Messiah of Evil appears in an aspect ratio of approximately 2.35:1 on this Blu-ray Disc. The movie’s press release indicates the 4K scan came from the “best surviving elements”, and that appears to be code for “expect a less than attractive image”.
Which occurred here, as Messiah lacked much visual appeal. Still, I suspect those involved did what they could with the source.
Sharpness turned into a problematic element, as much of the film came across with mediocre delineation. Some shots looked better than others, while others seemed awfully soft, so expect decent but lackluster definition as a whole.
No issues with jagged edges or shimmering occurred, and I saw no edge haloes. A healthy layer of grain implied no problematic use of noise reduction, and print flaws remained isolated to occasional specks or lines but nothing notable.
Messiah brought a palette that emphasized blue and red. The hues tended to feel flat and without much impact. The colors can also seem a little pale at times.
Blacks leaned inky, while shadows offered reasonable clarity. For a low-budget 50-year-old movie, Messiah remained more than watchable, but it didn’t bring anything impressive.
Similar thoughts greeted the movie’s average LPCM monaural audio, as it also suffered from these limitations. Speech sounded a little thin/edgy and came with some awkward looping but the lines were always concise and easily intelligible.
Music lacked much range and occasionally felt a bit shrill, but the score usually showed adequate reproduction. The same went for effects.
Those elements seemed rough in their louder moments but they demonstrated adequate clarity overall. This was a decent track for an older flick.
A few extras appear here, and we open with an audio commentary from film historians Kim Newman and Stephen Thrower. Both sit together for a running, screen-specific look at cast and crew, genre domains, influences and inspirations, sets and locations, production issues and their thoughts about the film.
This becomes a decent but unexceptional chat. While we get a reasonable number of insights, Newman and Thrower devote too much time to their own thoughts about the film.
Some of those seem useful, but I’d prefer more about the production. The men also sometimes appear eager to simply name-drop as many genre films as possible. This leaves us with a listenable but inconsistent discussion.
Recorded in 2018, next comes an Interview with Writer-Director Willard Huyck. An audio-only affair, this runs 37 minutes, 34 seconds.
Created for the “Projection Booth Podcast”, Huyck discusses aspects of his life and career as well as elements related to the creation of Messiah. I like the emphasis on that film and this becomes a quality chat.
What the Blood Moon Brings lasts 56 minutes, 55 seconds. It features film scholars Alexandra Heller-Nicholas, Maitland McDonagh, Guy Adams, Mikel Coven and David Huckvale.
“Moon” examines the movie’s roots and development, influences and genre domains, aspects of the production and thoughts/interpretation related to the movie.
We get a pretty good mix of concrete domains related to the film’s creation as well as introspective insights. These combine to deliver a worthwhile program.
Finally, the disc provides a visual essay from critic Kat Ellinger. It goes for 21 minutes, 31 seconds.
Subtitled “On American Gothic and Female Hysteria”, Ellinger focuses on those topics. She offers good background in those domains and views their connection to Messiah in this engaging piece.
The set also comes with an 80-page booklet. My review copy lacked this text but I wanted to mention it.
As a low-budget 1970s horror movie, one can do worse than Messiah of Evil. However, the presence of American Graffiti screenwriters Willard Huyck and Gloria Katz raises expectations that the film fails to fulfill. The Blu-ray comes with erratic but acceptable picture and audio as well as an assortment of bonus materials. Messiah acts as an intriguing curiosity but it’s not much of a movie.