Info: The Hammer films thread

I suddenly realized that there was no thread for Hammers in preservations. With each film having different qualities on essentially each successive release it has always been a challenge to even see the classic horror cycles let alone in their original uncut form.

Since myself, TAF and many others have often discussed the Hammers and their varying states of presentation across the various rights holders it’s high time there was one definite place to discuss…so here goes…

WB has finally announced their BD Hammer release…only to say that it is only four films presumably just upgraded from their old video masters (much like all the recent Warner catalog material). However the good news is that is is credited to Warner Archive which might mean BD-50 presentations. However, the box art is simple and regular WB style so I presume it’s actually a major release with each film simply slapped onto a BD-25 and basically feature-less.

http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=16969

Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed, Dracula Has Risen From the Grave, The Mummy, Taste the Blood of Dracula.

The Vol. one tag alludes to the fact that they’re obviously missing the other three Warner owned Hammers and for some beyond idiotic reason refused to include them here. There is no reason for Dracula A.D. 1972 to not be here as it is just in the same based-on-video-master shape as the others.

The real news is the lack of Curse of Frankenstein and Horror of Dracula…the two most awaited titles that have had both poor and questionable releases in the UK. Warner holds the best elements and hasn’t put too much work into them other than making a newer scan of CoF a few years back.

Sooo…where does that leave us? At least we will have decent BD releases of two great horror films stateside (FMBD, Mummy). Maybe it will give the option to watch FMBD without the horribly tacked on bedroom scene as it was outside the US.