Christopher Lee & Reb Brown Are Part Of Severin Summer

The temperatures outside are heating up and you need some hot cult cinema to stay cool. Severin Films has plenty of Blu-rays coming out in June and July. Tomorrow is the anniversary of Christopher Lee’s birth. Today Severin has an unexpected gift with The Eurocrypt of Christopher Lee Collection The boxset features 8 Blu-rays filled with rare horror films and even a series Lee hosted on Polish television. The Torture Chamber of Dr. Sadism is perfect for when the whole family is sitting around the TV sipping lemonade on a Sunday afternoon. Strike Commando has director Bruno Mattei ripping off the Rambo films with Reb Brown, the original Captain America. Strike Commando 2 doesn’t have Reb, but we get Vic Diaz and Richard Harris (Orca). Invaders of the Lost Gold has an Oscar nominee and Laura Gemser (star of the Emanuelle films). How can you not want to sweat on a June night with an erotic action adventure flick?

July will be equally steaming with Skinned Deep. The film from the guy behind the gore effects in Frankhooker has Warwick Davis. What more needs to be said? Siege is about what happens when a bunch of moral majority freaks decide to just stamp out the people they despise. Born For Hell based off Richard Speck’s mass murders. What’s interesting is that a few years after this drive-in flick, the director would be Oscar nominated as a producer on the classic Atlantic City.

Here’s the press release from Severin Films with more details and the bonus features:

Severin Films’ Summer lineup includes a massive Christopher Lee box set, a boatload of epic Action flicks, and a few Horror gems for good measure… He remains one of the most beloved horror/fantasy icons in US/UK pop culture history, but Christopher Lee delivered several of the most compelling, acclaimed and bizarre performances of his entire career in 1960s Europe. THE EUROCRYPT OF CHRISTOPHER LEE brings together five of these Lee classics – the 1964 gothic shocker CRYPT OF THE VAMPIRE; the 1964 cult hit CASTLE OF THE LIVING DEAD co-starring an unknown Donald Sutherland; 1962’s celebrated SHERLOCK HOLMES AND THE DEADLY NECKLACE; 1967’s lurid favorite THE TORTURE CHAMBER OF DR. SADISM and the rarely-seen 1963 oddity CHALLENGE THE DEVIL – with the 24 surviving episodes of the 1971 Film Polski anthology series THEATRE MACABRE hosted by Lee, all remastered from original negative materials with over 10 hours of trailers, rare promos, audio commentaries & vintage interviews, plus the CASTLE OF THE LIVING DEAD soundtrack and an all-new 88-page book by Lee biographer Jonathan Rigby. Two years before the deranged genius of ROBOWAR and SHOCKING DARK, writer/director Bruno Mattei and co-writers Claudio Fragasso & Rossella Drudi borrowed from RAMBO: FIRST BLOOD PART II, MISSING IN ACTION and more to create their own mind-blowing ‘Namsploitation masterpiece STRIKE COMMANDO. Reb Brown (UNCOMMON VALOR) stars as Sgt. Mike Ransom, a one-man war machine on a screaming-for-vengeance mission against brutal Vietcong, merciless Russians, double-crossing U.S. officers and acres of bullet-blasted Philippines jungle. Christopher Connelly (RAIDERS OF ATLANTIS), Luciano Pigozzi (ALL THE COLORS OF THE DARK) and Jim Gaines (ISLAND OF THE LIVING DEAD) co-star in this exploding bamboo gun-tower of “Mattei magic at its finest” (Good Efficient Butchery), now mastered in 2K from the original negative for the first time. In STRIKE COMMANDO 2, Mattei and crew return to the Philippine jungles with a higher budget, bigger action and Richard Harris (yes, that Richard Harris) for a crowd-pleaser that shamelessly borrows from APOCALYPSE NOW, RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK, RAMBO and beyond. This time, Sgt Mike Ransom (Brent Huff of GWENDOLINE fame) battles the KGB, rogue CIA agents, an army of ninjas, a tough bar owner (Miss World 1977 Mary Stavin) and “all the stuntman craziness and explosions you can cram into 90 minutes” (DTV Connoisseur). Mel Davidson (ROBOWAR) and Vic Diaz (THE BIG BIRD CAGE) co-star in this slow-motion machine-gun of Mattei mayhem that’s “just as insane as its predecessor” (Good Efficient Butchery), now featuring a 2K scan from the original negative for the first time ever. From producer Dick Randall – whose international trashterpieces include ESCAPE FROM WOMEN’S PRISON, THE WILD WILD WORLD OF JAYNE MANSFIELD and PIECES – comes perhaps the most notorious all-star Philippine productions of the ’80s, INVADERS OF THE LOST GOLD. In the last days of WWII, a Japanese platoon is attacked by headhunters while attempting to hide millions in gold. 36 years later, a grizzled guide (onetime Academy Award® nominee Stuart Whitman) is hired to lead an expedition – including Woody Strode (SPARTACUS), Harold ‘Oddjob’ Sakata and Laura ‘Emanuelle’ Gemser – into a jungle inferno of greed, violence, nudity and murder. Edmund Purdom (ABSURD) and Glynis Barber (DEMPSEY AND MAKEPEACE) co-star in this “delicious piece of atrocity cake” (Funxton) directed by Alan Birkenshaw (KILLER’S MOON) – also known as HORROR SAFARI – now scanned in 2K for the first time ever. His mind-blowing work as an FX artist has included everything from Frank Henenlotter’s BRAIN DAMAGE and FRANKENHOOKER to Matthew Barney’s CREMASTER CYCLE. And for SKINNED DEEP, his 2004 debut as writer/producer/director, Gabe Bartalos created this “demented gift from the B-Movie Gods” (Bloody Good Horror) about a rural clan of psychotic freaks, the killing spree “that takes us places and shows us things we’ve never seen before” (Dread Central) and the final girl that may be their depraved undoing. Warwick Davis (LEPRECHAUN) and Jason Dugre (SAINT BERNARD) star – with an appearance by fandom legend Forrest J. Ackerman – in this “brutal, bloody forgotten masterpiece” (Morbidly Beautiful) featuring music by Captain Sensible of The Damned, now scanned uncut in 2K from the original negative for the first time ever. From co-directors Paul Donovan and Maura O’Connell (DEFCON-4) comes one of the most disturbing – and rarely-seen – Canadian shockers of the ’80s, SIEGE, which was inspired by the actual 42-day Halifax police strike. When a local group of right-wing vigilantes massacres the patrons of a gay bar, the sole survivor seeks refuge in a nearby apartment building whose residents must now defend themselves in a night of hate, terror and bloodshed. Doug Lennox (BREAKING POINT), Tom Nardini (CAT BALLOU), Jack Blum (HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME) and Keith Knight (MY BLOODY VALENTINE) star in this “dark and intense thriller, still uncomfortably relevant 35 years after it was made” (Blog Of Horror) – released in the U.S. as SELF DEFENSE – scanned in 2K from the original negative recently discovered in a Nova Scotia archive. In 1976, Montreal filmmaker Denis Héroux – future director of THE UNCANNY and Oscar®-nominated producer of ATLANTIC CITY – adapted the true story of Chicago mass murderer Richard Speck to war-torn Belfast, where a disturbed Vietnam vet drifter (Mathieu Carrière of MALPERTUIS and BILITIS fame) brutalizes a dorm full of student nurses in BORN FOR HELL. Re-edited by its video distributor and released as NAKED MASSACRE, Héroux’s harrowing director’s cut has remained unseen in America until now. Debra Berger (THE INGLORIOUS BASTARDS), Leonora Fani (GIALLO IN VENICE), Christine Boisson (EMMANUELLE), Ely Galleani (BABA YAGA) and Carole Laure (SWEET MOVIE) co-star in this “uncompromising and unfathomably grim work of art” (Video Basement), scanned in 2K from an uncut 35mm print discovered in The National Archives of Canada. The Eurocrypt Of Christopher Lee Collection 8 BLU-RAY COLLECTION FEATURING 5 CLASSIC EUROPEAN FILMS, A TV ANTHOLOGY, DISC OF RARE INTERVIEWS + BOOK & SOUNDTRACK CD List Price: $149.95   He remains one of the most beloved horror/fantasy icons in US/UK pop culture history, but Christopher Lee delivered several of the most compelling, acclaimed and bizarre performances of his entire career in 1960s Europe. THE EUROCRYPT OF CHRISTOPHER LEE brings together five of these Lee classics – the 1964 gothic shocker CRYPT OF THE VAMPIRE; the 1964 cult hit CASTLE OF THE LIVING DEAD co-starring an unknown Donald Sutherland; 1962’s celebrated SHERLOCK HOLMES AND THE DEADLY NECKLACE; 1967’s lurid favorite THE TORTURE CHAMBER OF DR. SADISM and the rarely-seen 1963 oddity CHALLENGE THE DEVIL – with the 24 surviving episodes of the 1971 Film Polski anthology series THEATRE MACABRE hosted by Lee, all remastered from original negative materials with over 10 hours of trailers, rare promos, audio commentaries & vintage interviews, plus the CASTLE OF THE LIVING DEAD soundtrack and an all-new 88-page book by Lee biographer Jonathan Rigby. Bonus Materials DISC 1: Audio Commentary with Mondo Digital’s Nathaniel Thompson & Film Writer Troy Howarth; Audio Commentary with Film Writer Kat Ellinger; From The Castle To The Academy – Interview with Master Producer Paul Maslansky The Castle Of The Mystery Man – Roberto Curti, Author of ‘Mavericks of Italian Cinema,’ on Writer / Director Warren Kiefer + CD Soundtrack DISC 2: Dance With The Devil – Interview with Roberto Curti, Author of ‘Mavericks of Italian Cinema’; The Importance Of Being Giorgio – Interview with Giorgio Ardisson Over Two Decades; Trailer DISC 3: Trailer DISC 4: Audio Commentary with Film Writers Kim Newman & Barry Forshaw DISC 5: Promo with Christopher Lee DISC 7: Audio Commentary by Mondo Digital’s Nathaniel Thompson and Film Writer Troy Howarth; Audio Interview with Actress Karin Dor (German with English subs); Location Featurette; Theatrical Trailer (German); Teaser Trailer Die Schlangengrube – Die Burg des Grauens – German Super 8 Digest Short; Die Schlangengrube des Grafen Dracula – German Super 8 Digest Short; Poster Gallery; Behind the Scenes Still Gallery; Restoration Slideshow DISC 8: HORROR!!! 1964 Swiss Documentary Short by Pierre Koralnik Featuring Interviews; Behind The Mask – Christopher Lee Remembers Boris Karloff; Colin Grimshaw Interviews Christopher Lee in 1975 1985 Audio Interview with Christopher Lee, Accompanied by stills from The Del Valle Archive & Video Introduction with David Del Valle; Monsters & Vampires – Interview with Pioneering Horror Movie Historian Alan Frank The Crypt Keepers – Making of CRYPT OF THE VAMPIRE with Screenwriter Ernesto Gastaldi, Assistant Director Tonino Valerii and Film Historian Fabio Melelli; ‘It’s Now Or Never’ & ‘She’ll Fall For Me’ Christopher Lee & Gary Curtis Outtakes from TO THE DEVIL… A DAUGHTER / THEATRE OF DEATH 2001 DVD interview session covering the most frightening films ever, BLACK MASSES, POLICE ACADEMY 7 & More (15 mins) University College Dublin 2011 Q&A with Sir Christopher Lee This Box Set includes an all-new 88-page book by Lee biographer Jonathan Rigby. Each Blu-Ray disc is packaged separately along with a brand new book, all housed inside a sturdy chipboard splitcase box. DISC 9: Original Soundtrack CD The Castle of the Living Dead DISC 8 featuring interviews with Lee, Boris Karloff, Vincent Price, Roy Ashton, Roger Corman and behind-the-scenes footage of THE GORGON and MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH. DISC 1: The Castle of the Living Dead, Directors: Warren Kiefer, Luciano Ricci, Year: 1964, Runtime: 90 mins, Rating: 16+, Audio: English Mono, Aspect Ratio: 16×9 Widescreen, Country of Origin: Italy, France DISC 2: Challenge the Devil, Director: Vegezzi, Year: 1963, Runtime: 79 mins, Rating: 16+, Audio: Italian Mono/ English subtitles, Aspect Ratio: 16×9 Widescreen, Country of Origin: Italy DISC 3: Crypt of the Vampire, Director: Camillo Mastrocinque, Year: 1964, Runtime: 85 mins, Rating: 16+, Audio: English & Italian Mono, Aspect Ratio: 16×9 Widescreen, Country of Origin: Italy, Spain DISC 4: Sherlock Holmes and the Deadly Necklace, Director: Terence Fisher, Year: 1962, Runtime: 86 mins, Rating: 16+, Audio: English & German Mono, Aspect Ratio: 16×9 Widescreen, Country of Origin: West Germany, France, Italy DISC 5: Theatre Macabre, Directors: various, Year: 1971-1972, Runtime: 305 mins, Rating: 16+, Audio: English Mono, Aspect Ratio: 4×3, Country of Origin: Poland DISC 6: Theatre Macabre, Directors: various, Year: 1971-1972, Runtime: 305 mins, Rating: 16+, Audio: English Mono, Aspect Ratio: 4×3, Country of Origin: Poland DISC 7: The Torture Chamber of Dr. Sadism, Year: 1967, Runtime: 84 mins, Rating: 16+, Audio: English & German Mono, Aspect Ratio: 16×9 Widescreen, Country of Origin: West Germany DISC 8: Relics from the Crypt – a collection of interviews with Christopher Lee over the years and other related horror featurettes, including the first ever release of the recently unearthed 20 minute 1964 Swiss TV documentary ‘HORROR!!!’ Strike Commando BRUNO MATTEI’S LEGENDARY RAMBO RIP-OFF NOW SCANNED FROM THE ORIGINAL NEGATIVE List Price: $34.95   Two years before the deranged genius of ROBOWAR and SHOCKING DARK, writer/director Bruno Mattei and co-writers Claudio Fragasso & Rossella Drudi borrowed from RAMBO: FIRST BLOOD PART II, MISSING IN ACTION and more to create their own mind-blowing ‘Namsploitation masterpiece: Reb Brown (UNCOMMON VALOR) stars as Sgt. Mike Ransom, a one-man war machine on a screaming-for-vengeance mission against brutal Vietcong, merciless Russians, double-crossing U.S. officers and acres of bullet-blasted Philippines jungle. Christopher Connelly (RAIDERS OF ATLANTIS), Luciano Pigozzi (ALL THE COLORS OF THE DARK) and Jim Gaines (ISLAND OF THE LIVING DEAD) co-star in this exploding bamboo gun-tower of “Mattei magic at its finest” (Good Efficient Butchery), now mastered in 2K from the original negative for the first time. Media Bonus Materials War Machine – Interview with Co-Director Claudio Fragasso All Quiet On The Philippine Front – Interview with Screenwriter Rossella Drudi In-Production Promo Trailer Strike Commando 2 THE WORLDWIDE DISC PREMIERE OF MATTEI’S INFAMOUS EXPLODING-HUT SEQUEL List Price: $34.95   Director Bruno Mattei and screenwriters Claudio Fragasso & Rossella Drudi return to the Philippine jungles with a higher budget, bigger action and Richard Harris (yes, that Richard Harris) for a crowd-pleaser that shamelessly borrows from APOCALYPSE NOW, RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK, RAMBO and beyond. This time, Sgt Mike Ransom (Brent Huff of GWENDOLINE fame) battles the KGB, rogue CIA agents, an army of ninjas, a tough bar owner (Miss World 1977 Mary Stavin) and “all the stuntman craziness and explosions you can cram into 90 minutes” (DTV Connoisseur). Mel Davidson (ROBOWAR) and Vic Diaz (THE BIG BIRD CAGE) co-star in this slow-motion machine-gun of Mattei mayhem that’s “just as insane as its predecessor” (Good Efficient Butchery), now featuring a 2K scan from the original negative for the first time ever. Bonus Materials Guerrilla Zone – Interview with Co-Director Claudio Fragasso Michael Ransom Strikes Back – Interview with Actor Brent Huff Trailer Invaders Of The Lost Gold THE WORLDWIDE BLU-RAY PREMIERE MASTERED FROM THE ORIGINAL NEGATIVE! List Price: $34.95   From producer Dick Randall – whose international trashterpieces include ESCAPE FROM WOMEN’S PRISON, THE WILD WILD WORLD OF JAYNE MANSFIELD and PIECES – comes perhaps the most notorious all-star Philippine productions of the ’80s: In the last days of WWII, a Japanese platoon is attacked by headhunters while attempting to hide millions in gold. 36 years later, a grizzled guide (onetime Academy Award® nominee Stuart Whitman) is hired to lead an expedition – including Woody Strode (SPARTACUS), Harold ‘Oddjob’ Sakata and Laura ‘Emanuelle’ Gemser – into a jungle inferno of greed, violence, nudity and murder. Edmund Purdom (ABSURD) and Glynis Barber (DEMPSEY AND MAKEPEACE) co-star in this “delicious piece of atrocity cake” (Funxton) directed by Alan Birkenshaw (KILLER’S MOON) – also known as HORROR SAFARI – now scanned in 2K for the first time ever. Bonus Materials Rumble In The Jungle – Interview with Director Alan Birkinshaw Outtakes from MACHETE MAIDENS UNLEASHED with Director Alan Birkinshaw and Wife of Producer Dick Randall, Corliss Randall Born For Hell U.S. BLU-RAY PREMIERE OF THE DIRECTOR’S CUT WITH ALL-NEW SPECIAL FEATURES List Price: $34.95     In 1976, Montreal filmmaker Denis Héroux – future director of THE UNCANNY and Oscar®-nominated producer of ATLANTIC CITY – adapted the true story of Chicago mass murderer Richard Speck to war-torn Belfast, where a disturbed Vietnam vet drifter (Mathieu Carrière of MALPERTUIS and BILITIS fame) brutalizes a dorm full of student nurses. Re-edited by its video distributor and released as NAKED MASSACRE, Héroux’s harrowing director’s cut has remained unseen in America until now. Debra Berger (THE INGLORIOUS BASTARDS), Leonora Fani (GIALLO IN VENICE), Christine Boisson (EMMANUELLE), Ely Galleani (BABA YAGA) and Carole Laure (SWEET MOVIE) co-star in this “uncompromising and unfathomably grim work of art” (Video Basement), scanned in 2K from an uncut 35mm print discovered in The National Archives of Canada. Bonus Materials The Other Side Of The Mirror – Interview with Actor Mathieu Carriere Nightmare In Chicago – Remembering the Richard Speck Crime Spree with Local Filmmakers John McNaughton and Gary Sherman A New Kind Of Crime – The Richard Speck Story with ‘Once Upon A Crime’ Podcaster Esther Ludlow Bombing Here, Shooting There – Video Essay by Filmmaker Chris O’Neill NAKED MASSACRE – U.S. Video Release Cut Artist Joe Coleman On Speck Inside The Odditorium With Joe Coleman Seige THE WORLDWIDE BLU-RAY PREMIERE OF BOTH THE THEATRICAL & EXTENDED VERSIONS OF THE ’80s CANUXPLOITATION SHOCKER List Price: $34.95   From co-directors Paul Donovan and Maura O’Connell (DEFCON-4) comes one of the most disturbing – and rarely-seen – Canadian shockers of the ’80s, inspired by the actual 42-day Halifax police strike: When a local group of right-wing vigilantes massacres the patrons of a gay bar, the sole survivor seeks refuge in a nearby apartment building whose residents must now defend themselves in a night of hate, terror and bloodshed. Doug Lennox (BREAKING POINT), Tom Nardini (CAT BALLOU), Jack Blum (HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME) and Keith Knight (MY BLOODY VALENTINE) star in this “dark and intense thriller, still uncomfortably relevant 35 years after it was made” (Blog Of Horror) – released in the U.S. as SELF DEFENSE – scanned in 2K from the original negative recently discovered in a Nova Scotia archive. Bonus Materials Trailer Audio Commentary with Co-Director Paul Donovan & Filmmaker Jason Eisener Sales Points Japanese cut: 93 mins/ Theatrical cut: 84 mins Skinned Deep WORLDWIDE PREMIERE OF THE UNRATED VERSION WITH ALL-NEW SPECIAL FEATURES List Price: $34.95   His mind-blowing work as an FX artist has included everything from Frank Henenlotter’s BRAIN DAMAGE and FRANKENHOOKER to Matthew Barney’s CREMASTER CYCLE. And for his 2004 debut as writer/producer/director, Gabe Bartalos created this “demented gift from the B-Movie Gods” (Bloody Good Horror) about a rural clan of psychotic freaks, the killing spree “that takes us places and shows us things we’ve never seen before” (Dread Central) and the final girl that may be their depraved undoing. Warwick Davis (LEPRECHAUN) and Jason Dugre (SAINT BERNARD) star – with an appearance by fandom legend Forrest J. Ackerman – in this “brutal, bloody forgotten masterpiece” (Morbidly Beautiful) featuring music by Captain Sensible of The Damned, now scanned uncut in 2K from the original negative for the first time ever. Bonus Materials Trailer DEEP CUTS – A look back on SKINNED DEEP with Writer/Producer/Director Gabe Bartalos, Actors Jay Dugre and Karoline Brandt and Weapons Machinist Jake Lee Audio Commentary With Cast & Crew Archival Making Of Featurette