Blu-ray Today: Grindhouse, Lego and Necrophilia

The Beyond – When I was around the age of 12, The Beyond, also known as Seven Doors of Death, was spoken about reverently, in hushed tones, as a holy grail of gore that only the luckiest kids had ever managed to see without a wrathful parent running interference. In those pre-Internet days, it fell to the few who had beheld its horror to retell us the story in gruesome detail, with all its face-melting and zombie/demon kills.

Watching it today, it’s pretty clear that it influenced an entire generation of those who managed to set eyes on it – the early Resident Evil games in particular owe it a debt. The house on the bayou in this film doesn’t conceal a chemical lab, but rather one of the seven gates to hell, out of which zombies come. It’s cheesy but heartfelt and seriously violent, with an amazing score you’ll never get out of your head. This is Italian ghoul-meister Lucio Fulci at the peak of his powers, and a must-see.

LEGO: DC Comics Super Heroes: Justice League vs. Bizarro League – It’s not the Will Arnett movie Batman, but don’t let that stop you; by all accounts this superhero spoof is packed with comic in-jokes and Lego’s somewhat anarchic humor. And it comes with a Batzarro minifg.

Massacre Mafia Style – All I need to know about this movie is that it has maybe the greatest trailer I have ever seen in my life.

Seriously. Watch this:

Atlantis: Season 2 Part 1 – My understanding is that this was canceled halfway through, and there will be no season 2 part 2. If you’re new to the show you may not want to jump on board, is what I guess I’m saying. never seen it myself. The trailers looked cheesy as hell.

Don’t Look Now: Criterion Collection – Donald Sutherland and Julie Christie deal with the death of their daughter while being menaced by evil dwarves in Venice. It’s the sort of star-driven art-horror you don’t see so much any more, and as expected, this disc is packed with new documentaries.

Nekromantik 2 – Okay, so how messed up does a movie about necrophilia have to be to get banned in Germany…during the ’90s? Watch this and find out. Limited run of 5,000 copies.

Sailor Moon Season 1 Part 2 – It’s friggin’ Sailor Moon. What do you want me to say? What do you need me to say? What’s that? Shut my stupid mouth about stuff I never watched and don’t understand? Okay, that works.

101 Dalmations – The good one. Not the Glenn Close one.

Tarzan – Not the Disney one, despite the deceptive cover. It’s a German CG movie dubbed with Kellan Lutz’ voice, and looks AAAH-Ah-AH-AH-AAAAAAAAwful.

Nightcrawler – Great movie that I’m not sure is necessarily nerdy, though it does deal with a thoroughly obsessive, antisocial character played by Jake Gyllenhaal – a sociopathic aspiring cameraman who strives to be first on the scene at major accidents so he can sell the footage to TV stations. Watch it and tell me he shouldn’t have been cast as the Joker – he almost out-crazies Crispin Glover.

Anything else out today I should be watching? (Sadly, the Hardware 25th anniversary disc looks by most accounts to be a rip-off with a badly cropped transfer and no extras – otherwise it would have topped today’s list.)