GRINDERS’ Ray Dannis), seals his fate when he tries to conk one of his friends on the head with a rock; the group promptly slices off his arm, only to find a rescue crew coming through to save them moments later. Ted vows never to forget and, five years later, a severed arm sawed off a cadaver shows up mailed to the doorstep of the group’s ring- leader, Jeff (David G. Cannon). The men all reconvene to form a game plan at the home of their wealthiest member, Ray (John Crawford), who loses his arm that night to an intruder lurking by the staircase. The other men turn to Ted’s daughter, the strangely- named Teddy (AIP beach favorite Deborah Walley), who reluctantly helps them lure her father in be- fore anyone else winds up on his axe-wielding chopping list. Though no lost classic, thanks to its slack pacing and made-for- TV ambience, THE SEVERED ARM boasts enough attributes to make it linger in the memory longer than some of its peers. The dron- ing electronic score becomes ef- fectively oppressive as the film progresses (and almost never stops during the second half); the shadowy photography wrings suspense out of the few but ef- fective stalking scenes; and, most significantly, the macabre twist ending is a terrific flourish, pull- ing off a claustrophobic Poe-style bit of just desserts that haunted many a late-night TV viewer. Unfortunately, edited TV prints are all most people have been able to see, thanks to a multitude of PD releases, all culled from a censored TV print. Running 90m 54s, this censored edition was not only very dark (deliberately obscuring the cru- cial arm removal in the cave scene and ruining the payoff for the elevator murder sequence), but lacking shots of Ray lying on the ground with his bloody arm
beside him and, most crucially, the climax of the radio station attack with a cat nonchalantly sit- ting next to its owner’s bloody remains. (That latter scene, inci- dentally, was the first in the “He’s calling from inside the house!” scenarios duplicated by more than a few better-known horror films in later years.) A complete print minus any extra logos or rating certificates should clock- in at 91m 26s, with the closest to date still being the early 1980s VHS release from Video Gems. Apart from some minor frame loss due to print damage (namely a shot of Cannon parking his car), the Video Gems edition remains the longest version ever released on home video but it’s far from the most visually satisfying. The version included with this double feature release from Code Red (part of their “Maria’s B- Movie Mayhem” line featuring wrestler/singer/horror hostess Maria Kanellis) is an odd duck indeed and a variant few people probably even knew existed. Something’s obviously up as this one, of British origin, runs just under 84m, but all of the violence is intact. The image quality here easily surpasses any other trans- fer on the market, as it’s brighter, clearer and more colorful. There’s some minor print damage scat- tered throughout, of course, but it’s a major upgrade in other re- spects including the more satis- fying 1.78:1 framing, which crops the unnecessary safety area from the top compared to the TV ver- sion while adding some signifi- cant information to both sides. As for what’s actually missing, it appears the British distributor wanted the film to move along a little more quickly and decided to excise some random bits of “filler.” This includes removal of the following: Cannon and the men down inside the mine; ad- ditional cave exploration shots;
extra dialogue deliberating the arm amputation (“That’s cop talk, Mark”) and protestations from radio DJ Mad Man Herman (played by genial comedy and voiceover actor Marvin Kaplan, the film’s second-most-surprising bit of casting); extra dialogue lay- ing out the conspiracy to cover up their deed (“We did it because we had to”) and Kaplan’s accusa- tions; a car arriving at Crawford’s house; two lengthy (and admit- tedly overlong) sequences with Crawford and Cannon driving around before and after their first meeting with Walley; a comic re- lief scene with Kaplan talking to the janitor at the radio station before going to his car; more dia- logue with Cannon, Crawford and Walley discussing the killer’s motives at a bar; another bit of comedy-laced tension before the elevator attack with stalling cour- tesy of a huge St. Bernard and a biddy in curlers; and two estab- lished shots before the failed beach ambush at night. Strang- est of all, several reaction shots and slight extensions are miss- ing from the last scene; they don’t really affect it significantly, but the reason for the omissions is difficult to fathom. Some may actually prefer this tighter cut as it does move more quickly, though anyone hoping for a genuine uncut presentation will have to keep on waiting. Better known to VHS collec-
tors from its Prism release as VI- SIONS OF EVIL, the second feature, SO SAD ABOUT GLORIA, is a fairly standard heiress-in-peril thriller spiced up with a truly jolt- ing axe murder and a hallucina- tory final act owing more than a shade to the Spanish classic, A BELL FROM HELL (La Campana del Infierno, 1973). PETTICOAT JUNCTION’s Lori Saunders stars as Gloria, who’s released from a sanitarium to the care of her ag- ing uncle Frederick (Dean Jagger).
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