Vinegar Syndrome and Their Partner Labels

[swo17]

Ah yes, I'd forgotten about Rad, which I haven't seen but which looks to be pretty tame. Isn't the uncut version of Tammy supposed to be pretty gruesome though?

[Glowingwabbit]

Ah yes, I'd forgotten about Rad, which I haven't seen but which looks to be pretty tame. Isn't the uncut version of Tammy supposed to be pretty gruesome though?

Oh I'm not sure. You might be right. But still based on the past year or so they've clearly been branching out (last month they released Drop Dead Fred in their mainline) so releasing a cult action adventure from the 80s doesn't feel as out of place coming from them as it might have just a few years ago.

This is just speculation but I also think people who were born in the 80s have become a bigger audience for them and this is a film many of them grew up with (and of course many of them have kids now that they could introduce it to).

[EddieLarkin]

When they announced the VSU line they did say it would be specifically for UHDs of films that don't fit the usual VS mold. So it's the expected place for C&D.

As for Miami Connection, it's one of the best so bad they're good films ever, which VS have always specialised in, especially since they lauched the VSA line.

[dwk]

As I've said elsewhere, the Thriller issue was going to end up with lawyers. (of course Vibenius was paid, he just had sellers remorse and then refused to cash Synapse's checks.)

I still have absolutely no idea what Synapse had to gain by releasing the film if they no longer had the rights, which is why I'm betting they still have the US rights to the film.

So, it appears that Synapse has removed their Thriller releases from their website.

I have to admit that I am shocked and disappointed that Synapse essentially bootlegged this film. Why sully a hard earned reputation just to, essentially, screw with Vibenius?

[The Elegant Dandy Fop]

Off-topic/sort of on topic question here. Is there any statute of limitations regarding using copyrighted music for a film that’s this old and low-budget or can a film get in trouble decades later regarding licensed music? How did Scorpio Rising, a low-budget experimental film, clear the use of all its pop songs? I know it’s maybe a strange question, but I recently saw a more obscure release by Vinegar Syndrome that had wall-to-wall copyrighted music: Terry Riley, Carlos Santana, and Pink Floyd. I take it that this must’ve been released in a legal grey zone, right? I was surprised they released this film with music like that as there’s no way this film could officially afford these tracks. I won’t name the title as I don’t want them to get them in trouble for an early release that I’m sure didn’t sell well.

[Matt]

There’s no statute of limitations on the use of copyrighted music, but each case must be decided on its own merits. If the release has been out for years and none of the copyright holders of the music noticed and took action, a judge might not be inclined to punish the label harshly. Perhaps they’d be required to destroy remaining stock but not have to pay any damages.

As civil law, copyright enforcement requires the copyright holders themselves to notice and take legal action against infringement.

As for Scorpio Rising, Anger claims he cleared all the rights before the release of the film. Of course, he’s a notorious teller of tall tales, but the licensing of pop music for motion pictures would have been in its infancy then, and I don’t doubt he could have licensed all these recordings very cheaply and in perpetuity. Who could have foreseen then that pop singles would have lucrative afterlives on movie soundtracks?

[criterionsnob]

Some intriguing new discs announced by partner labels today:

Ivan Passer's Born to Win [Fun City Editions]
The Mob [Canadian International Pictures]
The Islands of Yann Gonzalez / You and the Night [Altered Innocence]

[What A Disgrace]

Taking a chance on the Passer film, and automatically buying everything that CIP releases.

[therewillbeblus]

I'm curious about Born to Win as well (in part because Fun City is the sublabel-of-interest for me out of all VG's branches). Apparently extensive interviewing and casting was done to commit to an authentic depiction of addiction, but post-production altered the tone towards a more diverse palette. Hopefully the commentary digs into this aspect of production a bit more than what the internet offers on a cursory search, but I'm unfamiliar with these commentators and the podcast.. do they typically engage in academically-informed, research-based conversation?

[ianthemovie]

I haven’t tried listening to the podcast, but Bailey has literally written the book on NYC cinema (Fun City Cinema), the parts of which I’ve read so far I’ve liked. It’s well researched and Bailey clearly has a detailed knowledge of both film and NY history, though I wouldn’t describe it as “academic,” exactly. Detailed and insightful but squarely aimed at a general reader rather than a film scholar.

[colinr0380]

You and the Night previously had a US release from Strand Releasing but on DVD only, so its good to see the upgrade across to the label that has previously put out Knife + Heart on Blu-ray, with the earlier short films maybe included as an extra incentive to upgrade.

[The Elegant Dandy Fop]

It's been over a decade since I saw Born to Win, but recall it being the best of Ivan Passer's American films. Maybe I'm not the right person to defend it as I even love his critically maligned Law and Disorder (another perfect title for Fun City), but recall it being an excellent piece of instilling the humanism of Czech films into seedy New York. I'm mostly shocked that it's getting a proper release and restoration as I think this is one of those titles thats been floating in public domain hell for eternity.

[Finch]

Better even than Cutter's Way? I'm definitely intrigued now! I'm also keen on The Mob.

[dwk]

Born to Win was on the Criterion Channel last year, in a pretty crummy transfer, and I'd disagree that it is better than Cutter's Way. However, I'm not a big fan of movies about drug addicts. So that, and the crummy transfer, could be clouding my opinion on the film.

[senseabove]

You and the Night previously had a US release from Strand Releasing but on DVD only, so its good to see the upgrade across to the label that has previously put out Knife + Heart on Blu-ray, with the earlier short films maybe included as an extra incentive to upgrade.

God bless Altered Innocence if they start poaching licenses from Strand and putting actual effort into the releases.

[domino harvey]

They need to rescue Fucking Åmål!

[Matt]

God bless Altered Innocence if they start poaching licenses from Strand and putting actual effort into the releases.

How do I donate to this cause?

[Q Pete Mitchell]

Born to Win was on the Criterion Channel last year, in a pretty crummy transfer, and I'd disagree that it is better than Cutter's Way. However, I'm not a big fan of movies about drug addicts. So that, and the crummy transfer, could be clouding my opinion on the film.

It's currently on Amazon Prime, in - yes - a very terrible print. Also available in full on YouTube.

It's a good film; I'd place it about equally with Law and Disorder, but well below Cutter's Way or Intimate Lighting.

Speaking of Cutter's Way, it brought to mind Heard's film On the Yard. Also not a great film, but good and worth watching. Not that Heard's and Segal's performances or the films are all that similar (though there are some fascinating parallels in their careers and the types of roles they ended up playing over the decades) but there is something of a shared tone of defeat, I think. Lot of films from this era, obviously, evoke this: Fat City, Scarecrow, Panic In Needle Park, et al

[swo17]

I was hoping for Law and Disorder to be on par with Taking Off and wound up quite disappointed with it. Perhaps that expectation was unfair though?

[Q Pete Mitchell]

I was hoping for Law and Disorder to be on par with Taking Off and wound up quite disappointed with it. Perhaps that expectation was unfair though?

Law and Disorder's half-comedic approach makes it odd company with the same year's Death Wish, but thematically probably has more in common with the subsequent decade's worth of similar "take back the night" films which took their subjects very (perhaps too) seriously, for example David Greene's The Guardian or John Flynn's Defiance. Death Wish obviously operates from the protagonist's personal sense of revenge, while many others, including the Passer, examine a more general feeling of threat. Had the Passer film come out at the end of that cycle (mid-80s) it may have worked more as a satirical commentary; as it is, it maintains his usual supple handling of mood and tone, though lacking any real teeth. It's a slight film, but one with good performances from the two leads. Borgnine as a cop always reminds me of the utterly stupid but compelling strangeness of Corbucci's Super Fuzz; Passer doesn't usually go in for that sort of random eccentricity (his characters are almost always more psychologically... "correct"... however quirky they are) but Law and Disorder might've benefited from moving more in one direction or the other. I'd say Passer's the perfect director for that sort of story, but the script could've been more deeply astute.

Taking Off is my favorite Forman film by far, and I don't understand its absence on Blu in the States, perhaps some weird rights issue. For now, I have the French disc whenever I want to experience the pleasure of seeing Buck Henry give and get the Black Power salute.

[therewillbeblus]

I'm fairly certain Flesh for Frankenstein is the one I liked- I think it's the more graphic of the two (or more "creatively" graphic), but it's been many years since I've seen either.

Having now revisited both Blood for Dracula and Flesh for Frankenstein, I'm sure my memory was correct, but thankfully I got more out of the former this time around. I was really surprised by how much I wound up enjoying Flesh for Frankenstein though, which for a while follows a similar trajectory to the other Warhol/Morrissey in the vein of simmering camp value, but has a cumulative effect of mixing antisocial histrionics with deadpan humor under a mocking spatial neutrality that left me in hysterics. Kier is so ridiculous playing it straight while making statements that are literally verbatim quips during near-universal developmental milestones for young boys around the age of six-seven years old regarding unfairness and frustration. Arno Juerging's weird introverted looks in wide shots are a perfect complement during their many scenes together, and Dallesandro's awful and unearned austerity jives well with his mistress' vapid nature or especially when he's trying to engage with his zombified friend- which must be some kind of in-joke since he's basically a mirror image of Dallesandro's wooden acting!

In general Morrissey approaches the use of space with supreme intellect to design these absurdist juxtapositions in ways that engage many diverse kinds of personalities and behavioral mannerisms in a circus act of dense comic dryness vis the methodology. For example, within the same shot bodies act in entirely different ways- stiff unconscious monsters or stiff socialites are contrasted with whiny grown men framed as small and weak from a distance. The topic of sex is treated as either banal when desired or a symbol to spark repulsed anxiety, making this an inverted sex-comedy that's only really interested in the folly of "adulthood" (the two kids in the peripheries are the smartest and most maturely-restrained characters), where violence and sex are secondary flourishes to the repetitive zoom-outs onto the meaninglessness of adults' pathetic self-seriousness. This is the kind of film that would never work as a gore-loaded short film or economical Corman affair (whereas I wonder if Blood for Dracula could have benefited from some diligent trimming) because it needs to breathe long enough under its distinct style to reveal its eccentric ethos of anti-humanist ridicule. What a gas!

[swo17]

Are you able to watch it in 3D? It's a blast

[therewillbeblus]

Are you able to watch it in 3D? It's a blast

Unfortunately not, though I imagine that would work in complete opposition to the objective flattening effect I’m taking about- which would be a bit like watching two very different versions of the same film! I do have the glasses in case I ever get a 3D TV.

On another note, is there a way to tell which UHD is corrected? I just bought my copy off DD and have no idea if they’re still stocking the bunk ones

[swo17]

I received my replacement Flesh for Frankenstein disc. You can tell it's new because the UHD logo is now orange

[therewillbeblus]

Oh cool, thanks!