Arrow Video has announced the world premiere Blu-ray release of cult director Luigi Cozzi’s video nasty, Contamination, which takes the premise of Ridley Scott’s classic Alien and peppers it with exploding guts galore and a dangerously infectious soundtrack from celebrated Italian prog-rockers Goblin (Deep Red, Suspiria).

Starring Italian horror veteran Ian McCulloch (Zombie Flesh Eaters), Contamination, from director Luigi Cozzi (Starcrash, Hercules) is one of the brightest stars in the firmament of early ’80s Italian splatter.

A cargo ship drifts into New York harbour. Its crew: all dead, their bodies horribly mutilated, turned inside-out by an unknown force. Its freight: boxes upon boxes of glowing, pulsating green eggs. It soon becomes clear that these eggs are not of this planet, and someone intends to cultivate them here on Earth. But who? And to what end?

Boasting a brand new 2K restoration of the film, this new disc will come loaded with hours of bonus content, including the featurettes Notes on Science-Fiction Cinema, an archive documentary featuring behind-the-scenes footage, and a featurette with director Luigi Cozzi on the birth of Contamination, as well as a brand new interview with the director in which he discusses his filmmaking career from past to present.

Alongside this, the new release will include the new featurette, Imitation Is the Sincerest Form of Flattery: A Critical Analysis of the Italian Cash-In which looks at the Italian genre movies that sought to cash-in on popular Hollywood blockbusters. The disc will also include a 2014 Q&A with Cozzi and star Ian McCulloch and Sound of the Cyclops, a featurette with Goblin keyboardist Maurizio Guarini. In addition, the Blu-ray comes with a reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Gary Pullin and a fully-illustrated collector’s booklet featuring new writing by Fangoria editor Chris Alexander.

This newly restored edition of Contamination will debut on Blu-ray and DVD as a dual format edition in all its sci-fi spectacle on 6th July 2015 from Arrow Video at the RRP of £19.99.

Featuring a brand new 2K restoration of the film from the original camera negative, original Italian and English soundtracks in mono audio (uncompressed PCM on the Blu-ray), newly translated subtitles for the Italian soundtrack and optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing for the English soundtrack, the release will have the following extras:

• Brand new audio commentary by filmmaker, Fangoria editor and Contamination super-fan Chris Alexander

• Notes on Science-Fiction Cinema – an archive documentary featuring behind-the-scenes footage and director Luigi Cozzi on the birth of Contamination

• 2014 Q&A with Cozzi and star Ian McCulloch

• Sound of the Cyclops: Maurizio Guarini on the music of Contamination – the Goblin keyboardist discusses Contamination’s dark, progressive rock score and a lifetime of making music for Italian terror

• Luigi Cozzi vs. Lewis Coates – a brand new interview with the director in which he discusses his filmmaking career from past to present

• Imitation Is The Sincerest Form of Flattery: A Critical Analysis of the Italian Cash-In – a brand new featurette looking at the Italian genre movies which sought to cash-in on popular Hollywood blockbusters

• Theatrical trailer

• Graphic Novel based on the original Contamination screenplay (Disc gallery)

• Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Gary Pullin

• Fully-illustrated collector’s booklet featuring new writing on the film by Chris Alexander