The Thrill Killers

The Thrill Killers. Ray Dennis Steckler, 1965.

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Edition screened: Included in Severin Blu-ray box set The Incredibly Strange Films of Ray Dennis Steckler, released 2002. English language. Runtime approximately 70 minutes.

Summary: No animals or references to animals in the film.

The Severin release also includes the re-release cut of The Thrill Killers called The Maniacs Are Loose!  Skip it. It’s the complete original film prefaced with a staggeringly boring six-minute introduction by real hypnotist Ormond McGill. McGill encourages the audience to submit to voluntary hypnosis which will allow them to see real maniacs rampaging in the theatre when cued by a swirling disc graphic cut into the film. He slowly explains this process about four times. Indeed, the swirling disc is inserted into the film for a few seconds during crescendos of violence. This re-release tour of re-titled The Thrill Killers featured actors running in the theatre isles with prop weapons during Swirly Disc Time, a stunt Steckler employed for other films that had worn out their welcomes.

Sleep (Venus)

Sleep (Schlaf). Michael Venus, 2020.

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Edition screened: Arrow Blu-ray, released 2021. German language with English subtitles. Runtime approximately 102 minutes.

Summary: No particular depictions of violence or harm to animals. 

Details: When Mona first comes to the village of Stainbach she encounters Lore in a shed cutting a piece of meat from a suspended carcass. This two-second act is not bloody, alarming or the focus of the scene. 

Emanuelle and the Last Cannibals

Emanuelle and the Last Cannibals. Joe D’Amato, 1977.

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Edition screened: Included in Severin Blu-ray box set The Sensual World of Black Emanuelle, released 2023. English language with original Italian as an option. Runtime approximately 93 minutes.

Summary: A constrictor drops from a branch and wraps around Laura Gemser, followed at 34:22 by a one-second close-up of the snake being shot.  2/5❤

Edge of the Knife

Edge of the Knife (SGaawaay K'uuna). Gwaai Edenshaw and Helen Haig-Brown, 2018.

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Edition screened: Included in Severin Blu-ray box set All the Haunts Be Ours: A Compendium of Folk Horror Volume 2, released 2024. Haida language with English subtitles. Runtime approximately 101 minutes.

Summary: The film includes several scenes in which ocean fish, freshly caught but dead, are cut by the skilled hands of 19th-century Pacific Canadian native people. There is no beheading, gutting or other intentionally disgusting details.

Edge of the Knife is a captivating story that weaves realistic social drama with tribal mythology. It is the first feature film in the Haida language, which survives with only a few dozen native speakers.

The culturally sympathetic films Haida Carver (1964) and Nalujuk Night (2021) are included on the disc. 

Born of Fire

Born of Fire. Jamil Dehlavi, 1987.

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Edition screened: Included in Severin Blu-ray box set All the Haunts Be Ours: A Compendium of Folk Horror Volume 2, released 2024. English language. Runtime approximately 84 minutes.

Summary: No particular depictions of violence to animals.

The Born of fire BD in the box set also features Dehlavi’s 1975 Towers of Silence and 1985 Qâf.

3 from Hell

3 from Hell. Rob Zombie, 2019.

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Edition screened: Included in Lionsgate Rob Zombie Trilogy Blu-ray set, released 2020. English language. Runtime approximately 115 minutes.

Summary: No particular depictions of violence or harm to animals.

I enjoyed the previous two associated titles but was disappointed by 3 from Hell. 

The Rob Zombie Trilogy also includes House of 1,000 Corpses and The Devil’s Rejects, each on an individual Blu-ray. You might enjoy clicking those links.

The Blot

The Blot. Lois Weber, 1921.

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Edition screened: Milestone DVD, released 2003. English intertitles, no dialogue track. Runtime approximately 91 minutes.

Summary: Early in the film a college student produces a small lizard with a string tied to it and places the animal on a classmate’s shoe during a lecture. There is no rough handling of the lizard or indication that it was harmed in fact or in the context of the film.

Blood-A-Rama Triple Frightmare

Blood-A-Rama Triple Frightmare. Various directors, 1970-1974.

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Edition screened: AGFA Blu-ray, released 2021. English language. Combined runtime approximately 251 minutes.

Summary: Help Me . . . I’m Possessed includes an unemotional statement about a mutilated cat with no visual content. The Night of the Strangler includes the murder of a snake. Carnival of Blood has no cruelty to or comments about animals.

The AGFA set includes a fun 20-minute compilation of vintage drive-in snipes and three feature films:

Help Me . . . I’m Possessed (Charles Nizet, 1974)

The Night of the Strangler (Joy N. Houck, Jr. 1972)

Carnival of Blood (Leonard Kirtman, 1970)

Carnival of Blood

Carnival of Blood. Leonard Kirtman, 1970.

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Edition screened: Included on AGFA Blu-ray Blood-A-Rama Triple Frightmare, released 2021. English language. Runtime approximately 87 minutes.

Summary: No particular depictions of violence or harm to animals.

Emanuelle Around the World

Emanuelle Around the World (Emanuelle - Perché violenza alle donne?). Joe D’Amato, 1977.

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Edition screened: Included in Severin Blu-ray box set The Sensual World of Black Emanuelle, released 2023. English language with original Italian as an option. Runtime approximately 102 minutes.

Summary: Sexual use of animals. 2.5/5❤

Details:

1) A snake crawls on the groin of a nude bound woman, 1:07:50-1:08:50

2) Depiction of a German Shepherd sexually assaulting the same woman, 1:09:26-1:10:25.

L’enfance nue

L’enfance nue (Naked Childhood). Maurice Pialat, 1968.

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Edition screened: Criterion DVD #534, released 2010. French language with English subtitles. Runtime approximately 83 minutes.

Summary: Depicted murder of a nice house cat.

Details:

1) We meet a gentle black cat early in the film as he sits on a little girl’s lap watching her and her adopted brother play a game. From 5:36-5:50 the cat tries to cling to the banister for his life as the brother drops him down the deep stairwell of an apartment building. We see a cat, possibly injured, hobbling away 6:07-6:10.

2) The psychopathic brother said he would care for the injured cat but just puts him in a box outside. He removes the dead cat from the box at 12:52 and tosses him over a bank with trash at 13:14.

The balance of the film is an enjoyable social drama about the difficulties faced by well-intentioned foster families. L’enfance nue is Pialat’s first film and the director has fallen for junior high school drivel that animal cruelty is a writer’s tool to develop character. As always, bullshit, no excuse, and shame on him. The entire film is about showing the child’s malignant character through other diverse anecdotes that are interesting, persuasive, and sometimes humorous or thought-provoking. Pialat should not have led with the most over-used and ignominious method.

Help Me . . . I’m Possessed

Help Me . . . I’m Possessed. Charles Nizet, 1974.

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Edition screened: Included on AGFA Blu-ray Blood-A-Rama Triple Frightmare, released 2021. English language. Runtime approximately 76 minutes.

Summary: Early in the film we see a black cat and a white mouse abiding peacefully together in a small wire cage, the result of the psychiatrist’s experiments to expel violence from the mind. Much later we hear a report that the cat was found shredded to pieces, presumably the victim of the violent mouse. No visual content or details.

The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies!!?

The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies!!? Ray Dennis Steckler, 1963.

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Edition screened: Included in Severin Blu-ray box set The Incredibly Strange Films of Ray Dennis Steckler, released 2002. English language. Runtime approximately 82 minutes.

Summary: No particular depictions of violence or harm to animals.

Manderlay

Manderlay. Lars von Trier, 2005.

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Edition screened: IFC DVD, released 2006. English language. Runtime approximately 139 minutes.

Summary: A brief dream-like vignette of a horse running in the distance while on fire, 1:48:32-1:48:37.

The Nightside of the Sky

The Nightside of the Sky. Rhayne Vermette, 2023.

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Edition screened: Included with The White Reindeer (disc 3) in Severin Blu-ray box set All the Haunts Be Ours: A Compendium of Folk Horror Volume 2, released 2024. No spoken audio track. Runtime approximately 5 minutes.

Summary: No depictions of violence or harm to animals.

The Reluctant Icon: A Tribute to Laura Gemser

The Reluctant Icon: A Tribute to Laura Gemser. Kier-La Janisse, 2023.

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Edition screened: Included with Black Emanuelle (disc 1) in Severin Blu-ray box set The Sensual World of Black Emanuelle, released 2023. English language. Runtime approximately 19 minutes.

Summary: No particular depictions of violence or harm to animals.

Swimmer

Swimmer. Carter Lord, 1973.

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Edition screened: Included with The Enchanted (disc 2) in Severin Blu-ray box set All the Haunts Be Ours: A Compendium of Folk Horror Volume 2, released 2024. English language. Runtime approximately 24 minutes.

Summary: No particular depictions of violence or harm to animals.

A documentary about artist Don Seiler’s creation of a concrete sculpture for the International Swimming Hall of Fame, Fort Lauderdale.

A Tribute to Karin Schubert: The 'Nackedei' Actress

A Tribute to Karin Schubert: The 'Nackedei' Actress. Kier-La Janisse, 2023.

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Edition screened: Included with Emanuelle Around the World in Severin Blu-ray box set The Sensual World of Black Emanuelle, released 2023. English language. Runtime approximately 19 minutes.

Summary: No particular depictions of violence or harm to animals.