teeming influences of such past masters as Louis Feuillade, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Cole Porter, Busby Berkeley and Erté. It and its sequel feature support- ing talent of the highest order: Joseph Cotten, Terry- Thomas, High Griffith, Beryl Reid, Peter Jeffrey as Inspector Trout, John Cater as Superintendent Waverly of Scotland Yard, and of course Virginia North and Valli Kemp, who play Phibes’ mysterious and beautiful associates, Vulnavia and Vulnavia II. The choppy sequel—set mostly in Egypt and in- volving a race against an arch-rival (Robert Quarry) to locate and claim the fabled River of Life—shows the thoughtless post-production tampering of AIP, whom Fuest subsequently accused of chopping a full reel from the director’s cut he submitted, which now appears to be lost. This is a tragedy, since the director’s cuts of several other compromised AIP titles (PSYCH-OUT, G-A-S-S-S-S-S!, CRY OF THE BANSHEE and MURDERS IN THE RUE MORGUE) have since replaced their butchered brethren in circulation on disc.
Both films are eye candy of the first order and spark to life on Blu-ray in ways they haven’t always in their earlier home video incarnations, which had their camera compositions cropped, the scores re- edited and replaced, and were sometimes sourced from indifferent materials. Even now, the set’s notes identify the source materials only vaguely, saying
only that they are “transferred from original film elements by MGM,” but the films look and sound better in these 1080p 1.85:1 incarnations (with 1.0 mono PCM audio, particularly wonderful in deliver- ing the bass notes of Phibes’ theater organ) than ever before. Both titles carry optional SDH English subtitles for the deaf and hard-of-hearing. THE COMPLETE DR. PHIBES is well-outfitted with supplementary materials. ABOMINABLE is augmented with two audio commentaries, both new—one by director Robert Fuest (who sadly did not live to see this project realized, passing away in March 2012), moderated by film historian Marcus
Hearn, and the other by Phibes creator William Goldstein, who originated the Phibes character, had a hand in both scripts, and also wrote noveliza- tions of the two films. He is joined by his son Damon J. Goldstein, with whom he is now writing additional novels about the character. The Fuest commentary is in the form of an in- terview rather than a responsive commentary for the most part, though the image track does occa- sionally provoke a comment or train of thought. The late Mr. Fuest’s train has a tendency to mean- der off-track at times, which makes one grateful for Mr. Hearn’s ability to rein him in, and there are a few places where the film’s soundtrack abruptly pops in, making one wonder if something enticingly
THE ABOMINABLE DR. PHIBES: Price as a literal masked avenger, draining the life’s blood out of Terry-Thomas for love of his lost Victoria.
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