THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER: Price designed his characterization of Roderick Usher as pale and colorless, as allergic to sunlight as to sound.


tend to look a shade darker than Arrow’s, which sometimes brings out detail in the actors’ faces, but usually at the cost of scenic detail. This is rather a telling aesthetic choice because the two Scream Factory sets, as their titles indicate, position them- selves as celebrations of Vincent Price—something apparent even in perusing the supplementary ma- terials and commentaries—while Arrow pays equal attention to all levels of the films’ artistry, their commentaries and liner notes always taking care to pay detailed attention to their production and scenic values. (That said, mind you, Roger Corman’s name does not appear as part of the box design of SIX GOTHIC TALES, though he directed every film in the set.) The Scream Factory USHER has a solid ad- vantage with this title in that they are the exclusive Blu-ray source of the film’s seldom-heard Overture reel. Somehow Arrow missed the boat on this facet—it’s a valuable addition, as it demonstrates how prestigious a production AIP considered this film, their first original production in color, to be. (As it happens, the Overture was a tad too presti- gious for the film’s American mandate as children’s matinee fodder, and was never distributed outside


select premiere playdates.) The 2.35:1 presentation is slightly warmer and darker on the Scream Fac- tory disc, with Arrow’s registering as somewhat brighter, cooler and conveying more palpable depth of field. As in all cases on these titles, Scream Factory offers the 2.0 mono track in DTS-HD Master Audio, while Arrow’s disc is in LPCM Audio; in both cases, the soundtrack is included only in English, with op- tional English SDH subtitles. Many Arrow titles cov- ered in this article also include isolated Music and Effects tracks, but USHER is not one of these. As to be expected, the two labels are most as- sertive of their individuality with the supplementary materials they provide. Both discs include Roger Corman’s must-have audio commentary (the first he ever recorded, initially included with MGM’s 2001 DVD release), but thereafter things vary a great deal. An important and unique feature of the Scream Fac- tory sets are a series of videotaped wrap-arounds, all hosted by Price, that were recorded to accom- pany THE VINCENT PRICE GOTHIC HORRORS, a package of AIP titles presented by Iowa Public Tele- vision in 1982. The segments, produced by Paul Larson and written and directed by Duane Huey, are clearly influenced by Price’s hosting jobs for the PBS


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