If I were given hours to ponder what slasher movies might soon be getting the special edition Blu-ray treatment, I don't think my mind would ever stumble across DRIVE-IN MASSACRE. It wouldn't occur to me to give director Stu Segall's 1976 slasher a Blu-ray upgrade, but it did occur to the folks at Severin Films, who will be releasing their DRIVE-IN MASSACRE Blu-ray on March 14th.
This is the description Severin has for the release:
It was one of the few true slasher movies to pre-date HALLOWEEN and FRIDAY THE 13th, and remains the closest you’ll ever come to an actual seedy ‘70s drive-in experience: It’s a hot summer night in Southern California and the local passion pit is packed with patrons. But when a sword-wielding psycho begins carving up customers, it’ll unspool a grubby cavalcade of creepy carnies, peeping perverts, graphic decapitations and an ending you have to see/hear to believe. John F. Goff (THE FOG), Bruce Kimball (LOVE CAMP 7) and co-writer George ‘Buck’ Flower (BACK TO THE FUTURE) star in this nasty slab of ‘70s sleaze directed by adult film & episodic television veteran Stu Segall (INSATIABLE), now packed with all-new Special Features and restored from the original camera negative recently discovered in the ruins of the Sky View Drive-In near Oxnard!
The special features they've assembled include:
– Audio Commentary with Director Stu Segall
– Drive-In Days: Interview with Star/Co-Writer John F. Goff
– Norm Sheridan Recalls Drive-In Massacre
– Making the Massacre: Interview with Director Stu Segall
– Theatrical Trailer
– Reverse Cover Art
Both sides of the cover art can be seen below, and while one does accurately represent what goes on in the film, the other does not. Unfortunately, there is no Satanic samurai to be seen in DRIVE-IN MASSACRE.
I'm not particularly fond of Segall's movie, it's rather poorly made and it's full of filler, but I will admit that it had one hell of a gimmick, showing people getting knocked off at a drive-in during the peak of the drive-in era. That gimmick has carried it a long way, now all the way onto Blu-ray.
If you would like to own a copy of the Blu-ray, it is available for pre-order on Amazon.
If you have a Region B player, there is also a DRIVE-IN MASSACRE Blu-ray available from 88Films. I'm somewhat baffled, but I have to respect the movie for enduring so long after it came out.