Released by: AGFA
Released on: January 28th, 2025.
Director: Bart La Rue
Cast: Sally Schermerhorn, Jimmy Drankovitch, Jane August
Year: 1979
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Satan War – Movie Review:
Written and directed by Texas actor Bart La Rue, 1979’s Satan War is a movie. Yes indeed, it’s a movie. One opens with some psychedelic swirling effects that then follows a newlywed couple, Bill Foster (Jimmy Drankovitch) and his blushing bride Louise (Sally Schermerhorn), who decide to buy their first home together and then spend an unusually long part of the movie’s quick running time unpackaging boxes. What they don’t realize, though we do thanks to some off-screen narration from Bart La Rue himself, is that evil is about!
A short time after they move into their new humble abode, strange things start to happen – strange evil things! A cross that Louise hangs on their wall starts to very, very slowly invert itself and then kitchen furniture starts to move, seemingly under its own power. Before long, brown slime starts seeping out of the coffee pot and lime green slime, of a remarkably frothy variety, starts coming up out of the floor. Making matters worse, an unseen, and very evil, force is so brazen as to grope poor Louise when she gets out of the shower. When she and Bill talk about the incident on the beach, she admits to him that whatever it was that groped her did at least have nice hands. Bill jokes around about his wife’s experience, making him a bit of an asshole.
Unsure how to solve this problem, they consort with a psychic woman named Evelyn who, after exploring the house a bit, tells them that someone once took their own life in the home. From there, a figure all in black brandishing a knife shows up.
That’s more or less it.
Set to a pretty killer, and mind-numbingly repetitive, synth score and clearly made on a very modest budget, Satan War is as awesome as it is impenetrably ridiculous. The film’s charmingly primitive cinematography captures all the details of Louise doing dishes that you could hope for, pushing any smidgeon of atmosphere and style aside for clunky framing that somehow makes the movie better. The effects, much of which involve frothy slime and moving kitchen chairs, are amateurish and wonderful and all of this happens at such a snail’s pace that the whole thing feels like a fever dream.
Note that this Blu-ray release contains three versions of the film: the original sixty-five-minute cut, a revised seventy-seven-minute cut that pads things with an opening involving an occult ritual, and a ninety-two-minute cut that throws in a voodoo ceremony at the end of the movie along with the same occult ritual prologue to further extend the running time. Neither of the longer versions of the movie really makes any more sense than the original, shorter cut!
Either way, Satan War offers a wholly unique look into the void and for those who love the strangest of the strange and don’t get put off by things like a lack of coherence or logic, it’s cult movie gold.
Satan War – Blu-ray Review:
The feature version of Satan War, which is the original sixty-five-minute cut, arrives on Blu-ray in an AVC encoded 1080p high-definition transfer framed at 1.33.1 and taking up 14.9GBs of space on the 50GB disc. Preserved from the 16mm answer print, this is a good transfer of less than perfect elements. The darker scenes are very dark, likely because they weren’t especially well-lit in the first place, and this can make some of those moments a little tough to visually decipher. That issue aside, the image is stable and offers decent detail. Colors are maybe a little faded but never so much as to distract, and the image is properly film-like throughout, showing no problems with noise reduction or edge enhancement while retaining natural grain and avoiding compression problems.
The 24-bit DTS-HD 2.0 Mono English language track on the sounds fine. Optional subtitles are provided in English only. No real problems here, both tracks sound quite good. The levels are balanced properly and there are no major issues with any hiss or distortion to complain about (though some minor hiss is presents in spots). Sometimes the soundtrack buries the dialogue, but that’s ok. You get the impression that’s just how it’s supposed to be with Satan War.
A commentary with Kristin La Rue, Bart La Rue’s daughter, and AGFA’s Joe Ziemba that goes over loads of welcome detail about the origins of the picture and its mysterious director. Kristin offers up plenty of detail about her father both as a person and as a filmmaker, discussing his religious beliefs and how they played a part in shaping the movie, his work in the TV industry in Texas, location choices, his goals with this movie, casting choices, what their home life was like together, the film’s different versions and lots more.
The disc also includes an interview with Nightmare U.S.A. author Stephen Thrower where he spends seventeen minutes offering up his thoughts on the film, its place in the pantheon of Amityville Horror knockoffs, how he feels some of the movie’s more obtuse elements work, the style on display in the movie and other details.
Included inside the keepcase alongside the disc is a full color insert booklet that includes a thank you letter from the La Rue family to AGFA for preserving the film along with a print inspection report and some information on AGFA along with some archival photos.
Satan War – The Final Word:
Satan War looks and sounds as good as surviving elements will allow for – and the fact that a film as obscure and screwy as this has made its way to Blu-ray with a proper presentation and some quality extras (not to mention three different cuts!) is reason for fans of bizarro seventies horror films to celebrate. Recommended, if you’re in the right frame of mind for it.