(CAUTION! Potential SPOILER in this review for those who don’t know the film’s “gimmick”)

In S&MAN (now on DVD and Blu-ray under Magnolia Home Entertainment’s Magnet banner), J.T. Petty—the writer/director of SOFT FOR DIGGING, MIMIC: SENTINEL and THE BURROWERS—examines underground horror, voyeurism and the connections between sex and violence in the genre. This interesting, albeit uneven, mix of fact and fiction is presented as a documentary, but combines actual interviews with real people and professionals with a fabricated storyline involving a made-up director whose snuff films may be the real deal.

You have already seen THE HUMAN CENTIPEDE. Regardless of whether or not you’ve actually watched the film itself, the movie you’ve conjured up within your imagination has undoubtedly been playing on heavy rotation in your own cerebral cineplex ever since you first heard of Tom Six’s moderately controversial high-concept monstrosity. Now here’s the rub: The film you’ve made in your mind is far gorier, far more grotesque and potentially far better than the one Six committed to celluloid.

The original 30 DAYS OF NIGHT movie was a breath of fresh air. At the time of its release, there hadn’t been a good down-and-dirty vampire flick in quite some time, and this one embraced the primal nature of the lore and gave us plenty of fangs and blood, with no sunlit-glittering vamps to be found. It was also fairly faithful to the original Steve Niles/Ben Templesmith comics, with the exception of a few small subplots—and in this writer’s opinion, the film improved upon their human drama. So it should come as no surprise that the follow-up series 30 DAYS OF NIGHT: DARK DAYS would go before the cameras too—and unfortunately, it is a dark day indeed for this direct-to-disc sequel.

I don’t think I’m alone when I say that I’ve had enough vampires and zombies. For now. It’s just…enough. So when I received word that I’d be checking this one out, I immediately pulled up the trailer, and was surprised to find myself looking forward to SUCK (out on DVD and Blu-ray September 28 from E1 Entertainment). Writer/director/lead actor Rob Stefaniuk has combined sharp cheese with dry wit to bring you…what? A comedy about a vampire rock band, yes. But before you shunt this effort off into I-Hate-Vampires Land, consider this for a moment…

Way back in 1962, the year he warned America that Medicare would lead to socialism and the destruction of American democracy, Ronald Reagan switched political parties and famously said, “I didn’t leave the Democratic party; my party left me.” Five years later, in 1967, the former B-movie actor become governor of California; one year after that, in 1968, George A. Romero’s NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD was released and changed the face of modern horror cinema forever.

In the course of a single year, Werner Herzog has unleashed a pair of peculiar potboilers in quick succession: BAD LIEUTENANT: PORT OF CALL—NEW ORLEANS and MY SON, MY SON, WHAT HAVE YE DONE—two films that announce to their audience of devotees that we are now a far cry from the preferred rough country of FITZCARRALDO. Though the Urubamba River makes a guest plotline appearance in MY SON (on DVD September 14 from First Look), Herr Werner has traded in his Amazonian stamping grounds for the vastly bland urban wasteland of southern California, leading one to speculate that Herzog himself has now suddenly become the fish out of water for once, rather than the parade of hubristic protagonists from his films past.

Rarely does a film make me wish I had paid more attention in high school. I read Oscar Wilde’s THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY in 10th grade—well, kind of read it. As memory serves, I skimmed it and relied heavily on CliffsNotes for quizzes. However, upon first viewing this latest screen adaptation (on DVD and Blu-ray from E1 Entertainment), I was compelled to get a copy of the book and read it once again, this time paying attention. I then watched DORIAN GRAY (yeah, the filmmakers dropped “the picture”) a second time, feeling far more informed. But not only did the film influence me to revisit the source material, it stands up on its own as a fine movie.