The Visitor (1979)

[Ill_Be_Back]

From the Press Release

"Drafthouse Films, the film distribution arm of the Alamo Drafthouse Cinema, announced today the acquisition of North American rights to '70s phantasmagoric sci-fi/horror/action/??? hybrid The Visitor. Legendary Hollywood director/actor John Huston (The Maltese Falcon; Treasure Of The Sierra Madre) stars as an intergalactic warriorbattling alongside a cosmic Christ figure against a demonic eight-year-old girl and her pet hawk, as the fate of the universe hangs in the balance. A new HD restoration from the original film materials is planned for a theatrical, home video and multi Video On Demand/Digital platform release later in the year.

In the dawn of '70s American blockbusters, European production companies emerged stateside, attempting to recreate box office gold by cloning Hollywood. The infamous Supreme Court-banned Jaws copy Great White, The Exorcist-esque Beyond The Door, and countless otherswere packaged for export and the burgeoning drive-in circuit. Producer Ovidio G. Assonitis and Director/Professional Body Builder Michael J. Paradise's TheVisitorstands as perhaps the most ambitious of all, taking its inspiration by artfully fusing The Omen, Close Encounters Of The Third Kind, The Birds, Rosemary's Baby, The Fury and Star Wars alongside a baffling cast that includes Shelley Winters (NightOfTheHunter), Glenn Ford (Superman), Lance Henriksen (Aliens), Franco Nero (Django) and Sam Peckinpah (director of TheWildBunch).

The result is not so much a carbon copy, but rather an entertainingly hallucinatory and inscrutable mash-up that repertory cinema programmers around the country have rediscovered for late-night bookings. "Just when you think you've nailed down which direction the film is heading in, it completely shatters your notion of the time-space continuum," says LA art-house The Cinefamily. At the time of its original release, TheVisitoruniversally received poor reviews by mainstream critics including TV Guide who simply called it "junk," but now, the film stands as "the Mount Everest of insane '70s Italian movies" (Mondo Digital).

"This film is from another time, another place and another wholly different dimension," says Drafthouse Films Creative Director Evan Husney, "and contains the highest JDPM (jaw-drops-per-minute) ratio out of any movie we have ever encountered. The Visitor is a repertory mainstay at the Alamo Drafthouse and is truly one of the most joyfully delirious theatrical experiences we've unleashed on our audiences. The world wasn't ready for this film in 1979, and it still may not be. Regardless, we are ecstatic to be able to reintroduce cinema's most colossally bizarro achievement. Ever."

The deal was negotiated by COO James Emanuel Shapiro on behalf of Drafthouse Films and Fabrizio Gionaon behalf of the film's rights holder, producer Ovidio G. Assonitis."

Source

[MTRodaba2468]

I will have to look into this...

[The Phantom Goat]

This is really a great little forgotten movie.

I saw a screening of the print they'll be using for the theatrical showings, and it looks pretty good.

[WesReviews]

I thought Code Red had the home video rights for something like 10 years?

[PowellPressburger]

I always loves the Poster Art... Does this mean we could see a possible BLU release or do they need to find a home video distributor?

Visitor.jpg

[sethdlh]

Originally Posted by PowellPressburger

I always loves the Poster Art... Does this mean we could see a possible BLU release or do they need to find a home video distributor?

Drafthouse films has already released some blus before so I'm assuming a distributor isn't an issue.

[iamnoone]

Code Red made a statement that they do indeed still have the rights to the film so we shall see what happens. He also said it was a poor seller on DVD which I can believe considering it was a bomb in theaters and even the VHS was always worthless even though it was a very hard to find tape for many years. I find it amusing, though, that as soon as Drafthouse announces it, all the hipsters come out of the woodwork as if they just discovered some lost euro-cult flick.

[pro-bassoonist]

Originally Posted by iamnoone

Code Red made a statement that they do indeed still have the rights to the film so we shall see what happens.

Yes, indeed. This is what was said

Pro-B

[PowellPressburger]

Originally Posted by sethdlh

Drafthouse films has already released some blus before so I'm assuming a distributor isn't an issue.

Really? I must own 0 of them Oh well whoever owns the rights there is always room for another bizare bad B Movie release on BLU.

[sethdlh]

Originally Posted by PowellPressburger

Really? I must own 0 of them Oh well whoever owns the rights there is always room for another bizare bad B Movie release on BLU.

Yup. I highly suggest Miami Connection for really fun 80s cheese with rock n roll ninjas.

[Mykol Gantt]

Originally Posted by iamnoone

Code Red made a statement that they do indeed still have the rights to the film

And not doing anything with them. Hopefully Drafthouse Films will come out the winner in this.

[ScorpionReleasing]

Originally Posted by Mykol Gantt

And not doing anything with them. Hopefully Drafthouse Films will come out the winner in this.

I am no longer involved with Code Red, but they released it on DVD, the uncut version, with tons of extras, with commentaries and on camera with the two female stars and the producer, so I am not sure what you mean by they are doing nothing with it. You can still buy it from them, as it is still in print. And when they had a nation wide distributor solicit this title, the title did not sell that well, so they did all they can to put the word out.

[ScorpionReleasing]

Originally Posted by iamnoone

I find it amusing, though, that as soon as Drafthouse announces it, all the hipsters come out of the woodwork as if they just discovered some lost euro-cult flick.

I always thought Code Red was crazy for always making comments similar to this, but my god, I am actually witnessing this first hand now.

Kinda makes me wonder what happens if Drafthouse announces say WOMBLING FREE, one of my worst selling titles.

[manicsounds]

Code Red still hasn't made the upgrade to Bluray, have they? In addition, many of their older releases were reaquired by Scorpion, that's why most of their more recent releases have gone unnoticed around here, which is a shame.

[iamnoone]

Originally Posted by Mykol Gantt

And not doing anything with them. Hopefully Drafthouse Films will come out the winner in this.

So, since Code Red isn't doing a Blu or doing theatrical screenings, any other company should win out just because they like the film more or want to do more with it??? Hey, I don't know the legalities in this situation so we shall see who really has the rights, but if Drafthouse comes out the "winner", they'll probably lose their shirt on any Blu release of this film anyway and would be lucky to move 2,000 units. And it's not like Code Red hasn't done anything with the film. They licensed it years ago when no one else wanted it and released a relatively extras-filled DVD of the film a few years ago, which you can still buy (and apparently they lost a lot of money licensing and restoring this film). There are a lot of cult-film hipsters and cult-film revival screeners out there now that act like they are the only ones who know these films and are discovering every cult film from the past, as if they have never been seen before by anyone. And then the young hipster audiences do show up so that they can feel that they are part of this cool underground fringe appreciation society that can show up at midnight and laugh hysterically at a 30-year-old euro-horror film. And, therefore, the revival theater guys who are more hip than everyone else and want to release the movie on Blu and show it at their theater, they really should legally win, right?

I saw THE VISITOR in a practically empty theater when it first came out (doubt many people here can brag about that, as if they'd even want to, or were even born yet), and the film really sucked then, just as it does now. Probably even MORE now as it's now the LONGER original version! But now the in-hipsters that run a theater tell you it's the wackiest euro-trash flick ever that you've never seen, and the lines will go around the block and it's another instant cult classic. This whole TROLL 2 or THE APPLE rediscovery-type scenario is getting really boring these days, as the flock of 20-something lemmings show up, laugh their a***es off, and immediately christen every film from the 80's that is screened as some forgotten or lost worst movie ever.

That said, I will second and third the recommendations for Alamo's MIAMI CONNECTION blu or dvd. Definitely a cult film that needed to be rediscovered and hadn't been seen in many years. Kudos to them on that one. THE VISITOR is pretty old news, though. It just looks like they are trying to create another new "bad lost movie discovery" scenario for a movie that's been quite easy to see for decades, and directing their marketing at the same hipsters who will always eat up anything they're fed because they feel so elite that they went to a screening of THE VISITOR on a Saturday night instead of something like IRONMAN 3. Not that there's anything wrong with profiting off a small, but passionate audience - it's the American way - so all the power to them, I suppose.

[ScorpionReleasing]

Originally Posted by iamnoone

So, since Code Red isn't doing a Blu or doing theatrical screenings, any other company should win out just because they like the film more or want to do more with it??? Hey, I don't know the legalities in this situation so we shall see who really has the rights, but if Drafthouse comes out the "winner", they'll probably lose their shirt on any Blu release of this film anyway and would be lucky to move 2,000 units. And it's not like Code Red hasn't done anything with the film. They licensed it years ago when no one else wanted it and released a relatively extras-filled DVD of the film a few years ago, which you can still buy (and apparently they lost a lot of money licensing and restoring this film). There are a lot of cult-film hipsters and cult-film revival screeners out there now that act like they are the only ones who know these films and are discovering every cult film from the past, as if they have never been seen before by anyone. And then the young hipster audiences do show up so that they can feel that they are part of this cool underground fringe appreciation society that can show up at midnight and laugh hysterically at a 30-year-old euro-horror film. And, therefore, the revival theater guys who are more hip than everyone else and want to release the movie on Blu and show it at their theater, they really should legally win, right?

I saw THE VISITOR in a practically empty theater when it first came out (doubt many people here can brag about that, as if they'd even want to, or were even born yet), and the film really sucked then, just as it does now. Probably even MORE now as it's now the LONGER original version! But now the in-hipsters that run a theater tell you it's the wackiest euro-trash flick ever that you've never seen, and the lines will go around the block and it's another instant cult classic. This whole TROLL 2 or THE APPLE rediscovery-type scenario is getting really boring these days, as the flock of 20-something lemmings show up, laugh their a***es off, and immediately christen every film from the 80's that is screened as some forgotten or lost worst movie ever.

That said, I will second and third the recommendations for Alamo's MIAMI CONNECTION blu or dvd. Definitely a cult film that needed to be rediscovered and hadn't been seen in many years. Kudos to them on that one. THE VISITOR is pretty old news, though. It just looks like they are trying to create another new "bad lost movie discovery" scenario for a movie that's been quite easy to see for decades, and directing their marketing at the same hipsters who will always eat up anything they're fed because they feel so elite that they went to a screening of THE VISITOR on a Saturday night instead of something like IRONMAN 3. Not that there's anything wrong with profiting off a small, but passionate audience - it's the American way - so all the power to them, I suppose.

[fuzzymctiger]

Code Red most likely retain the DVD rights still, and Drafthouse might have blu-ray only rights.

But this films is so bonkers, glad to see it coming to blu ray, I always thought the original elements were missing or something. Glad to upgrade the Code Red disc.

They showed it once recently in Australia, but it had some godawful comedy commentary live over it, so I didn't see it.

Hope they do one of the special sets for it, would love that poster.

[iamnoone]

Originally Posted by fuzzymctiger

They showed it once recently in Australia, but it had some godawful comedy commentary live over it, so I didn't see it.

My argument rests. Dumb hipster laugh-track commentary over the film, even in Australia!!! At least you were smart enough to avoid it. Good job.

I do agree that THE VISITOR is fun and bonkers in many ways. Worth seeing for real cult-movie fans, for sure. But I've never been a fan of those unfunny low-end Mystery Science Theater derogatory-type quip comment tracks (let the hate come upon me for that anti-MST3K comment) as they just seem like dumb laugh-tracks. It seems that the majority of people who frequent bad-movie-screenings or watch MST3K are not primarily genre movie fans, either, but only want to laugh at something dumb just as they do when they watch all their favorite cheap sitcoms on tv. I need no part of that laugh-track community.

Just give me the DVD, or Blu, from whomever. I don't need anyone to tell me when to laugh, or what movie is some undiscovered bad-movie classic.

[TJS_Blu]

Originally Posted by PowellPressburger

Really? I must own 0 of them Oh well whoever owns the rights there is always room for another bizare bad B Movie release on BLU.

Hmm, Bullhead and Klown in recent past. Pieta next month. Pretty awesome boutique label. Damn, I think I just blew my hipster cover.

[reece]

Originally Posted by ScorpionReleasing

I always thought Code Red was crazy for always making comments similar to this, but my god, I am actually witnessing this first hand now.

Kinda makes me wonder what happens if Drafthouse announces say WOMBLING FREE, one of my worst selling titles.

I bought Wombling Free!! Scorpion rules...can't wait for Monster Club!