BLACK PAST

A disarming prologue sequence is based in October 1978, when a father went apeshit in the family home, hacking his wife and daughter to death with an axe.

Then we jump to present times, and meet mullet-sporting teenager Thommy (Olaf Ittenbach). He’s just moved into the very same house with his parents.

Thommy doesn’t get on with his stepmother. Nor does he enjoy it at his new school, where he struggles to win the attention of resident beauty Petra (Andrea Arbter) and gets beaten up by the cool kids.

At least he has one friend, Frankie (Andre Stryi). Thommy invites Frankie round for a sleepover and visits his new home’s basement in search of a spare fold-out bed. While searching, he also finds an old suitcase bound in chains. Apparently, the stepmother informs him, it must’ve belonged to the house’s previous owner.

Intrigued, Thommy goes back to the suitcase later and pries it open. Inside he finds an old journal, which he and Frankie read later that evening.

"Today I have killed my family in the most horrific of ways" reads the book, after explaining how its author had become possessed by an evil power contained within a mirror found in the house. And, would you believe it, the mirror still remains there. Unperturbed by its apparent evilness, Thommy takes a shine to it and hangs it on his bedroom wall ...

The following morning, Thommy resolves to get talking to his love interest Petra. Things seem to be going well and he actually looks happy for once. Back at home, it’s a different story – he’s getting increasingly sick of the constant bickering from his sister and stepmother.

Unfortunately when he invites Petra round she is the first to realise the hold the mirror has over those who look into it – and suffers fatally as a consequence.

Thommy’s devastated. So much so that he starts dreaming of her return from the grave, and is sent slowly but surely deranged. And, when he gets his hands on a chain saw, this spells bad news for those around him ...

Elements of THE BOGEYMAN and THE EVIL DEAD are plain to see in young Ittenbach’s directorial debut. But if he wears his influences brazenly on his sleeve, that’s not such a bad thing. He at least keeps his screenplay straightforward and simple, and knows even at this tender stage in his career how to execute devastatingly effective gore sequences.

Foam latex and corn syrup are employed with wild abandon to produce lots of satisfyingly squishy set-pieces sequences, such as car crash fatalities, axes to the face, dismemberment, decapitations ... They all look rather crude, but in an agreeably "video nasty" fashion.

Considering the limited means he apparently had while filming this video production, Ittenbach does a superb job of working round his limitations with inventive camerawork, slick editing and atmospheric artificial lighting.

A decent sombre score and a rather unusual (for its era) sober tone lend BLACK PAST further gravitas. There’s only its uneven pace – it does drag at times, seemingly filled with non-scenes just to bolster its running time to feature length – and tendency to nod to other films, that prevent it from achieving the same nihilistic impact as, say, NEKROMANTIK.

BLACK PAST comes to DVD fully uncut, courtesy of our friends at Another World Entertainment.

It looks good in its original 4:3 aspect ratio, exhibiting strong natural colour schemes and respectable depth. Images are a tad smooth and there is a slightly washed-out look to the picture overall, but considering the film was shot on video for peanuts in 1989, it’s fared remarkably well. Any issues with the picture quality are certainly not a reflection on the disc’s mastering.

German audio comes in choices of 2.0 and a rather synthetic 5.1 mix. Both are adequate though, and optional subtitles are provided in six different languages, including English. The subtitles are easy to read and offer excellent translation.

All menus are static aside from an animated scene-selection menu which allows access to BLACK PAST via 8 chapters.

The DVD’s cover fails to mention the inclusion of any bonus features. However, there are some on offer – and they’re almost identical to those found on Another World’s new PREMUTOS disc:

Two "TV specials", both taking a brief but entertaining look at the works of Ittenbach, kick off the extras. They both come with German audio and optional English subtitles, along with some interviews and nice behind-the-scenes footage of his films. The first segment is 4 minutes in length; the second is more substantial at 12 minutes, taking a gander at the director’s novel approach to no-budget FX wizardry (he’s very talented in this respect).

From there, we get a few "early clips". These are priceless snippets of very primitive, shot-on-video horror scenes from the director’s early days. Most of them look like crap, but there’s lots of cheesy gore to be enjoyed regardless. Aside from a brief video introduction from Ittenbach, there’s precious dialogue in this thoroughly enjoyable 7-minute featurette, but English subtitles are once again on hand anyway.

Next up are the original trailers for PREMUTOS and GARDEN OF LOVE. With subtitles? Of course!

Finally, we get trailers for other titles in the Another World roster, which on this occasion include PENANCE, GROTESQUE, INTRUDER, REYKJAVIK WHALE WATCHING MASSACRE and PLAGUE TOWN. They’re all presented with English audio aside from GROTESQUE (Japanese with subtitles), and an on-screen disclaimer advises us before viewing that the presentations here are not indicative of the fully remastered versions of each film that Another World offer on DVD. Indeed, the quality of these trailers is a hodgepodge of the good, the bad and – in the case of GROTESQUE – the downright ugly.

BLACK PAST is an above average example of the type of no-budget video splatter fests that came on to the market in the late 1980s (it’s so much better than the same year’s VIOLENT SHIT). It’s full of literally eye-popping gore and demonstrates yet again that Ittenbach has a ton of imagination, along with a fair degree of style when he puts his mind to it.

If you like your films grisly and don’t care for the polish of mainstream cinema, you should find plenty to enjoy here.

Review by Stuart Willis