Who Killed Teddy Bear (1965)

"Worldwide Blu-ray Premiere of A Deliciously Disturbing Cult Classic"

Yes well done to Network who are bringing out this fascinating piece of independent American 1960s cinema on Blu-ray for the first time. It's getting a digital release as well but that's not until next month.

New York City in the mid 1960s. Pretty Norah (Juliet Prowse) is being bothered by nuisance phone calls to her apartment. She alerts the police and Lt Dave Maddin (Jan Murray) takes a special interest in her case. Could the fact his own flat is filled with porn mags and textbooks on fetishism and other 'sexual deviancies' be important?  

And what about Lawrence (Sal Mineo), the very tight trouser-wearing busboy whose 19 year old sister sustained an injury to her brain as a child that might just be Lawrence's fault? Could he be the caller?

You find out pretty quickly, because while the first act of WHO KILLED TEDDY BEAR makes it out to be a mystery, it's actually much more than that. Creatively shot with distorted images worthy of Polanski (I was reminded of REPULSION more than once) it's likely that giallo film-makers of the 1970s picked up a few lessons in suspense & technique from this one as well. 

But TEDDY's influence (probably) doesn't end there. The grim and grimy New York locations, with their porn cinemas and seedy back alleys, also foreshadow the 'miserabilist maniac' pictures of the late 1970s /early 1980s like Abel Ferrara's DRILLER KILLER, Romano Scavolini's NIGHTMARES IN A DAMAGED BRAIN and of course William Lustig's MANIAC.

Network's transfer looks a bit rough in spots with scrapes and scratches here and there & what look like tiny holes in the negative in places, but this has been newly scanned from one of the few surviving 35mm prints, and according to their press release 'the restoration involved careful grain management, both automated & manual removal of film dirt & damage & correction of major instability, warping & density fluctuations. Missing frames / sections have been reinstated from a 16mm print and the image matched as far as possible.' So now you know

Extras on Network's Blu-ray include an episode of early 1960s TV show COURT MARTIAL which features Sal Mineo as guest star alongside regulars Bradford Dillman and Peter Graves. You also get an LSD public information film narrated by Mineo. 

Yes it's a total Mineo package and well worth it. More than a simple 'Who is the killer sex pervert with a twisted back story' WHO KILLED TEDDY BEAR is never less than fascinating and very much deserves to be more widely seen. Hopefully this release will achieve that.

WHO KILLED TEDDY BEAR is out on Blu-ray from 

Network on Monday 17th September 2018 and 

Digital on 15th October 2018