BY ADRIAN SMITH
In
an isolated theatre, a group of young performers is being drilled by a
tyrannical director with a passion for the dark and twisted. This new
production appears to be an all-dancing musical extravaganza filled with rape, murder,
and saxophone solos. Unknown to everyone involved however, the lead actor under
the giant owl head (don’t ask) has been offed and replaced by an actual crazed
serial killer who then proceeds to pick off the attractive cast and crew one by
one whilst they search helplessly for a way out of the theatre to alert the
police outside. Think the Friday the 13th franchise meets the
kids from Fame .
This
suspenseful, entertaining slasher from Italy (but shot entirely in English and
presented as though this is happening New York) was something of
a staple in the VHS days and now a new audience will be able to discover it
thanks to this 4K director-approved restoration from Shameless Screen Entertainment.
Also
known as Aquarius or Deliera, Stagefright was the feature
directorial debut of Dario Argento acolyte Michele Soavi, who had a run of
spectacular and operatic horror films during the last gasp of the Italian genre
film industry in the tail end of the 1980s. He was seen as something of a
natural successor to Argento. Having worked as an actor and assistant director
on a number of hit Italian genre films like City of the Living Dead
(1980, Lucio Fulci), Phenomena (1985, Dario Argento) and Demons
(1985, Lamberto Bava), as well as on the epic Terry Gilliam production The Adventures
of Baron Munchausen (1988), Soavi was well experienced in putting the
grotesque and the fantastical onto the big screen. The success of Stagefright
enabled him to move onto bigger, weirder and more ambitions films like The
Church (1989), The Sect (1991) and Cemetery Man (1994) [which
are also all available on Blu-ray from Shameless] and he continues to work
today in a very successful television career in Italy.
As
well as a spectacular visual and audio restoration, this new Blu-ray (with an
O-ring and reversible sleeve featuring two kinds of original artwork) also
features a long and insightful interview with Michele Soavi himself, as well as
interviews with Irish star David Brandon, no stranger to Italian genre cinema
during his long career, and Italian supporting actor Giovanni Lombado Radice,
who has possibly had more gory onscreen deaths than any other actor of his
generation. All three of these interviews are as entertaining as Stagefright
itself.
Produced
by Joe D’Amato and written by George Eastman, with a score featuring Guido
Anelli and Stefano Mainetti, this film is Italian through and through yet still
captures something of that 1980s New York off-Broadway spirit in its
pretentious director and young cast’s highs and lows, where the backstage
dramas threaten to overshadow the show itself even before the crazed owl-headed
killer turns up with an attitude and a chainsaw.
Stagefright is available now. Click here to order. (Please note: this is a Region 2, PAL format release.)