Eyes of Fire (1983), The Shadow of Chikara (1977), Grim Prairie Tales (1990)

[Cujo]

Three fantastic horror westerns that I have on VHS, but would love to get on Blu-ray. Eyes of Fire is my personal favorite and a beautifully shot film. It'd be great to see the original Crying Blue Sky cut, but that's unlikely to ever be released. The Shadow of Chikara is a pretty eerie film that's had a bunch of cheapo (and cut) DVD releases under the title, Curse of Demon Mountain. Seems that music rights might be holding it back from a legit release. Grim Prairie Tales is one of the best horror anthologies, made even better by the fact that it takes place in the old west and features a terrific wraparound with two seasoned actors. These three titles deserve proper releases.

[Thomas Veil]

I haven't seen the other two but Grim Prairie Tales brings back memories. I worked at a video store part time and they used to play previews on a loop and this would come up constantly...finally I rented it and thought it was pretty good. Starred Brad Dourif and James Earl Jones...I think the pregnant lady story was the best. Would be nice to get some sort of release either on DVD or Blu.

[Cujo]

I emailed the director of Grim Prairie Tales saying that it'd be cool to have the film hit Blu-ray and asking if he knew who owns the rights. His response:

Dear Justin,

You’re so right. You can get boot-leg Chinese dubs from the video on DVD, I bought some around 2000 when they became available hoping they’d be the genuine article. Instead — I think the 20 year license on the video ran out and people took that as a field day to start dubbing. As you know, Janusz Kaminiski shot my film and did wondrous work. The producer, you can get his name from the box, is the copyright owner as far as I know. He’s a Pepsi employee in Philadelphia — but it’s been 15 years since I’ve heard of him. The Oscars wanted to get original footage for a life-time award presentation for James Earl Jones, I couldn’t help them much more than I’m helping you.

I won a court case entitling me to video masters & prints for my own personal use and promotion but was never able to extract them from the Producer.

Thanks for writing, good hunting.

If the producer is as stingy as he sounds, it doesn't bode well for a release.