The Criterion Collection and Sony Pictures Home Entertainment have confirmed the titles to be released on Blu-ray in October 2017. On 16 October, mermaids take the stage in Polish director Agnieszka Smoczynska’s horror musical, Lure, a cult classic in the making. Then on 23 October comes Carnival of Souls, one of the most chilling and influential cult horror films of all time.

The Lure (Poland 2015) | 16 October 2017

This genre-defying horror-musical mash-up – the bold debut of Polish director Agnieszka Smoczynska – follows a pair of carnivorous mermaid sisters drawn ashore to explore life on land in an alternate 1980s Poland. Their tantalizing siren songs and otherworldly auras make them overnight sensations as nightclub singers in the half-glam, half-decrepit world of Smoczynska’s imagining. The director gives fierce teeth to her viscerally sensual, darkly feminist twist on Hans Christian Andersen’s The Little Mermaid, in which the girls’ bond is tested and their survival threatened after one sister falls for a human. A coming-of-age fairy tale with a catchy synth-fueled soundtrack, outrageous song-and-dance numbers, and lavishly grimy sets, The Lure explores its themes of emerging female sexuality, exploitation, and the compromises of adulthood with savage energy and originality.

Director-Approved Special Edition features:

• High-definition digital master, supervised by director of photography Kuba Kijowski, with 5.1 surround DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack
• New programme about the making of the film, featuring interviews with director Agnieszka Smoczynska, actors Marta Mazurek and Michalina Olszanska, screenwriter Robert Bolesto, Kijowski, composers Barbara and Zuzanna Wronski, sound designer Marcin Lenarczyk, and choreographer Kaya Kołodziejczyk
• Deleted scenes
• Aria Diva (2007) and Viva Maria! (2010), two short films directed by Smoczynska
• New English subtitle translation
• An essay by writer Angela Lovell

Carnival of Souls (USA 1962) | 23 October

A young woman in a small Kansas town survives a drag race accident, then agrees to take a job as church organist in Salt Lake City. En route, she becomes haunted by a bizarre apparition that compels her toward an abandoned lakeside pavilion. Made by industrial filmmakers on a modest budget, the eerily effective B-movie classic Carnival of Souls was intended to have “the look of a Bergman and the feel of a Cocteau” – and, with its strikingly used locations and spooky organ score, it succeeds. Herk Harvey’s macabre masterpiece gained a cult following through late-night television and continues to inspire filmmakers today.

Special Edition features:

• New, restored 4K digital transfer, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack
• Selected-scene audio commentary featuring director Herk Harvey and screenwriter John Clifford
• New interview with comedian and writer Dana Gould
• New video essay by film critic David Cairns
• The Movie That Wouldn’t Die!, a documentary on the 1989 reunion of the film’s cast and crew
• The Carnival Tour, a 2000 update on the film’s locations
• Excerpts from movies made by the Centron Corporation, an industrial film company based in Lawrence, Kansas, that once employed Harvey and Clifford
• Deleted scenes
• Outtakes, accompanied by Gene Moore’s organ score
• History of the Saltair Resort in Salt Lake City, where key scenes in the film were shot
• Trailer
• More to be announced
• An essay by writer and programmer Kier-La Janisse