Joe Silver Archives - Big Gay Picture Show

Starring: Marilyn Chambers, Frank Moore, Joe Silver
Director: David Cronenberg
Running Time: 91 mins
Certificate: 18
Release Date: February 16th 2015

After bringing Shivers to Blu-ray last year, Arrow Video continues to release David Cronenberg’s early work in HD with his follow-up, 1977’s Rabid. Despite the success of the earlier (if controversial movie) it’s in many ways a simpler movie, although still an interesting and effective one.

After a horrific motorcycle accident Rose (Marilyn Chambers) is in need of plastic surgery. Her doctors decide to try an experimental skin graft technique, despite it never being tested before. However things don’t quite go as planned, as when Rose wakes up, she has an insatiable lust for human blood – in fact she can’t eat anything else. [Read more…]

Starring: Paul Hampton, Joe Silver, Lynn Lowry, Allan Kolman, Barbara Steele
Director: David Cronenberg
Running Time: 87 mins
Certificate: 18
Release Date: October 13th 2014 (UK)

Coming to Blu-ray for the first time anywhere in the world, David Cronenberg’s debut feature gets a sharp HD upgrade. Filmed a full 40 years ago on a fairly low budget, Shivers looks surprisingly good, even if on Blu-ray you can see the edges on some of the effects. That said though, for a movie that helped create so many of body horror effects that became popular after the film, they still work extremely well. Indeed one scene with a creature crawling around under someone’s stomach has never really been bettered.

Shivers is set in the big, modern Skyliner apartment block. A doctor has been experimenting, using a parasite to replace human organs. He tries to end the research by killing the female test subject and then himself. However it’s not enough and soon the parasite is out, infecting residents of the block. The infection causes all boundaries to break down, with everyone becoming sexually voracious as they look for more victims. [Read more…]

Rabid (Blu-ray Review)

Shivers (Blu-ray Review)