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Category:    Home > Reviews > Horror > Thriller > Comedy > Telefilms > TV > Night Stalker/Night Strangler (MGM/remaster)

The Night Stalker/The Night Strangler Double Feature (1972, 1973/ABC Circle Films/MGM/Remastered DVD)


Picture: B- Sound: C+ Extras: C+ Telefilms: A-



PLEASE NOTE: This DVD is out of print, but both films have been issued separately in upgraded Blu-ray editions in the U.S. with 4K scans of the original 35mm camera negatives, better sound and far more extras (including the ones here) that are the preferred choice to get. Hopefully, actual 2160p Ultra High Definition 4K Blu-rays will follow. The rest of this coverage applies, especially since the films retain their same running times.



When Anchor Bay issued the two Carl Kolchak TV movies back in 1998, The Night Stalker and The Night Strangler, they were some of the very first TV programs ever issued on DVD. This was at a time when TV on DVD was considered a joke and a niche at best. Now, the entire industry knows better. Since then, telefilm owners ABC were bought out by Disney and the best selling Anchor Bay DVD eventually went out of print. Six years later, MGM has surprised the industry by licensing many of the titles ABC holds (ABC telefilms, Cinerama, Palomar, and Selznick feature films) and they have reissued the popular double feature.


The immediate question is if it is better or different or worth getting to replace the Anchor Bay copy. For the most part, yes, it is an upgrade. Even though the Anchor Bay edition was stunning for a full-screen DVD in its time, typical of that company's efforts, this new set just about surpasses the older set in just about every technical way possible. The explanation of how will be followed by the content of the actual films.


In the case of The Night Stalker, a classic that remains one of the most commercially and artistically successful feature-length films ever made for TV to this day, its influence continues to grow strong (possibly even having extended to Roman Polanski's Robert Towne-penned Chinatown from 1974) and it has been in print more often of the two. Originally, Magnetic Video licensed the ABC films, a company that later became CBS/Fox, then Fox Video. Fox not only did videocassettes of the film, they even issued a 12-inch LaserDisc where the eyes of killer Janos Skorzeny were turned greenish versus red, a TV print consideration to meet network standards and practices against showing even a hint of blood. It even has a faint few frames of where to put a commercial break. When Anchor Bay got their print, the blood red was back overall, and the new print was cleaner and sharper. Though the LaserDisc offered the sound in PCM 2.0 Mono, the lossy Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono on Anchor Bay's DVD was clearer and more articulate, even with the potential fullness PCM has over the Dolby equivalent.


In one of the few things Disney/ABC has done inarguably right all year, they have supplied new prints of both films to MGM that pretty much outperform all previous versions. Both films were shot in the TV full frame 1.33 X 1 aspect ratio. The new Night Stalker print has more area on the left and below, is about the same on the right, and is missing a sliver of picture information at the top. The Video Black is also better, which MGM can particularly be happy with. The clarity, color range and depth is impressive. Recently, a friend commented on how clear the Anchor Bay print was, but the MGM is even better. The flesh tones and colors like yellow and silver are not always as good as the rest of the scale, as the first attack has some detail on the Anchor Bay and the silver dress we first meet Carol Lynley's Gail Foster in has some issues, but the rest of the print is superior and more complete. Michael Hugo did the cinematography for the film and it continues to endure all these years later, looking better than most digital-obsessed feature films (especially in the Horror genre) we get today.


The improvements in The Night Strangler are even more impressive, offering more frame image area on all four sides, having much better clarity and much better color range. Prior to the Anchor Bay DVD, the only copy of the film to be issued was very briefly (if that) on VHS from Fox. Anchor Bay's release was much celebrated for what turned out to be an underrated sequel, though also still very commercially and artistically successful, it has also been very influential. Despite the increase in comedy, the film is actually thematically and visually darker, shot by cinematographer Robert Hauser, A.S.C., and offering one of Kolchak's most memorable villains. This inspired The X-Files Eugene Toombs and the darker visual style of that series, the early Kolchak: The Night Stalker episodes and Millennium (reviewed elsewhere on this site).


Though a search was done for missing footage, this is still the 90-minutes-long version of the film issued in the previous versions, but there is no print damage and both prints are very clean and clear. Technicolor produced both prints, which is likely why they look so good now. These combine to be two of the best full-screen TV presentations yet on DVD, much more impressive now that so much TV is on DVD and it is a boom market.


Then there is the sound. If the Anchor Bay was an improvement from all versions of the films issued before on home video, this MGM version is a trade-off. Hiss and background noise has been reduced in this new MGM version, but a slight spectrum of highs seem to have been cut into, yet there is sound detail here (despite some slight compression) not on the Anchor Bay version. To compensate, you will have to turn the volume up louder and maybe even readjust treble. Fans will be happy to know the missing loop from the Anchor Bay DVD when Kolchak is called to the courtesy phone in the back of the hotel has been restored on this MGM copy.


Those who love the films likely own the Varese Sarabande CD soundtrack The Night Stalker & Other Classic Thrillers, a 2000 CD release of several of the Horror score Robert Cobert did for Dan Curtis' TV productions. Of the ten extended tracks, two of them (namely #3 & #4) offer medleys of the scores for each film that easily outperform their Dolby Digital appearance on either DVD. Sadly, Cobert recorded the score monophonic, but it would be nice to still see some kind of multi-channel or surround mix like MGM currently offers for the Thunderbirds feature films in both Dolby & DTS. Those films were pretty mono, but a remix could pull out more sound and should be considered whenever these films are issued in a Blu-ray version.


Otherwise, this is one of the best DVD reissues of the entire year and will hopefully do well enough to get the separate owners of the TV series (only issued to this day on VHS from Columbia House, now all out of print as of this posting) to finally put all twenty episodes out on DVD once and for all. With all The X-Files now on Blu-ray in HD upgrades, joined by a few X-Files mini-series revivals on Blu-ray, a Blu-ray of both films were apparently held these up by Johnny Depp remaking the first film, but that fell through after some personal scandals and his box office souring.


Produced in 1971 and broadcast January 1972, The Night Stalker was penned as a teleplay by the brilliant Richard Matheson, based on the unpublished original work The Kolchak Tapes by Kolchak creator Jeff Rice. Carl Kolchak (the late, great Darren McGavin) is an aging reporter who has been looking for ''the big story'' to make him the hottest newspaper reporter in the country. When a series of showgirls in Las Vegas turn up dead, he may have lucked out, until it is apparent this is bigger and uglier than he could have ever imagined. He uses his well-honed connections to be the first at every crime scene, much to the disgust of Sheriff Warren Butcher (Claude Akins, when he was still playing tough guys and well). As the murders become more gruesome and killer more elusive, Kolchak has to take on the killer, the authorities and his editor Anthony Albert Vincenzo (Simon Oakland) to get the story out. His girlfriend Gail (Carol Lynley) even suggests, much to his surprise, that it could be a real vampire.


The Night Strangler was made late in 1972 and broadcast January 1973. At first, it seems like the killer from the last film might be on the loose again, but then something more extraordinary turns out to be taking place. Jo Ann Pflug is the hilarious Louise Harper, Nina Wayne is her dancing co-worker dubbed Charisma Beauty, Wally Cox (the original voice of Underdog among his many credits) is newspaper researcher Titus Berry and Simon Oakland is back as Vincenzo. Both films have even more name cast members, but we'll save that for viewers willing to take our advice. Needless to say, The Night Strangler suffers a bit of pre-home video sequelitis, but it also has a very clever, original storyline that makes it a very worthy follow-up to the original.


The previous DVD was basic and totally void of extras, unless you count some text by Night Stalker Companion author Mark Dawidziak in a paper foldout. There is no such paper anything in this MGM edition, but it does have new interview clips with producer Dan Curtis especially for this release. He discussed the first film for 15+ minutes on Side One, 7+ minutes for the second film on Side Two. As he has done with MPI for his Dark Shadows series, and some other horror telefilms Curtis licensed to them, Curtis has more great stories to tell. However, I was surprised there were not more extras. For one thing, there are radio spots, TV spots and even print ads for both films that have yet to surface, but are somewhere. The second film was even released theatrically in Europe, so how about some of that press material? Though Curtis did not do an audio commentary, he directed the second film and produced both. John Llewelyn Moxey directed the first one and had already done on camera-interviews and audio commentaries for VCI's restored version of his City Of The Dead (aka Horror Hotel from 1960) and Blue Underground's special edition of Circus Of Fear (aka Psycho-Circus from 1967). Why could MGM not get a hold of him to do the same here? That is the saddest of all missed opportunities.


So there you have it, as great a Horror double feature as MGM is ever going to issue, which says something considering the huge number of Midnite Matinee series titles they have issued. As we wait for the TV series to come to DVD, we can only hope it will look and sound at least as good as this. In the meantime, though a Kolchak feature film starring Nick Nolte through Morgan Creek collapsed many years ago, the first TV movie here was turned into a comic book by Moonstone and two Kolchak series continued to successfully run for a long time. Dawidziak did a novel called Grave Secrets that was well done. A limited edition volume of the teleplays here, plus a third, unproduced Kolchak TV movie were recently issued. Richard Matheson penned all, except William F. Nolan joined him on the third, and it was called The Night Killers. Set in Hawaii, politicians are being replaced by androids, an idea that happened to the Westworld (1973) sequel Futureworld (1976). As usual, Kolchak would have been on the cutting edge of genre. Another idea has Janos Skorzeny alive in New York (which would have ruined the original film, if you think about it) and one on Jack The Ripper. Matheson refused the latter, since friend Robert Bloch (Psycho) had just done a novel about The Ripper. When the series was launched in 1974, that was the first monster, but from someone else's script.


At the time of the original posting of this review, the TV series that followed these films had not been issued and thanks to the terrible ABC/Disney revival of the show based only on these films, the original was issued on DVD and so was the failed 2005 series. The links to those reviews are:


1974-75 Show

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/2888/Kolchak:+The+Night+Stalker+(1974-75+series


2005 revival

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/3809/Night+Stalker+(2005)+-+The+Complete+Series



Until X-Files, Kolchak may have set a record for most TV shows and feature films trying to duplicate it unsuccessfully, but he and his adventures are original and this remastered DVD double feature of The Night Stalker and The Night Strangler does both films justice like never before. The 2005 version was one of the most unsuccessful of all. It is worth getting to replace the Anchor Bay edition if you actually have it, a must-have if you never owned it to begin with and a must-see if you have yet to see either film. We cannot strongly recommend these classic telefilms enough, if you can get a copy.



- Nicholas Sheffo


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