Massacre Video Releasing The Devil

[Alex K.]

Yes, yes, YES!! Probably the best film to come out of Hong Kong horror. To see it in good quality would be a dream!

It was among the first couple of HK horror/exploitation films I watched. I thought "Wow! If HK horror is this good everything else has to be just as good if not better!" Nope. The absolute closest I got to the high of watching The Rape After is the Untold Story and Dream Home.

[Bruce Holecheck]

Clearly this means a 4K release of THE WITCH WITH FLYING HEAD is only a matter of time now.

Not with the same rights holder, unfortunately. Trust me -- I looked!

[Lorne Marshall]

Not only that, but I seem to remember that DEVIL had the English and Cantonese tracks layered together (or right/left channel), am I remembering this correctly?

Ian, the one you're thinking of is CURSE in Tales of Voodoo, Volume 4 (listed on the sleeve as CANNIBAL CURSE). For that one, I'm sure Darcy's correct that a VCD was used and then incompetently played in stereo mode, presenting both Mandarin and Cantonese in the soundtrack. I have several Asian VCD's like that.

THE DEVIL is in English, so there's no problem with the soundtrack. I actually think the old Video City tape is slightly better quality. Interestingly, it's a squeezed image, so if you play it on a widescreen TV, it looks proper, while the Videoasia DVD is stretched, so to have it look "normal" you must watch it windowboxed. The tape is shorter (82:24 vs. the disc's 86 minutes), making me wonder if it has a PAL source?

[Darcy Parker]

Not only that, but I seem to remember that DEVIL had the English and Cantonese tracks layered together (or right/left channel), am I remembering this correctly?

That makes me think they probably used an existing VCD master for the DVD, as most Hong Kong VCDs I have had were twin mono, with one side being the Cantonese audio and the other being mandarin. Kind of a neat hack to get two languages onto a format designed to support one stereo track. Using my Daiwa and Grandview DVD players, you could isolate one audio track and it would re-twin the output to be 2.0 mono, but I don't think many non-Asian market players could do that.

[enandalusiskhund]

I still want a remastered The Rape After. That film may be a legit masterpiece.

Yes, yes, YES!! Probably the best film to come out of Hong Kong horror. To see it in good quality would be a dream!

[Alex K.]

Clearly this means a 4K release of THE WITCH WITH FLYING HEAD is only a matter of time now.

I still want a remastered The Rape After. That film may be a legit masterpiece.

[enandalusiskhund]

I completely missed this news, and just have to say: Quite possibly the release of the year for me, almost regardless of how it turns out. Just to have an official release of this gem on physical media feels almost unreal.

[Ian Jane]

No, I think you're right.

They had neat covers though.

[Ian Miller]

Not only that, but I seem to remember that DEVIL had the English and Cantonese tracks layered together (or right/left channel), am I remembering this correctly?

[Ian Jane]

I have that disc, I have that whole Tales Of Voodoo boxed set. Some great stuff in there - but it all looks like ass.

[Lorne Marshall]

And by the way, because it hadn't been said already, I wanted to mention this did get a DVD release on the Videoasia label in the Tales of Voodoo, Volume 3 set as DEVIL'S EXPRESS! At least that's the title on the sleeve; the print (which of course is terrible) has the real title.

[Lorne Marshall]

I really like this movie. It might just be nostalgia on my part, as it was one of the obscure Asian horror/fantasy flicks I found in my searches when I first began collecting tapes in the early 90's, along with WOLF DEVIL WOMAN, DRAGON AGAINST VAMPIRE, THE DEMONS (aka NINE DEMONS), WAR OF THE WIZARDS, WICKED WIFE, BRUTAL SORCERY, BLACK MAGIC WITH BUDDHA, and many others.

[Zaibatan]

Clearly this means a 4K release of THE WITCH WITH FLYING HEAD is only a matter of time now.

[Keeth]

It wouldn't surprise me if out of however long the running time there is a few minutes of grue..

Seems like the film was written about in Ecco mag. I may dig around to see if I still have them (sure hope so, it was one of the best).

[Alex K.]

It has two gore scenes. One at the beginning and one at the end and it's most just a possession HK style with puking up insects.