obsession horror express

Lost amongst Brian De Palma's many Hitchcock-inspired thrillers is 1976's Obsession, starring Cliff Robertson as Michael Courtland, a wealthy real estate mogul whose wife and daughter are killed in kidnapping plot gone wrong. Fast-forward 20 years. While on a business trip, Courtland stumbles upon Sandra (Genevieve Bujold), a native Italian who looks exactly like his dear departed wife. A whirlwind romance leads to a wedding date set back in the states. But is Sandra really who she claims to be...or is Courtland's second chance all an elaborate scam?

The amount of talent at work on Obsession is staggering. Shot by Vilmos Zsigmond (Close Encounters) with his typical foggy brilliance, plus a screenplay by Paul Schrader (Taxi Driver) and a score by the great Bernard Herrmann, this is the closest De Palma ever came to straight-up Hitchcock quality. While his subsequent success evolved into a more hyper-sexualized and gleefully violent sizzle reel, here he shoots for an upscale mystery that could have been released by the studio 20 years earlier. And he succeeds beyond all expectations.

Vertigo is the obvious template. De Palma revels in sequences of Courtland stalking his "rediscovered" wife from afar, meandering through the streets of Rome with Herrmann's music playing blissfully in the background. He even manages to create the same somnambulant atmosphere, coaxing a rather eerie performance out of Robertson that makes him a sympathetic figure and a suspect at the same time. It's a film that moves at a deliberate pace, gathering momentum until the final slow-motion finale, a De Palma signature that was never pulled off better than here.

Scream Factory's new Blu-ray collector's edition is one of the last pieces of the puzzle when it comes to securing De Palma's entire catalog on hi-def. Not only does it look tremendous, but a new slate of extras (commentary and interviews) have been added to the previous "Obsession Revisted" documentary featured on the original DVD. A must-buy in every respect.

Horror Express (1972) cribs two of Hammer Studios most famous stars (Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee) for a wild sci-fi / horror tale set aboard a trans-Asiatic passenger train carrying some deadly cargo. Unbeknownst to the two British scientists, the frozen ape-man they brought along for the ride is actually a body-swapping alien that absorbs the intelligence of anyone who stares into its red, glowing eye. As the bodies pile up, the list of suspects increases as well, turning this Spanish-produced quickie into a fun Agatha Christie-inspired "who-dun-it."

Shot on leftover sets that give the film a big budget boost, Horror Express has all the tongue-in-cheek inventiveness that Hammer films of the period lacked. And there's a healthy sense of humor, director Eugenio Martin doesn't shy away from the disturbing images (bleeding eyeballs, gruesome skullcaps, etc) genre fans expect. In fact, his film is such an entertaining grab bag of ideas that even the incredulous parts - like the monster's eye fluid retaining images of a brontosaurus - just add to the fun. Lee and Cushing seem to be in on the joke from the beginning, faring far better here than in other horror efforts of the era. A late cameo performance from Telly Savalas sends things a bit off the rails, but not enough to spoil the trip.

Arrow Video's Blu-ray comes with a brand new 2K restoration, commentary with Stephen Jones and Kim Newman and collector's booklet with new writing on the film. The other extras are all ported over from the previous Blu-ray / DVD combo released from Severin a few years back, all except for a 1973 interview with Peter Cushing.