wandering around.
With the cast sort of established, and an ominous laugh or two dispersed, one of the employees hears on the radio that – Gasp! Shock! – a lunatic has escaped from a nearby asylum and is running amok in the vicinity. Eventually the main characters get into the haunted house itself, where they’re greeted by a guy in a devil costume, and start exploring the place. The guy who heard the news on the radio gets killed by the escaped lunatic, who is skulking about in a very familiar hockey mask and soon to go after anyone else roaming the halls of the haunted house.
This one suffers from some pretty obvious pacing problems but depending on your tolerance for and/or appreciation of nonsensical micro-budget horror movie padding, you may find that aspect of the movie forgivable or maybe even charming in its own dumb way. A lot of people just sort of wander around but since they’re wandering around a haunted house, it isn’t so bad. What is bad, however, is much of the lighting and some of the audio recording. The dark scenes are often too dark and some of the dialogue can be tough to understand.
Still, despite these issues and the fact that no one in the film is an especially good actor, Asylum Of Terror offers up enough in the way of charmingly simple gore effects, horror movie references and cliches and just enough whatthefuckery (there’s a really bizarre sex scene in this one involving an attractive young lady and a goofy guy in a hokey mask that may or may not supposed to be Leatherface) to keep things interesting. Asylum Of Terror might not be especially original or particularly well-made, but it’s appreciably scrappy and that counts for something.
Asylum Of Terror – Blu-ray Review:
VHSHitfest brings Asylum Of Terror to region free Blu-ray on a 50GB framed at 1.33.1 and offered up in AVC encoded 1080i high definition taken from a tape source. This looks about as good as it probably can, given the source material available. The image is fairly soft and looks very much like the shot on tape production that it is. Detail can’t rise above the source material, nor should it. That said, it’s all very watchable. The film’s intentionally muted color scheme is replicated well and black levels are decent enough but some of the dark scenes are really dark.
Asylum Of Terror gets an English language 16-bit DTS-HD 2.0 Mono mix, with optional subtitles provided in English only. Audio quality is on par with the video quality in that it’s limited by the source materials but perfectly acceptable given the film’s low-fi roots. Most of the time, though certainly not always, the dialogue is perfectly audible and the movie’s utterly bizarre soundtrack sounds pretty solid.
An audio commentary with producer/writer/director George Demick and actor Melissa Young-Zimmerman starts off the extra features. This talk covers how the opening credits for the movie were created, the use of music in the film, why certain scenes were shot without sound, details on the different cast and crew members that worked on the movie, what it was like on set, some of the locations used for the movie, how most people involved with the production had two or three different jobs, memories of shooting specific scenes, Young-Zimmerman's experiences working as an actor on the movie, shooting nudity for the film, who did the makeup on the movie, needing to dub certain scenes in post-production, thoughts on how the movie turned out and holds up and more.
Inmates Of Asylum is a featurette running an hour and fourteen minutes that is made up of new interviews with George Demick, Melissa Young-Zimmerman, actor Ned Johnstone, actor Taylor Demick, and composer Mark Reynolds. This covers how Demick got into horror movies as a kid and how he wound up deciding to make his own movie after apprenticing on Knightriders for George A. Romero, who did what behind the scenes, casting the film, what it was like on set, playing different roles in front of and behind the camera, working on a very low budget, location choices, doing some of the stunts needed in the movie, what some of the cast and crew have been up to since the movie was made and how Jon Bon Jovi ties into this (sort of).
Also included here are two short films, the first of which is Blood Dreams directed by George Demick in 1983, a thirty-minute short that begins with a woman who wakes up one night only to be slaughtered by a man with a hook for a hand. From here, we learn that three people have died in the last nine days in a similar fashion, and it's all tied together by people having the same dreams, possibly through a psychic link of some sort. It's pretty gory and creative enough to be worth a watch.
The second short film, So Say The Dead, from 1984 , runs twenty-two minutes. In this one, a group of people arrive at a house to investigate the paranormal activity that has been going on inside. Mr. Garrett, the home's owner, has seen his furniture disappearing right before his eyes! He shows them around and gives them some background information on the house and from there, the investigators set up their gear and get to work. It's gets fairly crazy from then on out.
Finishing up the extras on the disc are the film’s soundtrack and a trailer. Menus and chapter selection options are also provided. This release comes with some reversible cover sleeve art.
Asylum Of Terror – The Final Word:
Asylum Of Terror takes a bit of time to get moving, but once it does, it proves to be a pretty entertaining slice of low-fi late nineties SOV weirdness with some memorable murder set pieces and a cast of compellingly quirky character. The Blu-ray release from VHShitfest looks and sounds as good as the source elements likely allow for, and it comes with some solid extra features. Recommended for fans of vintage SOV horror!