New Releases for August 1 2023

52 PICK-UP (1986)

Based on a novel by Elmore Leonard, this gritty movie follows a plot to blackmail wealthy industrialist Harry Mitchell (Roy Scheider). Married to an aspiring politician (Ann-Margret), Harry has been caught having an affair with Cini (Kelly Preston), a much younger woman. When Harry doesn't play by the rules of his blackmailers, they begin an escalating chain of violence that extends to murder. Undaunted, Harry decides to fight back against the criminals. (BLU-RAY)

ABOUT MY FATHER (2023)

When Sebastian tells his old-school Italian immigrant father Salvo that he is going to propose to his all-American girlfriend, Salvo insists on crashing a weekend with her tony parents. (BLU-RAY and DVD)

ADJUST YOUR TRACKING: THE UNTOLD STORY OF THE VHS COLLECTOR (2013)

Some see VHS as worthless plastic, but Adjust Your Tracking shows a vibrant world of collectors and movie fans who are keeping the format, and the movies, alive. Over 100 collectors, filmmakers, producers and video store owners express how VHS changed their lives. Travel back to the days of video rental stores with those who still buy, sell, rent and trade the format that will not die — VHS. Now more relevant than ever, VHSHITFEST is proud to present the 10th anniversary blu-ray debut of Adjust Your Tracking with countless hours of new and archival special features. (BLU-RAY)

CINDERELLA (1950) (ULTIMATE COLLECTOR'S EDITION)

Cinderella, treated as a slave by her selfish stepfamily, dreams of going to the Prince's ball. She gets her wish courtesy of her Fairy Godmother, who warns her to be home by midnight, or else... (BLU-RAY + 4KULTRAHD)

CONFESSIONS OF A CONGRESSMAN / HIDDEN PLEASURES (1977)

Older male lust for tender young flesh lovingly pervades these two early films by the Spanish director Eloy de la Iglesia who specialized in many genres of films including the legendary Quinqui films, but is least credited with directing the first two openly homosexual films in Spain: Hidden Pleasures & Confessions of a Congressman. (DVD)

DALGLIESH: SERIES 2 (2021)

Based on P.D. James’s global hits, this mystery series stars Bertie Carvel (Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell, Doctor Foster) as enigmatic Inspector Adam Dalgliesh. Death of an Expert Witness begins with a senior forensic biologist being found dead in his Lab. Dalgliesh is called to East Anglia, where the murderer is lying in wait to strike again. In A Certain Justice, an illustrious but controversial defense barrister is found dead in her chambers. Suspicion falls on her colleagues and her daughter’s new fiancé. In The Murder Room, a young doctor is set on fire in the grounds of his family museum. Everyone who works there comes under suspicion, including his own siblings. (DVD)

DELIRIUM (1972)

A vicious sex-killer has been preying on pretty young women, leaving a trail of nude and mangled bodies. Little do they know that respected local physician, Dr. Herbert Lyutak has been responsible for the ongoing violence. His wife, Marcia, senses something amiss about her husband's erratic behaviors and mood swings, but her frustration mainly lies in his impotence, which prevents them from enjoying a satisfying marriage, and which she believes might be triggered by her husband's bizarre and sadomasochistic nightmares. After a witness emerges who fingers Dr. Lyutak as having been seen with the latest victim, the police finally feel convinced that they've got their man. However, no sooner than the good doctor is in custody does another murder occur; one with jarring similarities to Lyutak's own crimes... (BLU-RAY)

DEMON RAT (1992)

Irina is a teacher in the middle of a messy divorce with her husband, Roberto, who has cunningly stolen the pharmaceutical company she was set to inherit. She's also dealing with a rat problem. A rat so large and terrible it has mutilated her dog. Enlisting the help of her new love interest and biologist friend, Axel, they soon discover that Roberto has been recklessly dumping nuclear waste to get ahead and wreaking havoc on the nearby wildlife. Now Irina has to contend with a mutated rat in her home and her soon-to-be ex who will do anything to keep his secret. (BLU-RAY)

DIRTY MONEY (1972)

After a raucous visit from the wealthy Uncle Arthur (The Death of a Lumberjack's J. Léo Gagnon), working class Montreal couple Roland (O.K. ... Laliberté's René Caron) and Berthe (Mustang's Luce Guilbeault) are left feeling slighted by his meager gift of $500. Hungry for more, Berthe hatches a plan to descend on Uncle Arthur's remote country house and steal his small fortune with the help of her delinquent brother and cousin. When the robbery spirals out of control, allegiances shift, blood is spilled, and Roland's dimwitted lodger Ernest (J.A. Martin Photographer's Marcel Sabourin) takes center stage in a harrowing battle for Arthur's stolen cash. (BLU-RAY)

EAST OF EDEN (1954)

In the Salinas Valley in and around World War I, Cal Trask feels he must compete against overwhelming odds with his brother Aron for the love of their father Adam. Carl is frustrated at every turn, from his reaction to the war, to how to get ahead in business and in life, to how to relate to his estranged mother. (4K ULTRA HD)

FAKE IT SO REAL (2011)

Fake it So Real follows a ragtag group of wrestlers in North Carolina over the course of a week leading up to a big show. The film explores what happens when the over-the-top theatrics of the wrestling ring collide with the realities of the working-class South. The wrestlers aren't paid for their passion, but they treat wrestling like any artist treats their work. Fake It So Real shares the triumphs and heartaches of an often under-appreciated American art form. (BLU-RAY)

FALCON LAKE (2022)

A love and ghost story: a shy teenager on vacation experiences the joy and pain of first love when he forges a bond with an older girl. (BLU-RAY)

FULL TIME (2021)

Julie (Laure Calamy, Call My Agent!) is a single mother who can't catch a break. Raising two children in the Paris suburbs and commuting to the city daily, the train is her lifeline -- until it's suddenly severed by a transit strike. Without the train, Julie struggles to make it in time to her job at a five-star hotel, to the interview for a better job she's tied her hopes to, or back home to pick up her kids from childcare. Before long, Julie is at her breaking point and as her responsibilities pile up, she finds herself bending the rules to stay afloat in a cutthroat society. Anchored by Calamy's dynamic performance, Full Time is a race against the clock and a kinetic real world thriller about the obstacles working parents face every day. (BLU-RAY)

GORGO (1961)

When an underwater volcanic eruption tears up the sea bed off the coast of Ireland, two treasure hunters make the discovery of a lifetime when they encounter a gigantic prehistoric monster that's been unleashed from the earth's crust. After capturing the beast, the pair transport the creature down to London where it's given the name of "Gorgo" and put on display to an avid public. Little do they realize that Gorgo is just an infant, and that his exponentially larger mother is about to emerge from the depths to avenge the capture of her offspring. As Gorgo's mother begins her advance on the British capital, not even the considerable might of Her Majesty's Armed Forces can stop her colossal devastation! (BLU-RAY + 4KULTRAHD)

GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY VOL. 3 (2023)

Still reeling from a terrible loss, Peter Quill rallies his team to defend the universe and one of their own - a mission that could mean the end of the Guardians if not successful. (BLU-RAY + 4KULTRAHD and DVD)

HAMMONS, DAVID: THE MELT GOES ON FOREVER (2022)

THE MELT GOES ON FOREVER chronicles the singular career of the elusive African-American art star David Hammons from Watts rebellion era ’60s L.A. to global art world prominence today. Hammons’ category-defying practice – rooted in a deep critique of American society and the elite art world – is in the words of one art critic “an invitation to confront the fissures between races." (DVD)

HARBINGER, THE (2022)

When her oldest friend is plagued by horrific nightmares from the beyond, Monique is forced to travel to NYC. On the first night of the visit, Monique learns the dreams are contagious – and so is the HARBINGER, the plague mask-wearing demon who not only feeds on its victims' souls, but warps reality itself to remove any trace of their existence. (BLU-RAY)

HARLEY QUINN SEASON 1&2 (2019)

Harley Quinn (Kaley Cuoco) has finally broken things off once and for all with the Joker (Alan Tudyk) and attempts to make it on her own as the criminal Queenpin of Gotham City in this half-hour adult animated action-comedy series. With the help of Poison Ivy (Lake Bell) and a ragtag crew of DC castoffs, Harley tries to earn a seat at the biggest table in villainy: the Legion of Doom. Don't worry – she's got this. Or does she? In Season 2, Harley has defeated the Joker, and Gotham City is hers for the taking…what's left of it, that is. Her celebration in the newly created chaos is cut short when Penguin, Bane, Mr. Freeze, The Riddler and Two-Face join forces to restore order in the criminal underworld. Calling themselves the Injustice League, they're intent on keeping Harley and her crew from taking control as the top villains in Gotham. (BLU-RAY)

HEART IS DECEITFUL ABOVE ALL THINGS (2004)

Steeped in controversy, unflinching, unforgettable. Dekanolog is proud to present Asia Argento's adaptation of J.T. Leroy's best selling novel The Heart is Deceitful Above All Things, a searing exploration of trauma and survival in the underside of America's heartland. Headlining one of the most intriguing casts of the 2000s, which includes Peter Fonda, Ornella Muti, Jeremy Renner, Lydia Lunch, Ben Foster, and Winona Ryder, Argento stars as Sarah, a woman who rips her son (played at various points by Jimmy Bennett, Dylan, and Cole Sprouse) out of foster care and throws him into her transient life as a sex worker at truck stops. Leroy was later revealed to be a fabrication of author Laura Albert and her sibling-in-law Savannah Knoop, a story that broke the year after The Heart is Deceitful Above All Things was released. Argento's blistering second feature finds real pain in a historic hoax, traveling to dark places most directors fear to tread. (BLU-RAY)

HOLE IN THE FENCE (2021)

At a secluded exclusive summer camp in the Mexican countryside, under the watchful eyes of their adult guardians, boys from a prestigious private school receive physical, moral and religious training to turn them into tomorrow's elite. The discovery of a hole in the fence sets in motion a chain of disturbing events as the boys devolve into a Lord of the Flies-like mob mentality that creates and spreads hysteria in this profoundly disturbing coming-of-age drama that unravels like a horror movie while drawing on actual events. (BLU-RAY)

INFINITE (2021)

Who says you only live once? Self-medicated and on the brink of a mental breakdown, Evan McCauley (Mark Wahlberg) is haunted by memories of places he has never been and manifests skills he's never learned. When a secret group that calls themselves "Infinites" comes to his rescue, they reveal that his memories are real - but they are from multiple past lives. Evan must work with the Infinites to unlock the answers in his memories that are the key to stopping a madman from destroying humanity. (DVD)

LITTLE RICHARD: I AM EVERYTHING (2023)

Growing up in Macon, Georgia, Little Richard (Leon) discovers music through his church. After winning a local talent contest, Richard is encouraged to pursue a career as a songwriter and performer, and finds success and stardom following his first single, "Tutti Frutti." At the height of his fame, Richard abandons his career in favor of a religious life. His retirement, however, proves to be short-lived, and he soon makes a triumphant return to rock 'n' roll. (BLU-RAY)

MAGGIE MOORE(S) (2023)

Maggie Moore(s) takes place in a dusty desert town where nothing ever happens, as a police chief is suddenly faced with the back-to-back murders of two women with the same name. (DVD)

NIGHTBREED (1990) (COLLECTOR'S EDITION)

Boone (Craig Sheffer) may be a troubled young man, but his troubles are just beginning. Set up as the fall guy in a string of slasher murders, he decides he'll hide by crossing the threshold that separates "us" from "them" and sneak into the forbidden subterranean realm of Midian. Boone will live among the monsters.

Hellraiser creator Clive Barker writes (adapting his novel Cabal) and directs this vivid leap into horror that asks: in the battle of man vs. monster, who's really the monster? The answer supplies flesh-crawling suspense, sudden fear, a colorful Danny Elfman score and a creepy array of shape-shifting beings. They are the Nightbreed, denizens of a world beyond death, beyond the imagination, perhaps beyond anything you've seen. (BLU-RAY + 4KULTRAHD)

ONCE A MOTH (1976)

Nora Aunor stars, in what is often deemed her finest performance, as Corazon de la Cruz, a Filipina nurse. Living near the US Clark Air Base on Luzon Island, she dreams of a better life in the United States… until the unspeakable happens. (BLU-RAY)

PIED PIPER (1986)

Director Jiří Barta's stop-motion animated masterpiece, based on The Pied Piper of Hamelin, is set in a dark and twisted medieval village of narrow streets and weird Gothic arches, half-CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI and half-Jan van Eyck. The money-obsessed citizens, carved out of wood blocks and speaking in an onomatopoeic babble, are like George Grosz caricatures, literally spouting coins from their mouths instead of words. The rats are far more organic and sympathetic, made of real fur and whiskers, constantly tunneling and burrowing under the towering arches and cobblestone streets above. (BLU-RAY)

PSYCHO GIRLS (1986)

In 1966, little Sarah Tusk poisoned her parents to death. Now some twenty years later, Sarah is an inmate at the Lakeview Asylum. Her sister, Victoria, who is now a personal chef, has never forgiven Sarah for her terrible crime and is determined to see her rot in the asylum, and is happy to make Sarah readily aware of her intentions. Little does Victoria realize, Sarah's bloodlust and insanity have grown and upon learning that her sister won't help get her out, she hatches a plan to escape on her own. After literally turning Victoria into steak tartare, she ingratiates herself into her sister's work; fixing a dinner party for Victoria's employers wherein she's the main course. Unfortunately for them, some unwitting cannibalism is the least of their troubles as the meal has been spiked with sleeping pills and the revelers soon awaken in an abandoned wing of Lakeview as guinea pigs in Sarah's demented lab... (BLU-RAY)

RIMINI (2022)

Richie Bravo, once upon a time a successful Austrian pop star, chases after his faded fame in wintry Rimini, Italy. He funds his dissolute lifestyle and addiction to gambling with concerts for busloads of German-speaking tourists and sexual favors for his female fans. His world starts to collapse when his adult daughter suddenly breaks into his life and demands money from him that she feels he owes her. Meanwhile his elderly father, who suffers from dementia, goes round and round in circles in an Austrian nursing home as his condition steadily declines. (BLU-RAY and DVD)

RIO BRAVO (1959)

A small-town sheriff in the American West enlists the help of a disabled man, a drunk, and a young gunfighter in his efforts to hold in jail the brother of the local bad guy. (4K ULTRA HD)

SORRY ABOUT THE DEMON (2022)

Though freshly dumped, sad sack millennial Will (Jon Michael Simpson) thought his luck was finally turning when he got an amazingly affordable lease on a whole house. Unfortunately, his landlords were setting him up as a sacrifice to the demonic entity that's haunting the place... but what happens when he's such a loser, the fiend isn't even interested? (DVD)

SOUNDIES: THE ULTIMATE COLLECTION (1941 - 47)

Soundies have been called the music videos of the 1940s, but that doesn’t begin to describe their cultural importance. It’s true that they feature a remarkable range of talent, from big-band luminaries like Duke Ellington and Count Basie to then-emerging stars like Doris Day and Ricardo Montalban, and lesser-known artists of the American nightclub circuit. But Soundies are also a rich, largely overlooked chronicle of American popular culture during and just after World War II. Produced for coin-operated jukeboxes in neighborhood bars and taverns, Soundies have an uncanny way of revealing what Americans were thinking about topics that weren’t discussed openly, from sexuality to ethnicity and race. Curated by Susan Delson, author of Soundies and the Changing Image of Black Americans on Screen: One Dime at a Time, this four-disc collection presents a diverse sampling of 200 shorts—jazz, country-western, folk, and the boogie woogie roots of rock ’n’ roll—newly restored from 35mm and 16mm materials preserved by the Library of Congress and other archives. Never have so many Soundies been celebrated in one collection, or presented with such care: thematically organized, accompanied by on-screen introductions and a booklet of essays, photos, and credits. (BLU-RAY)

STARGIRL: SEASON 3 (2020)

The third season of DC’s STARGIRL finds Starman back from the dead and offering to train Courtney while she helps him adjust to his new life in quiet Blue Valley. But when there’s a murder, the mystery will not only have our heroes questioning the former super-villain’s commitment to truly reforming, but lead Courtney, Pat and Starman to a secret that will shock them all. (DVD)

STARLING GIRL (2023)

17-year-old Jem Starling struggles with her place within her Christian fundamentalist community. But everything changes when her magnetic youth pastor Owen returns to their church. (DVD-R)

SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL GUNFIGHTER (1971)

The Wild West just got wilder...and a whole lot wackier! James Garner (Support Your Local Sheriff) is back in the saddle in Support Your Local Gunfighter, a powder keg of laughs co-starring Suzanne Pleshette, Jack Elam, Harry Morgan, Joan Blondell, Marie Windsor, Henry Jones, Dub Taylor, and Chuck Connors. Hustling gigolo Latigo Smith (Garner) arrives in a mining town for an operation, but while in town he overhears that the local mining baron Taylor Barton (Morgan) is looking to hire the notorious gunman, Swifty Morgan, to wipeout his competition. Seizing the opportunity for an easy con, Smith passes off a reprobate cowhand, Jug (Elam), as the dreaded Swifty - with bankroll in-hand; he plans to head for the hills at first opportunity. Complicating matters are Barton's suspicious pistol-packin' daughter, Patience (Pleshette), and the arrival of the real Swifty Morgan (Connors). Now, can Smith come up with a scheme to save Jug's hide, stop the mining feud, and win over Patience - or will he end up blowing up the entire town? Directed by western legend Burt Kennedy (The Train Robbers). (DVD)

TERROR AT TENKILLER (1986)

When college student Leslie decides that she needs a break from her controlling boyfriend Josh, her roommate Janna has the perfect suggestion - that the pair spend the summer at her family's remote cabin on the edge of Lake Tenkiller. The vacation starts off well enough as the two friends settle into the idyllic surroundings, but their peace is soon disturbed when they begin receiving menacing calls and unsettling answering machine messages. And then there are other disconcerting goings-on - strange, watchful figures sitting out on the lake, and the ominous sound of a harmonica playing in the dead of night. Little do Leslie and Janna know that a vicious killer is at large and working their way through the local population - can they prevent themselves from being next on the chopping block? (BLU-RAY + 4KULTRAHD)

TORTURED SOUL TRILOGY (1981)

A scarcely seen and distributed regional SOV slasher saga, the Tortured Soul trilogy is the masterwork of legendary Minneapolis, Minnesota filmmaking madman Michael W. Johnson (Serial Killer Massacre, Blood Kiss, Tales From The Cannibal Side), whose features were notorious for pushing the boundaries of extreme violence and graphic sexual content far beyond that of his '90s SOV contemporaries. Featuring performances by horror legend Kyra Schon (Night of the Living Dead), scream queen Stephanie Beaton (Eyes of the Werewolf, The Evilmaker), & AVN nominated porn starlet Avy Scott, Saturn's Core is proud to present the first ever, director's approved release of the Tortured Soul trilogy; freshly packed with an abundance of new and archival special features. It's our most exhaustive and comprehensive set to date with over 9 hours of content spread across 2 fully-loaded Blu-Ray discs!

In Tortured Soul (1992), a psychotic cannibalistic serial killer named Stevie and his equally demented, dim-witted brother Ike are terrorizing Minnesota's Twin Cities; savagely eviscerating nude young women in their homes and devouring their remains. When an innocent cyclist is kidnapped and murdered, her vengeful boyfriend Mike Hamilton (Michael W. Johnson) becomes determined to track down the killers and exact a bloody vengeance of his own.

In Tortured Soul II: Ike & Mike (1994), the stocking-clad killer Ike returns and continues his murderous rampage! Goaded even further into insanity by the spectral voice of his deceased brother Stevie, Ike begins slaughtering the family and friends of his nemesis Mike; culminating in a barbaric creekside fight to the death!

In Tortured Soul 3: The Willing Flesh (2004), a buxom criminology student (Stephanie Beaton) attempts to interview Mike for her thesis on the Black River slayings. As the pair becomes romantically entangled, the murder of nubile females begins anew. Is Ike still alive? Is there a copycat killer on the loose? Or was it all just the hallucination of a delusional, psychotic mind? (BLU-RAY)

VIDEO DIARY OF A LOST GIRL (2012)

The feature film debut from writer-director Lindsay Denniberg and co-writer Chris Shields, VIDEO DIARY OF A LOST GIRL is a hypercolored dreamland that combines a love for genre film history with a gorgeous handmade aesthetic. Louise (Pris McEver) works in a video store. But she's also a demon. A descendent of biblical demon-mother Lilith, Louise fulfills her predestined obligation to have sex with a man—and then kill him—every full moon. When she meets Charlie (Shields), a reincarnated partner from her past, Louise struggles to not do what she does best. Meticulously crafted with the use of repurposed art materials and green screen, VIDEO DIARY is a valentine to the VHS aesthetic and an exploration of personal themes via the guise of body horror. The movie was influenced by everything from LIQUID SKY to ROCKULA, from HEATHERS to DEAD RINGERS, resulting in an absurdist, experimental horror-comedy that was years ahead of its time. (BLU-RAY)