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Category:    Home > Reviews > Horror > Thriller > Vampire > Literature > Midnight Son (2011/Image Entertainment DVD)/Twins Of Evil (1971/Hammer/Synapse Blu-ray w/DVD)

Midnight Son (2011/Image Entertainment DVD)/Twins Of Evil (1971/Hammer/Synapse Blu-ray w/DVD)

 

Picture: C/B- & C+     Sound: C+/B- & C+     Extras: C+/B     Films: C+

 

 

The following vampire films might have their flaws and share of problems, but still have some moments worth seeing along with some good performances.

 

 

Scott Liebereich’s Midnight Son (2011) is the story of Jacob (Zac Kilberg), a young man who keeps to himself, has an overnight security job, issues with sunlight and a hunger for blood.  He does what he can to keep this in check until he starts to kill for what he needs and then meets a female (Maya Parish) he becomes more interested in than he expects.  The latter two break up his pattern of quietly protecting himself and his addiction (think Michael Fassbinder in Shame) and he then starts finding himself in other problematic situations.

 

This is one of those vampire films that make a big deal out of the hunger aspect of the protagonist, which is still rare and was much more rare only a few decades ago.  The ending does not work and between predictability later on and some scenes that do not work, this eventually is not the success it could have been.  Shot a few years ago, it was finished recently and is still consistent for a low budget work, but narrowly misses becoming a minor classic of the genre.  Too bad, because I liked the cast and the look achieved.

 

Extras include a trailer, Cast/Crew Interviews, Deleted Scenes of interest and a feature length audio commentary with Director Leberecht and Co-Stars Kilberg, Parish and Jo D. Jonz.

 

 

John Hough’s Twins Of Evil (1971) is an older vampire film, with its source material going to the beginning of the genre in literature, as it is loosely based on the writing of Sheridan La Fanu, who created the lesbian vampire Camilla and whose work influenced Bram Stoker.  It also led to Carl Theodore Dreyer to make one of the first great films in the genre, Vampyr in 1932.

 

However, Hammer Studios had already made two films built and based on the material and this film is considered the conclusion of an unofficial trilogy that includes the following films we reviewed at the links listed:

 

The Vampire Lovers (1970/here on MGM DVD with Ingrid Pitt in Countess Dracula)

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/490/Vampire+Lovers/Countess+Dracula

 

Lust For A Vampire (1971, on Anchor Bay DVD)

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/643/Lust+For+A+Vampire

 

 

Synapse has issued the film on Blu-ray with a DVD they recently issued a few years ago and though the film is the least of the three and not always successful, it is interesting and has some classic Hammer moments that makes it worth the deluxe set here.

 

This time, Peter Cushing plays a puritan leading and let loose with a group of men called The Brotherhood burning innocent women at the stake anytime they think they might be witches.  They enjoy doing this, though the way the film makes it out is logically problematic.  As this is going on, twin nieces (Mary and Madeline Collinson) whose father just died are orphaned and arrive to stay with him and his wife.  However, they will become pawns in the battle soon to come.

 

Count Karnstein (Damien Thomas, recently of Never Let Me Go) is a Satanic-worshiping vampire out to challenge the Witchfinder and this will lead to a wild climax as one of the twins is lured to lusty evil and no one can tell one from the virginal other.

 

The title of the film has multiple meanings, covering both the actual twins, the two opposing parties (would-be witchhunters versus Satanists) and even subliminally the church vs. Satan.  It is never pretentious about this and at 87 minutes does not have much time to be, but the film holds up well for what it is 41 years later and is worth revisiting, even if you have not seen the films before it.  Hammer would have liked a longer, more profitable series out of all this, but they used up the source material and moved on as they tried to reinvent themselves.

 

Hough worked on the British TV spy classic The Avengers for five years from second unit before directing key episodes of the final Linda Thorson/Tara King era, so he brought some solid sensibilities to making this film that still make it interesting to watch.  It is never as slick or modern though, rightly choosing a period approach that feels authentic enough.  Besides more spy work later, he directed more in the horror/thriller genre including The Legend Of Hell House, The Incubus and Sudden Terror.  This is a film the capable journeyman director can be proud of.

 

The together link in the trilogy (besides characters that show up, but are played by new actors each time) is writer Tudor Gates (who also penned Peter Collinson’s thriller Fright (1972)) wrote or co-wrote all three films and Harry Robertson (credited as Harry Robinson) scored all three films.  That closes another interesting chapter in classic Hammer history.  Dennis Price also stars.

 

Extras include a trailer and new featurette The Flesh And The Fury: X-Posing Twins Of Evil (84 minutes) on both format editions, but the Blu-ray adds three TV spots, a double feature trailer, a Deleted Scene, Motion Still Gallery, Isolated DTS-MA music track (with sound effects) of the score by Harry Robertson and another new featurette The Props That Hammer Built: The Kinsey Collection that shows what survived from the company.  It is quiet a story.  All in all, that is a terrific group of extras as strong as a Criterion release and among the best of many such Synapse releases.

 

 

The anamorphically enhanced 1.78 X 1 image on Son is expectedly dark, but is also much softer than I would have liked and has some motion blur throughout.  Director of Photography Lyn Moncrief does the best he can to give this a distinct look on the low budget there, but some problems remain on this transfer.  Maybe this looks better on Blu-ray.  The 1080p 1.66 X 1 digital High Definition image transfer on Twins was filmed on 35mm film and then processed by Rank Labs, so no fancy dye-transfer prints were made.

 

The result is color that is a little more shaded and grain in the darker/darkest shots, but this is how the film is supposed to look and Synapse could not have delivered a better, more authentic representation of the film on Blu-ray.  The age of the materials used can show, but the film is supposed to look like it is from the past and the print source is in good shape.  In addition, this version is far superior a transfer to all previous releases of the film with the best definition reproduction you will see outside of a good, mint film print.  I have seen this film over the years and this is right on the money on how it should look and feel.

 

Director of Photography Dick Bush, B.S.C. (Blood On Satan’s Claw, Toomorrow, Phase IV, Dracula A.D. 1972, Russell’s Tommy, Friedkin’s Sorcerer) delivers some smooth work here with just enough atmosphere to not overdue it and still make it present and work.  That is not as easy as it would seem.  The included DVD is also not bad and looks as good as the film will look in that format, but it is no match for the Blu-ray.

 

 

The lossy Dolby Digital 5.1 on Son is not badly recorded for an independent production, but it is obvious this is a simple stereo recording and they are stretching things out a bit to get a soundfield that is not always there.  This is also a film with silences, so only expect so much activity.  The lossy Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono on the Twins DVD is cleaned up and on par with Son as it is a professional recording with consistent audio, hardly any silence and not bad for its age, but neither can match the warmth and relative fullness of the DTS-HD MA (Master Audio) 2.0 Mono lossless track on the Twins Blu-ray which is the best the film has ever sounded or will sound.

 

 

-   Nicholas Sheffo


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