Flesh for Frankenstein (1974)

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General		Extras
Category	Horror	Main Menu Audio
Rating
Year Of Production	1974
Running Time	94:55
RSDL / Flipper	No/No	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	1,2,3,4,5,6	Directed By	Paul Morrissey
Studio Distributor	Andy Warhol Beyond Home Entertainment	Starring	Joe Dallesandro Monique van Vooren Udo Kier Arno Juerging Dalila Di Lazzaro Srdjan Zelenovic Nicoletta Elmi Marco Liofredi Liu Bosisio Fiorella Masselli Cristina Gaioni Rosita Torosh Carla Mancini
Case	Amaray-Opaque-Secure Clip
RPI	$29.95	Music	Claudio Gizzi

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Dolby Digital 1.0 (192Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	2.40:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	2.35:1	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	None	Smoking	No
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

    The absolutely unique Udo Kier stars as Baron Frankenstein in this writing and directing effort from Paul Morrissey, a very campy take on the Hammer franchise of the 70s.

    The Baron Frankenstein has settled into family life, with a frustrated wife who also happens to be his sister Katrin. Their two understandably weird children like to spend play time cutting the heads off dolls with a miniature guillotine and spying on their inattentive parents - their father in his cadaverous laboratory and their mother in the sack with the labourer. What a childhood! The Baron and his ever-faithful assistant Otto have been hard at work for years, perfecting a man of parts with which they intend to begin a race of super humans that can populate and eventually take over the world. Now only one piece is missing - a head. But it can't be just any ordinary head - it must be the head of a strong, virile, insatiable hunk. The mayhem begins when the Baron mistakenly installs the head of a quiet artistic lad who can't get it up, and is left with his plans for world domination in tatters.

    This is actually quite a funny film, but sadly not funny enough to stand up to repeat viewings. There are many gross-out scenes that focus on the fondling of internal organs, but all of the props and effects are so laughable it is absolutely impossible to take any of this seriously. The terrifyingly awful rubber bats on strings cracked me up in particular.

    Although the title bears the words Andy Warhol Presents it is widely believed that the famed artist had very little to do with the creative process of filmmaking, only offering financial backing in exchange for the inclusion of his name and an acting job for some of his 'friends'. Morrissey's flair behind the camera can can only be respectfully described as unique, although it certainly does this horror/comedy style justice. Flesh for Frankenstein is by no means the best retelling of this classic monster tale. However, one thing is for sure - Hammer did it better.

Video

    Our transfer of Flesh for Frankenstein has been slightly overmatted into a 2.40:1 aspect ratio, though still quite close to the original theatrical ratio of 2.35:1. Be aware that contrary to the disc's packaging, this transfer is not 16x9 enhanced. Considering the film's age and relatively low budget, I was prepared to cut it a bit of slack. I have, however, ultimately been left disappointed by the transfer.

    This is a hazy transfer at best, generally lacking in definition. There are absolutely no examples of film-like sharpness to be found, and black levels are similarly foggy and inconsistent. Judging by the lack of detail and some distractingly jerky pans, I suspect that this transfer may have been sourced from an NTSC tape.

    The colour palette is muted and drab, with no rich colouring to speak of. Skin tones take on a slightly orange appearance in well lit scenes and appear washed out during darker moments.

    Film artefacting isn't the the worst I have seen, but it does become obvious at times. There are many segments of damaged or scratched film, and some rather dirty portions as well, presenting both positive and negative specs intermittently. An ugly black spot also appears on the camera lens at 7:50 for a few seconds and is a little distracting. Telecine wobble is surprisingly rare, but similarly noticeable. I didn't see any compression issues during the transfer, probably because I was so consumed by the lack of detail.

    There are no subtitles on this single-layered disc.

Video Ratings Summary

Sharpness
Shadow Detail
Colour
Grain/Pixelization
Film-To-Video Artefacts
Film Artefacts
Overall

Audio

    An English Dolby Digital mono soundtrack is included.

    The film's dialogue is composed of location audio and a little ADR in some scenes. Voices off camera are muffled and hard to understand, while some pieces of dialogue are presented at a lower level and are even harder to discern. There were a couple of minor instances of audio sync problems, but these were only brief.

    The soundtrack score by Claudio Gizzi is not surprisingly the most professional aspect if this production. His contribution to the film is a haunting, melodic and strangely romantic theme reminiscent of many classic European horror films from this era.

    There was obviously no surround activity or subwoofer response in this mono soundtrack.

Audio Ratings Summary

Dialogue
Audio Sync
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts
Surround Channel Use
Subwoofer
Overall

    None.

    There is censorship information available for this title. Click here to read it (a new window will open). WARNING: Often these entries contain MAJOR plot spoilers.

• 16x9 enhanced transfer.
• Feature Commentary by Director Paul Morrissey, Actor Udo Kier and historian Maurice Yacovar.
• German trailer (16x9 enhanced) (3:18).
• Scrolling gallery of production stills (18:54).
• Gallery of promotional material
• A page of text in German about a 3D version of the film.
• Cast & crew filmographies.

    A Region 1 Criterion release also exists, with these extra features included:

• Widescreen transfer, not 16x9 enhanced.
• Feature Commentary by Director Paul Morrissey, Actor Udo Kier and historian Maurice Yacovar.
• Gallery of production stills and promotional material.

    Both releases are coded Region 0 and do not have any subtitles. Despite not being 16x9 enhanced, the Criterion transfer is reportedly superior to the Region 2. The best value has to be the Region 2, offering both films in a package.

    The video transfer is not very good.

    The audio transfer is similarly ordinary.

    There are no extras.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall