July is shaping up to be Arrow Video’s very own blockbuster season with a multitude of new releases making up a perfect month of cult film viewing.

Following on from its theatrical release, the latest from acclaimed filmmakers Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead comes to DVD and Blu-ray. The Endless is a genre-blending sci-fi-horror movie that sees two brothers return to the ‘UFO death cult’ they’d left behind. It follows on from their lauded Resolution, which is included in the Limited Edition Blu-ray release.

Fans of Seijun Suzuki’s yakuza films should be on the watch for Detective Bureau 2-3 Go to Hell Bastards!, which arrives on Blu-ray early in the month. And if that love stretches to hard-hitting, violent crime films, they should also check out Arrow Video’s Blu-ray edition of cult classic The Boondock Saints, which presents the director’s cut of the film in vivid high definition.

Horror fans are well catered for too, as 1980s splatter slasher Doom Asylum arrives on Blu-ray. Starring Kristen Davis of Sex and the City fame, it sees a group of randy teenagers go up against a hideously deformed maniac armed with a wide selection of surgical tools. Funny and gory in equal measure, it’s one of the best slashers of the 80s. And if your horror bent turns to giallo, Arrow Video have that covered as well, with a 2K restoration of Sergio Martino’s The Case of the Scorpion’s Tale. Combining intricate plotting, shocking violence and beautiful views of the Greek coast, this is a classic gialli that overflows with European talent.

Arrow Video finishes the month by returning to genre-bending sci-fi with The Navigator: A Medieval Odyssey. This New Zealand cult classic from Vincent Ward seamlessly blends time travel, sci-fi and medieval fantasy to create a story unlike anything you’ve seen before.

And if you simply can’t wait until July (and we can’t blame you) then you can get your cult fix from Arrow Books, who release Samuel J. Umland’s intense examination of Nicolas Roeg’s David Bowie-starring The Man Who Fell to Earth in May. This much-needed exploration gives an enthralling view of one of the most enigmatic sci-fi films ever made.

Arrow Video releases for July 2018

The Endless | DVD and Blu-ray | 2 July 2018 | £24.99 (Blu-ray) & £15.99 (DVD)

From acclaimed filmmakers Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead (Resolution, Spring) comes The Endless, a truly unique, mind-bending, genre-blending indie gem of a film that will leave you spinning.

When brothers Justin (Benson) and Aaron (Moorhead), former members of a “crazy UFO death cult”, receive a mysterious videotape in the mail, they find an eerie calling card from their past inviting them back to attend an event called “The Ascension”. 

Despite Justin’s initial apprehension, the two agree to return for one day. At first, their old cult friends seem warm and welcoming, but things soon begin to turn strange and the two brothers find themselves drawn ever more into a vortex of bizarre rituals, strange messages, unseeable forces and sinister supernatural secrets that threaten to tear apart the very fabric of reality.

Directors Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead are on a roll – their critically acclaimed and utterly unique film Spring (which Empire called ‘one of the freshest genre offerings of recent years’) got them onto Variety’s ‘Directors to watch’ list in 2015, and received raves from Oscar-winning film-makers Richard Linklater and Guillermo del Toro (and which was surely an inspiration for his The Shape of Water). Their follow up, The Endless, is another dark and riveting tale of the unexpected, that blends David Lynch’s Lost Highway with Martha Marcy May Marlene. 

The directors themselves take the lead roles, showing they have talent to burn, and proving themselves remarkably assured actors as the likeable brothers plunged back into the cult they so wisely left all those years before. The film also stars bewitching genre star Callie Hernandez (Alien Covenant, Blair Witch), Tate Ellington (Sinister 2, The Walking Dead), movie veteran Ric Sarabia, and David Lawson as creepy cult member ‘Smiling Dave’; as well as Peter Cilella and Vinny Curran reprising their roles from Benson and Moorhead’s innovative debut Resolution, which is niftily linked to this film.

The Endless features what are fast becoming the directing duo’s trademarks: long, dread-drenched takes with detailed, naturalistic performances; superb, unsettling sound design; and an unpredictable, deliciously fresh script with Lovecraftian overtones. From the brilliantly staged rope-pull set piece, through to a seriously strange cult-style karaoke session, this is a stunningly realised slow burner that firmly establishes Moorhead & Benson’s unique cinematic universe, gripping you from the first shot, and steadily tightening its hold as things get very weird indeed.

Described as a ‘true indie gem’ by Bloody Disgusting, The Endless, is a genuinely extraordinary and groundbreaking cross between Of Mice and Men and Close Encounters of the Third Kind. After wowing genre fans at the 2017 London Film Festival, The Endless is now ready for more converts. Are you ready to join the cult following?

Blu-ray 2-disc Limited Edition contents:

• High Definition Blu-ray (1080p) presentations of The Endless and Moorhead & Benson’s first feature, Resolution
• DTS-HD MA 5.1 audio
• Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
• Reversible sleeve with a choice of artwork designs 
• Limited edition collector’s booklet containing new writing on the films by critics Jamie Graham and Alexandra Heller-Nicholas

Blu-ray disc 1: The Endless

• Audio commentary by Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead
• Brand-new interview with Benson and Moorhead, recorded exclusively for this release
• Behind-the-scenes featurette
• Breaking the News – Benson and Moorhead pull a practical joke on actor Vinny Curran
• Casting Aaron – Benson, Moorhead and producer Dave Lawson audition for the role of Aaron
• Casting Smiling Dave – Lawson auditions for the role of Smiling Dave 
• VFX Breakdown 
• UFO Cult Comedy – improvised short film made whilst Benson and Moorhead were on the festival circuit
• Vinny’s Story – a behind-the-scenes documentary filmed on-set by Curran
• Michael Felker – a tongue-in-cheek featurette referencing The Endless’s editor
• Seven deleted scenes
• Outtakes
• Theatrical Trailer

Blu-ray disc 2: Resolution

• Audio Commentary with Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead, and actors Peter Cilella and Vinny Curran
• Audio Commentary with Benson and Moorhead
• Audio Commentary with Carmel the Dog
• Brand-new interview with Benson and Moorhead, recorded exclusively for this release
• Archive interview with Benson and Moorhead
• Behind the scenes featurette

DVD Special Edition contents:

• Standard Definition presentation
• 5.1 audio
• Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
• Audio commentary by Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead
• Brand-new interview with Benson and Moorhead, recorded exclusively for this release
• Behind-the-scenes featurette
• Breaking the News – Benson and Moorhead pull a practical joke on actor Vinny Curran
• Casting Aaron – Benson, Moorhead and producer Dave Lawson audition for the role of Aaron
• Casting Smiling Dave – Lawson auditions for the role of Smiling Dave
• VFX Breakdown
• UFO Cult Comedy – improvised short film made whilst Benson and Moorhead were on the festival circuit 
• Vinny’s Story – a behind-the-scenes documentary filmed on-set by Curran
• Michael Felker – a tongue-in-cheek featurette referencing The Endless’s editor
• Seven deleted scenes
• Outtakes
• Theatrical Trailer
• Reversible sleeve with a choice of artwork designs

Detective Bureau 2-3 Go to Hell Bastards! | Blu-ray | 9 July 2018 | £24.99

Starring original Diamond Guy, Jo Shishido, Seijun Suzuki's Detective Bureau 2-3: Go to Hell Bastards! is a hard hitting, rapid-fire yakuza film that redefined the Japanese crime drama.

Detective Tajima (Shishido) is tasked with tracking down a consignment of stolen firearms, as the investigation progresses things take an anarchic, blood-drenched grudge match.

Rapidly paced, darkly funny, and extremely stylish, Detective Bureau 2-3: Go to Hell Bastards! is unlike anything seen before and rightly deserves its cult status. Suzuki's send up of post-war greed would go on to cement his domestic and international status as one of the leading directors to come out of Japan.

We hope to have more information on the specifics of this release in the near future.

The Boondock Saints | Blu-ray | 9 July 2018 | £24.99

Boston, Massachusetts. Home of clam chowder, the Red Sox and Harvard. Home, too, to some of the roughest, toughest criminals ever to walk the streets. When the bungling McManus brothers, Conner (Sean Patrick Flanery – Saw 3D) and Murphy (Norman Reedus – The Walking Dead), inadvertently end up taking out a pair of Russian Mafiosi, they realise they’ve found their calling and embark on a mission to cleanse their city of criminals, inspired by the tactics of on-screen vigilantes like Clint Eastwood and Charles Bronson. But their vigilante antics soon attract the attention of Paul Smecker (Willem Dafoe – To Live and Die in LA), an FBI agent with his own unique approach to fighting crime, setting the stage for an epic confrontation that will redefine the words “truth” and “justice”. 

Released in early 2000 in the wake of the infamous Columbine High School massacre, writer/director Troy Duffy’s tale of ultra-violent vigilantism was all but buried during its brief theatrical run but went on to enjoy a second wind on home video and has since attained cult status. With its irreverent humour and unflinching portrayal of violence, The Boondock Saints offers its own distinctive take on the seedy world of organised crime.

Special Edition contents:

• High Definition Blu-ray (1080p) presentation of the director’s cut of the film
• Original 5.1 lossless English audio
• Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
• Audio commentary by writer/director Troy Duffy
• Audio commentary by actor Billy Connolly 
• Outtakes 
• Deleted scenes 
• Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Chris Malbon
• First pressing only: Illustrated collector's booklet featuring new writing on the film by Kieran Fisher

Doom Asylum | Blu-ray | 16 July 2018 | £24.99

If you thought Sex and the City 2 was a stomach-churner, you ain’t seen nothing yet! Long before playing one of Carrie Bradshaw’s best gal pals, actress Kristen Davis found herself up against an altogether different kind of horror in 1987’s Doom Asylum, a riotous mix of gore, gags and goth girl groups galore! 

When a group of horny teens wind up on the grounds of a creepy abandoned asylum, they think they’ve found the perfect place to party. Little do they know that inside the building’s crumbling walls lurks a freakishly deformed maniac, driven to madness by the tragic loss of his fiancée in a car accident. With an array of grisly surgical tools at his disposal, it’s only a matter of time before the youngsters begin meeting various splattery ends at the hands of the ghoulish Coroner. Helmed by director Richard Friedman (Scared Stiff and Phantom of the Mall: Eric’s Revenge), and also starring Penthouse Pet of the Year 1988 Patty Mullen (Frankenhooker), Doom Asylum combines outlandish gore and a wise-cracking villain to create one of the most wildly entertainingly blood-spattered slashers of the late ’80s.

Special Edition contents:

• Brand new 2K restoration from the original camera negative
• High Definition Blu-ray (1080p) presentation
• 1.85:1 and 1.33:1 versions of the feature
• Original uncompressed PCM mono audio
• Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
• Brand new audio commentary with screenwriter Rick Marx
• Brand new audio commentary with The Hysteria Continues
• Tina’s Terror – a brand new interview with actress Ruth Collins
• Movie Madhouse – a brand new interview with director of photography Larry Revene
• Morgues & Mayhem – a brand new interview with special make-up effects creator Vincent J. Guastini
• Archival interviews with producer Alexander W. Kogan, Jr., director Richard Friedman and production manager Bill Tasgal
• Still Gallery
• Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Justin Osbourne
• First pressing only: Fully-illustrated collector’s booklet featuring new writing by Amanda Reyes

The Case of the Scorpion’s Tale | Blu-ray | 16 July 2018 | £24.99

One of the major consequences of Western Europe’s post-war Economic Miracle was the proliferation of international travel. Eager to tap into audiences’ desire to experience the glamour of the jet set lifestyle, the popular filmmakers of the day rushed to make the most of the exotic locales at their disposal. 

Arguably no other giallo captured this trend as vividly as The Case of the Scorpion’s Tail. The film begins in London, where Lisa Baumer (Evelyn Stewart – The Psychic) learns that her husband has died in a freak plane accident. Summoned to Athens to collect his generous life insurance policy, she soon discovers that others besides herself are keen to get their hands on the money – and are willing to kill for it. Meanwhile, private detective Peter Lynch (George Hilton – The Strange Vice of Mrs Wardh) arrives to investigate irregularities in the insurance claim. Teaming up with a beautiful reporter, Cléo Dupont (Anita Strindberg – Your Vice is a Locked Room and Only I Have the Key), Lynch resolves to unearth the truth… before he too ends up on the wrong end of the murderer’s straight razor. 

The second giallo by genre master Sergio Martino (Torso, The Suspicious Death of a Minor), The Case of the Scorpion’s Tail combines stunning views of Athens and the Greek coastline with brutal bursts of violence, a typically tangled script by Ernesto Gastaldi (Death Walks on High Heels), and a cast overflowing with Euro cult talent, including Alberto de Mendoza (A Lizard in a Woman’s Skin), Janine Reynaud (Jess Franco’s Succubus) and Luigi Pistilli (A Bay of Blood).

Special Edition contents:

• Brand new 2K restoration of the film from the original camera negative
• High Definition Blu-ray (1080p) presentation
• Original lossless mono Italian and English soundtracks
• Newly translated English subtitles for the Italian soundtrack
• Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing for the English soundtrack
• Audio commentary with writer Ernesto Gastaldi, moderated by filmmaker Federico Caddeo (in Italian with English subtitles)
• New interview with star George Hilton
• New interview with director Sergio Martino
• New analysis Sergio Martino’s films by Mikel J. Koven, author of La Dolce Morte: Vernacular Cinema and the Italian Giallo Film
• New video essay by Troy Howarth, author of So Deadly, So Perverse: 50 Years of Italian Giallo Films
• Theatrical trailer
• Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Chris Malbon
• First pressing only: Illustrated collector’s booklet featuring new writing on the film by Rachael Nisbet and Howard Hughes, and a biography of star Anita Strindberg by Peter Jilmstad

The Navigator: A Medieval Odyssey | Blu-ray | 23 July 2018 | £24.99

Following the release of his 1984 debut feature Vigil, Vincent Ward returned four years later with The Navigator: A Medieval Odyssey, a film that would cement his position as one of the most exciting filmmaking talents to emerge during the eighties. 

Cumbria, 1348 – the year of the Black Death. Griffin, a young boy, is plagued by apocalyptic visions which he believes could save his village. Encouraging a small band of men to tunnel into the earth, they surface in 1980s New Zealand and a future beyond their comprehension but must complete their quest. 

Nominated for the Palme d’Or at the prestigious Cannes Film Festival, The Navigator: A Medieval Odyssey is a bold and often startling fusion of medieval fantasy and time travel science fiction, quite unlike anything you’ve seen.

Special Edition contents:

• High Definition (Blu-ray) presentation
• Original mono audio (uncompressed LPCM)
• Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard-of-hearing
• Brand-new appreciation by film critic Nick Roddick, recorded exclusively for this release
• Kaleidoscope: Vincent Ward – Film Maker, a 1989 documentary profile of the director made for New Zealand television
• Theatrical trailer 
• First pressing only: Illustrated collector’s booklet featuring new writing on the film by Kim Newman and an introduction by Vincent Ward

Arrow Books May 2018 new release

The Man Who Fell to Earth by Samuel J. Umland | available from 25 May 2018 | £19.99

Celebrated auteur Nicolas Roeg’s The Man Who Fell to Earth is a daring, artistically ambitious science fiction film that was made a full six years before Blade Runner, widely considered a masterwork of British-American cinema. Starring rock icon David Bowie in the title role, the film showcases Roeg’s dazzling, kaleidoscopic style and is at once a mythic parable, a provocative love story, a study of existential loneliness and a compelling portrait of exile and alienation, set in the vast, desolate spaces of the American Southwest.

The critical path into The Man Who Fell to Earth begins with a detailed examination of Walter Tevis’ neglected 1963 source novel, followed by a discussion of the film’s long initial development and unusual production history, culminating in a close analysis of the film itself, exploring its elliptical editing style, its mixed critical reception and its curious legacy. This book is a welcome and much-needed exploration of one of the most haunting and enigmatic science fiction movies ever made.

Samuel J. Umland is an American literary and film critic and academic who has written books on acclaimed writer Philip K. Dick and director Tim Burton. With Rebecca Umland he co-authored the highly praised critical biography, Donald Cammell: A Life on the Wild Side and a book on the Arthurian legend in film.