HOUSE ON STRAW HILL

(A.k.a. EXPOSE; TRAUMA)

The onscreen title is THE HOUSE ON STRAW HILL.

Paul (Udo Kier) is riding high on the back of his successful first novel, "Deadly Silence". He retreats to a remote English country house in a bid to write his follow-up amongst the solitude he feels he needs.

His only distractions on Straw Hill are elderly housekeeper Mrs Aston (Patsy Smart) and his occasional lover Suzanne (Fiona Richmond). Whenever Paul calls the latter over to the house, it’s so she can disrobe and he can fuck her while wearing surgical gloves.

But there’s still a job to be done: writing his new novel. With this in mind, Paul asks his agent to find him a competent typist. Enter Linda (Linda Hayden), who he picks up from the local train station a few days later. This sexy minx garners instant attention from two horny local lads (Karl Howman and Vic Armstrong) – so much so that Paul has to fight them off with an unexpected bit of karate-style showmanship.

Back at the house, Linda settles in quite quickly: she wastes no time in pausing for a quick wank in her bedroom mid-unpacking. Then it’s down to business, and Paul begins dictating prose for Linda to type in the study.

But all is not well. Paul is plagued by bloody nightmares of suicide and screams; Linda shows what she’s capable of when she next encounters the aforementioned horny youths.

What is Linda’s secret and does it explain why she’s taken the job at Straw Hill? Will it tie in with the mystery hidden within the fragments of Paul’s bad dreams? And will Suzanne hurry up and revisit the house to provide this viewer with more big-boobied nakedness?

Following on from producing Jose Ramon Larraz’s unexpectedly successful VAMPYRES, Brian Smedley-Aston turned his hand to writer-director James Kenelm Clarke’s curious thriller.

The producer was wise enough to order more sex in keeping with the trend of the time, and so Fiona Richmond became almost as significant a character as Hayden’s. Certainly, the film’s marketing campaign played heavily on the naked involvement of glamour model Richmond.

Perhaps part of STRAW HILL’s problem is that it attempts to be both thriller and sex film, and doesn’t really deliver enough on either count. I’d wager that the pace is too languid for most thriller fans’ tastes, with only Steve Gray’s occasionally menacing score and brief flashback edits getting close to providing the required frights. In terms of erotica, the scenes of Paul and Suzanne shagging are rough without being sexy; Linda’s masturbation scenes are often offset by some physical threat loitering unseen by her in the background.

Still, that’s me looking at the film from a detractor’s point of view. It’s easy to see why many view upon it as a failure. Personally, however, I’m a fan of this sordid, confused little picture. It’s cheap-looking, certainly, and its wafer-thin plot admittedly does rely too heavily on a twist that a retarded monkey would see coming from the start. But it’s sufficiently weird and quirkily British to qualify as a compellingly flawed variation on STRAW DOGS.

Part of what makes it so watchable is its interesting cast. Can Kier act? I still haven’t decided after all these years, but he oozes strange charisma regardless. His intense, wide-eyed performance is as bizarre as it is riveting – even if his voice was dubbed by an unknown actor in post-production (Udo revealed in a recent Darkside interview that he didn’t go back to dub his own voice, as he still hadn’t been paid for acting in the film).

Hayden is always a joy to watch, and she’s as gleefully mischievous here as she was in the earlier BLOOD ON SATAN’S CLAW. Richmond, meanwhile, was not a natural-born actress but had a body that allowed you to forgive such shortcomings.

Elsewhere, there is of course Howman – who went on to star in TV’s awful sitcom "Brush Strokes" – and Armstrong, who works to this day as a successful Hollywood stuntman. Even Smedley-Aston has a non-speaking, but crucial, cameo role to play …

Shot in Essex with mostly natural lighting, the film doesn’t look particularly handsome but works with the natural charms of the English countryside at its disposal, and manages to emerge as a slight, but endearing and easily watchable dark drama.

First-timers should be warned to keep their expectations of blood and gore in check though: the film was indeed banned in the UK as a video nasty during the 1980s, in a decision that to this day is totally inexplicable. In truth, STRAW HILL is very tame in terms of grisliness.

Severin Films announced quite a few years ago that they'd acquired the rights to this under-represented rough diamond, and since then have struggled to find watchable elements. Over time, there have been tales of a private collector owning a cut print in decent shape, original negatives of the uncut film being located in a water-damaged barn …

Well now, after much searching and even more deliberation, Severin have released the full uncensored version of STRAW HILL onto region-free blu-ray and DVD.

Looking at the blu-ray, the film is presented in the aspect ratio of 1.66:1 and is 16x9 enhanced. A text disclaimer warns of the condition of the materials used for this composite uncut presentation. Certainly, this is a very rough-looking film at times. Water-marks, faded colours, the very occasional vertical line: STRAW HILL hasn’t fared well over the decades.

Still, it must be said that Severin’s restoration efforts are definitely watchable, and this is still the best I’ve ever seen the film look. Blacks are mostly deep and stable, fine grain seems natural and there are little details here and there that I’d never picked up on in previous video and TV screenings. The moments that looked to suffer the most source damage occurred at 30 minutes in, and 44 minutes in. Both are relatively inconsequential scenes of Kier and Hayden chatting, if that’s any consolation.

English 2.0 audio is reliable and clean for the duration of playback.

The disc opens to an animated main menu page. From there, pop-up menus include a scene-selection menu allowing access to the film via 12 chapters.

Extras begin with an excellent audio commentary track from Clarke and Smedley-Aston. Moderated by Jonathan Sothcott, who produced the recent remake STALKER, this finds both chaps on fine form – sarcastic, friendly and blessed with amazing memories for detail. They speak of Hayden’s distaste for the film and put it down to the fact that she overshadowed by Richmond in trailers, remark upon cheeky nods to VAMPYRES, and laud Kier for being a consummate professional. The decision to cast Richmond is also touched upon, along with a fresh insight into her controversial bathroom scene. This really is a great proposition: warm, funny and packed with interesting titbits of information on the production.

"An Angel for Satan" is a 14-minute chat with Hayden, which has previously been available on UK DVD and blu-ray releases of BLOOD ON SATAN’S CLAW. It remains an enjoyable watch, with Hayden looking good and maintaining an agreeable enthusiasm as she recounts her unconventional journey into filmmaking.

The film’s original trailer bears the title EXPOSE and runs at under 2 minutes in length.

The DVD contains all of the above, with the main feature being in standard definition.

The first 3,000 copies of this dual-format combo release also contain a second DVD which houses both parts of David Gregory’s "Ban the Sadist Videos" documentary from 2005. These run for a total of 93 minutes and are as fascinating as they are entertaining. Contributions from critics and video distributors alike are interspersed between footage of many legendary video nasties as their banning is put into acute political perspective. Of course, this documentary was originally available in two parts on Anchor Bay UK’s "Box of the Banned" sets, and has since been trumped by Nucleus Films’ superior VIDEO NASTIES: THE ULTIMATE GUIDE. But it’s still a valid and most enjoyable addition to this set nevertheless.

Finally, a 10-minute featurette entitled "Censors Working Overtime" affords David Flint the opportunity to offer a more direct comment on the whole nasties debacle.

Folk who pre-ordered this release direct from Severin Films’ website also got a strictly limited VHS copy of the film, complete with a reproduction of the original pre-cert UK video’s cover art.

All in all, this is an important release as it preserves STRAW HILL uncut and in HD for generations to come. Severin Films have restored materials that many would have considered to be beyond the point of salvaging. The results are mixed, of course, but their efforts cannot pass by without applause. Those elements will only perish further with time, meaning this really does stand a good chance of being the last chance any of us will get to enjoy this cult film in its entirety.

Recommended.

Review by Stuart Willis