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Comparison between the US DVD by Code Red and the US Blu-ray by Severin.
Night of the DemonA series of mysterious deaths in a remote forest arouses the interest of anthropologist Professor Nugent. He suspects that a Bigfoot is responsible for the murders and starts a scientific expedition with his students, which would certainly have been rejected by the university administration because of safety concerns. While camping at night, Nugent tells his students about the murder victims who met their end in mostly bloody ways. Research work among the rural population leads the group to the remote cabin of the Rev. McGinty, who died years ago. The cabin is inhabited by McGinty's distraught daughter Wanda, who carries an atrocious secret. Originally shot as The Revenge of Bigfoot the title was changed to Night of the Demon, as interest in Bigfoot movies waned in the late 70s. Directed by James C. Wasson and produced by Jim L. Ball, both of whom were to specialize in gay porn in the following years, perhaps one of the strangest and bloodiest Bigfoot films was created, which packs bloody murder scenes and religious fanaticism into a kind of murder mystery. Logic falls by the wayside for long stretches. For example, Nugent tells of a motorcyclist who was ripped off by the Bigfoot while peeing. Why Nugent and his students take the arduous path over a river and through the forest instead of approaching their destination on the road, just as the motorcyclist does, remains questionable. How Nugent knows all the murder stories in detail also remains mysterious. In addition, there are stupid dialogues in which, for example, one of the students gets the idea that an elephant could have destroyed the group's boat. As if that wasn't crazy enough, Nugent disrupts a nightly ritual meeting of a cult, and Wanda reveals to him about her unhealthy relationship with her father, who stands idly by as the Bigfoot encroaches. In my eyes this is a gem of bad taste. Missing bits in the US DVD by Code RedAfter several rather mediocre VHS and DVD releases, the film was released on DVD in the U.S. in 2011 by Code Red, who had to resort to a 1-inch tape master, as no other master was available. Fortunately (or unfortunately), the supposedly lost original negative has since resurfaced and both in the UK from 88 Films and in the US from Severin, the film was released as an extensive Special Edition on Blu-ray. Fans of the film immediately noticed that before the murder of the camper in the sleeping bag, there is a shot of Nugent in the tent that was not present in the DVD. The assumption was that this was a mistake on Severin's transfer, since the shot makes little sense at this point, and it is only after the murder of the camper that the scene in the tent follows, in which Roy gets up to go to Carlson. Calls for an exchange program were raised, so Severin felt compelled to make the following statement on Facebook. There has been a lot of comments from self-proclaimed "experts" regarding a short shot of a night interior of a tent which occurs about 18 minutes into our release of NIGHT OF THE DEMON. While we have been addressing those questions quietly, it has started to seep out into the wider world of social media and there's even been some calls for a replacement program so we wanted to set the record straight. This shot is NOT a glitch / error on the Severin disc. While it certainly stands out from the shots following and before, this shot appears in the Producer's answer print of the film from which we scanned our new master, the most official cut of the film there will ever be. There are no splice marks to suggest it was cut in later by a malicious amateur but actually printed into the film. This shot is presumably to convey time passing, even if it doesn't necessarily read that way, but is definitely intentionally included by the filmmakers. We have no idea why the previous DVD of the film did not include this shot but it was also in the earliest official videotape release of the film, the Iver Film Services release in the UK that was banned as a video nasty, and other tape releases. Here's a digitized version of the scene from the Iver tape as proof.
The scene was part of the original version and was simply missing from the Code Red DVD. There are also several other minor differences between the DVD and the Blu-ray, most of which are short film tears in the Code Red version. So if you're interested in the film, you can grab the UK or US Blu-ray of the film without hesitation. They're both chock full of bonus material, including 1964 filmed Fraternity of Horror, which was also produced by Jim L. Ball and both parts of the documentary Ban the Sadist Videos!. Image comparison: DVD (Code Red):
Blu-ray (Severin):
Running times: DVD (Code Red): 95:38 Min. Blu-ray (Severin): 96:12 Min. [00:02:16][00:02:16]
The first shot of the woods can be seen a bit longer on the Blu-ray (BD).
BD: 0.5 sec [00:11:48][00:11:49] After the murder scene in the van, the black frame is longer in the BD. After that, you see Nugent's wife earlier.
BD: 3 sec [00:16:04][00:16:09] Nugent and his students are seen earlier in the camp.
BD: 1 sec [00:18:03][00:18:08] After the scene of Nugent talking to Carlson outside his house, the BD shows a longer black frame, followed by a shot of a person in a tent, then fades out again.
BD: 12 sec [00:25:40][00:25:58] The preacher can be seen earlier.
BD: 1 sec [00:28:18][00:28:37] The BD has a longer black frame after the smoking sheriff was seen.
BD: 1 sec [00:34:27][00:34:47] The forest dwellers are seen earlier in their ceremony.
BD: 1 sec [00:37:11][00:37:33] The black frame is longer in the BD before Nugent is seen in the tent.
BD: 4 sec [00:56:50][00:57:16] Gary and Linda are seen earlier on the BD.
BD: 1 sec [00:57:39][00:58:06] The DVD shows a black frame before the moon is visible.
DVD: 2 sec [01:01:45][01:02:10] The group can be seen earlier.
BD: 1 sec [01:09:43][01:10:09] Wanda can be seen for a longer time. The following shot of her starts earlier.
BD: 4 sec [01:12:06][01:12:36] The black frame is longer in the BD.
BD: 1 sec [01:27:03][01:27:35] Wanda is seen earlier running into the room during the Bigfoot attack.
BD: 1 sec |
