dark and gritty as it appeared on movie screens, while scenes that are saturated by reddish light appear vibrant and stable. Extras include a production still gallery, a PDF of the screenplay, trailers, and a documentary on the film’s making—not as lengthy as THE GALAXY OF TERROR doc but still interesting. In it, director Allan Holzman recalls how Corman originally wished to make a LAWRENCE OF ARABIA in space, but after realizing how expensive that would be he decided to just “rip-off” ALIEN instead! Shout! Factory generously offers both titles on the Blu-ray format. Aside from the bonus of high-def, the GALAXY OF TER- ROR Blu-ray package offers nothing different from its DVD equivalent, but with the FOR- BIDDEN WORLD Blu-ray, the company has tacked on an ex- clusive extra feature—an alter- nate “director’s cut” of the film that bears the project’s original title, MUTANT (81m 54s). Report- edly, Corman wasn’t amused by a test audience’s raucous reac- tion to certain scenes and so de- manded cuts in dialogue to stifle some of the laughs. However, a cursory glance at the full cut
didn’t reveal anything extra of real consequence to this reviewer. Surprisingly, the most noticeable differences are in the soundtrack: “Sam” the robot has a different voice (very electronic and difficult to understand in the original cut), while Strauss’ “Blue Danube” waltz (an out-of-place reference to 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY) makes two awkward appear- ances as source music in the MUTANT variant. A less jolting pop-synth tune covers the same footage in the theatrical version. The director’s cut comes from an inferior tape source that is soft, murky and framed in a boxy 1.66:1 ratio that exposes more picture in- formation on the bottom but is too confining on the sides. It’s nice to have, but this is reference quality at best. Probably due to the lack of quality, Shout! Factory delivers the film on a standard second disc rather than including it on the Blu-ray platter. Extras are rounded out by in- terviews with creature builder John Carl Beuchler (hired late in production to improve the adult monster’s movement) and Roger Corman, who confesses the film was not as successful as GLALAXY OF TERROR, “But
we didn’t expect it to be... You can learn a lot from the successes and failures of bigger pictures.”
HI-RIDERS / THE BAD BUNCH
1978/1973, VCI, $14.99, 91m 8s/79m 36s, DVD By John Charles
Following their deluxe presen-
tation of BLACK SHAMPOO (1976; reviewed VW 122:54), VCI has paired two more Greydon Clark features originally issued to theaters and drive-ins by Lawrence Woolner’s Dimension Pictures.
HI-RIDERS opens with road hustlers Mark (MALIBU EX- PRESS’ Darby Hinton) and Lynn (stuntwoman Diane Peterson) successfully duping Billy (Roger Hampton), a feckless braggart from a local hotrod/motorcycle gang called The Hi-Riders. When Billy refuses to hand over the $550 he lost, Hi-Riders’ leader T.J. (William J. Beaudine, in his first and only role) calls for a sec- ond race, which Mark also wins. Trouble follows when Billy de- feats the son of local kingpin Lewis (Stephen McNally) in a drag race. A rematch between the two
Darby Hinton and William J. Beaudine take action to save their friends from a mob-ordered rubout in HI-RIDERS.
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