Motor Psycho (1965)

 

The film Russ Meyer made just before his classic FASTER, PUSSYCAT! KILL! KILL! (also 1965) gets the top class treatment of being released in 4K by Severin Films on UHD and Blu-ray, scanned and restored from the original 35 mm negative.

MOTOR PSYCHO is 74 black and white minutes of hoodlums and Meyer's trademark gravity-defying large breasted women. Three bikers (all suffering from war trauma, it turns out) descend on a desert town to rape and kill. When they attack Gail (Lane Carroll who would go on to appear in George Romero's THE CRAZIES) they figure without her husband, localveterinarian Cory (Alex Rocco) who sets off in pursuit, picking up the bountiful Ruby (Haji), whose husband (Coleman Francis, director of Tor Johnson starrer THE BEAST OF YUCCA FLATS) has been killed by the gang, along the way. The inevitable desert confrontation follows.

Working with a minimal budget, MOTOR PSYCHO is fast-paced and benefits from a snappy script with some great biting dialogue, especially between Haji and her soon to be late husband. The crisp black and white photography of the desert locations gives them a better sense of eeriness than colour, and the concept of a collection of women with similar physical attributes in a small desert town adds to the sense of slight otherworldliness. 

Severin's 4K transfer is, as with all their other 4K Meyer releases, out of this world. Who would ever have thought any of the films of Russ Meyer (and certainly a more obscure one like MOTOR PSYCHO) could be made to look this sparkling?

The disc comes with a new commentary track by academic Elizabeth Purcell and film-maker Zach Clark which discusses not just this film but other Meyer films in context with it. On the Blu-ray (which comes with the UHD if you get that) there are also archival interviews with Haji and Alex Rocco that last about 21 minutes.

Russ Meyer's MOTOR PSYCHO is out from Severin Films in a UHD / Blu-ray combo, or just the Blu-ray, on Monday 28th April 2025

Up! (1976)

"(Not the Pixar Disney Film...Obviously)"

...although Russ Meyer was tagged in publicity of the period as 'The Walt Disney of Skin Flick'. Anyway, the film the producer-director-cinematographer-editor and all-round auteur made in between SUPERVIXENS (1975) and BENEATH THE VALLEY OF THE ULTRAVIXENS (1979) is now getting to join those two movies in getting a 4K UHD and Blu-ray release from Severin Films, scanned and restored from the original 35 mm negative.

UP! was obviously conceived as a follow-up to SUPERVIXENS in its attempt to recreate another crazy world filled with sexually-inspired daftness featuring women with enormous breasts. The mix isn't quite as successful this time around, but if you like Meyer's other films and have a penchant for his singular and colourful take on storytelling then this will satisfy your desire for more of the same quite nicely.

After some extremely dubious sexual shenanigans Adolf Hitler is murdered in his bath by a black-gloved piranha-wielding killer. Meanwhile immensely busty Margo Winchester (Raven de la Croix) arrives in the small American town where Hitler was 'hiding out' (in his castle on the hill). Who was responsible for Hitler's death swiftly takes second place to Margo's interactions with all the men in the immediate area in yet another of Meyer's depictions of weird small town life in rural America. 

We do find out who killed Hitler in a crazy climax that features as much large-breasted naked running through countryside as the rest of the film (which is a lot). Francesca 'Kitten' Natividad acts as a kind of bouncy naked Greek chorus to regularly remind you what's supposed to be going on. Before the climax there's some surprisingly graphic business in a bar that culminates in the use of both an axe and a chainsaw. All this plus almost as many shots of wobbling fried eggs as wobbling breasts to keep the discerning viewer entertained.

As with the other films they have released, Severin's 4K transfer is absolutely stunning, with colours at least as eye-popping as some of the camera angles. Extras on their UHD / Blu-ray set include an archival interview with Raven de la Croix which goes some way to explaining why she wasn't cast in Meyer's next film. New to this release is a commentary track from film, academic and UP! enthusiast Elizabeth Purchell which spends a good 20 minutes talking about Meyer's career up to the film before getting stuck in to the action.

Russ Meyer's UP! is out from Severin Films in a UHD / Blu-ray combo or just the Blu-ray on Monday 28th April 2025

Beneath the Valley of the Ultra-Vixens (1979)

 

"Russ Meyer's Nutty, Nudie, Under Milk Wood?"

The last (for now) of Severin's UHD and Blu-ray releases is a 4K transfer (after what sounds like a great deal of painstaking restoration of the original camera negative) of cult director Russ Meyer's final feature, all with the cooperation of the Russ Meyer Trust.

BENEATH THE VALLEY OF THE ULTRAVIXENS couldn't exactly be called poetry, but with its narrator introducing us to each of the characters and many of the situations, and its detailing of the (frequently bizarre) goings-on in a small town it stands up to comparison with Dylan Thomas' classic 'play for voices' Under Milk Wood.

The inhabitants of the community of Small Town USA get up to all kinds of strange things, from Martin Bormann watching a stripper from a coffin while covered in a sheet (based on a true story told to Meyer), to lead Francesca 'Kitten' Natividad trying to find a cure for husband Ken Kerr's predilection for being a 'back window' man. 

It's a film that's considerably sillier than either 1968'S VIXEN or 1975's SUPERVIXENS, with the result that it's less erotic than the former and less thrilling than the latter, although of course your mileage may vary. However, if lots of scenes of vigorous breasty bouncing up and down to the repeated twangs of a Jew's harp is for you then you'll think you've died and gone to heaven.

Once again Severin's transfer is eye-popping in the vividness of both colour and detail. Extras include an archival Russ Meyer commentary, an interview with Natividad (17 minutes) that looks archival but boasts a copyright date of 2024, a 1979 talk show in which Meyer is interviewed (23 minutes) and a new piece with Ellen Adelstein whose talk show it was (seven minutes). There's also a trailer.

Russ Meyer's BENEATH THE VALLEY OF THE ULTRAVIXENS is out from Severin Films in either a UHD  / Blu-ray combo or just Blu-ray alone on Monday 27th January 2025

Supervixens (1975)

 

The second of Severin's new 4K Russ Meyer releases, scanned and restored from the original 35mm negative in conjunction with The Russ Meyer Trust, is 1975's SUPERVIXENS. Made after Meyer's brief Hollywood studio career, it's a film that contains all the elements his fans had by now come to know and love, including lurid plotlines, frequently odd choices of soundtrack music, and of course beautiful women with enormous gravity-defying breasts.

SUPERVIXENS plays like a cross between film noir and a road runner cartoon, with a big break for some sex comedy shenanigans right in the middle. Psychotic cop Harry Sledge (Charles Napier) murders SuperAngel (Shari Eubank), the wife of petrol station attendant Clint Ramsey (Charles Pitt). While the film opens with the usual bouncy breasty fun be warned that the violence against Eubank's character, and especially her murder, is unexpectedly unpleasant.

Sledge tries to frame Clint for the murder and Clint goes on the run, travelling through a Russ Meyer landscape that is every bit as unique to its auteur as Sergio Leone 's westerns or Hammer's horror films. Every woman Clint meets is not just attractive but has huge breasts and chases after him with sex comedy verve. By the time he has met SuperVixen (Eubank again in a different role) Sledge is back on his trail and the film culminates in a ludicrous climax straight out of Warner Bros. cartoons. And no, I have no idea why every girl in this has 'Super' attached to their name. Perhaps Meyer just thought they were really, really great, which in a number of ways they are.

Severin's 4K UHD transfer is once more an eye opener, with the vivid reds of vehicles contrasting with the desert landscape, and yet again fans familiar with this one will probably shake their heads in disbelief at just how good it looks.

Extras include an archival Russ Meyer commentary, a Meyer interview from 1990 (24 minutes), a previously unseen interview with star Charles Napier (19 minutes), the episode of Jonathan Ross's Channel 4 Incredibly Strange Film Show (40 minutes, and providing a nice bit of nostalgia for those of us old enough), a trailer and TV spot.

Russ Meyer's SUPERVIXENS is out from Severin Films in either a UHD  / Blu-ray combo or just Blu-ray alone on Monday 27th January 2025

 

Vixen (1968)

Severin Films are releasing, on 4KUHD and Blu-ray in both the UK and the US, three of exploitation auteur Russ Meyer's movies as part of a planned ongoing partnership with The Russ Meyer Charitable Trust, with all transfers taken from negatives restored by The Museum of Modern Art in collaboration with Severin themselves.

If you're not familiar with the works of Russ Meyer, perhaps the first thing you notice (apart from them featuring ladies with large gravity-defying breasts) is just how good a film-maker Meyer is. There's a technical skill on display here that puts him leagues above exploitation contemporaries like Herschell Gordon Lewis, such that if you're in two minds as to whether you're going to end up watching intermittently tedious trash be assured that's absolutely not the case.

First up on Severin's release slate is 1968's VIXEN, and as soon as you press play prepare to have your eyes popped out, both in the way Mr Meyer intended but also by just how gorgeous and crisp and beautiful this new transfer is. The film almost looks as if was made yesterday - admittedly it's an 'Anna Biller LOVE WITCH'-type yesterday, but that's how vibrant and colourful the image here is.

We're in British Columbia, with the beautiful locations shown off their best advantage on Severin's UHD disc. Vixen (Erica Gavin) is married to a local pilot who takes couples on fishing-cum-swinging trips (or at least that's how it seems) while Vixen also satisfies her free-loving / nymphomaniac urges with Mounties and others. There's a little bit more plot towards the finale that involves the plane being hijacked which really just serves as a bit of extra seasoning to the film's raison d'etre, which is to display the physical attributes of both Ms Gavin and co-star Vincene Wallace as much as possible. 

Extras include an archival Russ Meyer commentary with an intermittently chatty director, and a new one with star Erica Gavin that's moderated by Severin's own David Gregory. These and a trailer are included on the UHD disc. You need to go to the Blu-ray for the rest which include the 1981 censor prologue (just a minute and a half of text scrolling that's a bit of a rant), archival interviews with stars Gavin and Harrison Page (20 minutes), an edition of Davd Del Valle's The Sinister Image TV show with guests Russ Meyer and Yvette Vickers that could previously be found on Arrow's (now out of print) Blu-ray of BEYOND THE VALLEY OF THE DOLLS (21 minutes), and a piece on the film's censorship battles in Cincinatti (13 minutes). 

Vibrant, sexy, well-paced and well made, Severin's excellent transfer of VIXEN is a very much the place to start if you're unfamiliar with the oeuvre of Russ Meyer. And if you're already a fan of his work that you'll likely be blown away by just how good this looks. 

Russ Meyer's VIXEN is out from Severin Films in either a UHD  / Blu-ray combo or just the Blu-ray on Monday 27th January 2025

Beyond the Valley of the Dolls (1970)

"More decadence than you can swing a large pair of breasts at"

What do you get if you cross the film-making skills of breast-obsessed cult auteur Russ Meyer with all the most ludicrous, decadent soap opera elements to be found in the once-popular potboiler novels of Jacqueline Susann, Harold Robbins, and others? Twentieth Century-Fox obviously couldn’t wait to find out because they gave him a load of money and carte blanche to do pretty much what he liked. The result has been given a new Blu-ray release from Arrow and if you’ve ever fancied having your brain fried by some of the most peculiarly demented trash to be seen outside a John Waters film, now’s your chance.

Nice

Busty (of course) pop trio The Carrie Nations travel to Los Angeles in search of fame but instead find themselves in the most outlandish soap opera ever. Lead singer Kelly (Bristol-born Dolly Read from Hammer’s KISS OF THE VAMPIRE) betrays her boyfriend and sees him end up paralysed after a failed suicide plunge onto the stage of one of the band’s performances; guitarist Casey (Cynthia Meyers) ends up in a prolonged lesbian scene with fashion designer Roxanne (Meyer regular Erica Gavin) and drummer Petronella (Marcia McBloom) gets herself into all kinds of trouble with a heavyweight boxer. 

Meyer-tastic!

Watching from the sidelines (and waiting to jump into the ever-present cesspool that is Hollywood in this film) are porn star Ashley St Ives (Edy Williams, another Meyer regular doing her best sexy Mary Woronov impersonation in this), movie star-cum-gigolo Lance Rocke (Michael Blodgett from THE VELVET VAMPIRE and Fritz Leiber’s Dead Man episode of NIGHT GALLERY) and most of all, raving mad decadent agent supremo Ronnie ‘Z-Man’ Barzell (John Lazar). Or is he actually Superwoman? Don’t ask me. 

Something for the ladies. And some of the guys, too, I don't doubt

BEYOND THE VALLEY OF THE DOLLS isn’t really a film about plot elements but about noise, colour, culture, craziness, and above all huge, huge breasts, as anyone familiar with Russ Meyer’s oeuvre might expect. It’s raving mad, it’s over the top, and it’s exhausting. It’s not difficult to see why it bombed at the box office on its initial release as it’s deliciously and deliriously all over the place, such that selling it must have been a nightmare.

But is it art?

Once again Arrow are to be highly commended for coming up with such a decadent package for this supremely decadent film. The transfer itself is spotless and an utter delight. The colours are so bright and so rich at times you want to put on sunglasses. There are so many extras it’s difficult to list them all, but you get two commentary tracks, a David Del Valle interview (always good value) with Meyer & Yvette Vickers, an introduction by John LaZar, a making of documentary, a featurette with composer Stu Phillips, short pieces on 1960s culture, Casey & Roxanne’s love scene, screen tests, photo galleries and more. 

This scene goes on for a bit, in case you need warning

The limited edition also comes with a second disc that features Russ Meyer’s other Hollywood picture THE SEVEN MINUTES which was not available for review. Finally, as well as a reversible sleeve you get a booklet with new writing on the film by Kat Ellinger, plus an interview with Meyer by Anne Billson and a piece by David del Valle. 

Russ Meyer's BEYOND THE VALLEY OF THE DOLLS is out now from Arrow Films on Region B Blu-ray and Region 2 DVD