‘The Stuff’ 4K UHD Blu-ray Review: Arrow Video

Author-director Larry Cohen’s The Stuff takes goal at consumerism, promoting, and right-wing paranoia, and although excessive on the gore quotient, it isn’t actually a horror film. Utilizing its high-concept sci-fi premise—an evil company mass markets a sentient yogurt-like product that slowly takes over its client’s thoughts and physique—to floor its supercharged satire, The Stuff is the Catch-22 of alien-invasion films, made three years earlier than Chuck Russell’s remake of Irvin S. Yeaworth Jr.’s The Blob. Solely right here the risk comes effervescent up by way of the bottom quite than from past the celebs.

Within the early levels of its takeover, the Stuff proves extremely addictive, taking part in on the notion that firms knowingly peddle dangerous merchandise to unsuspecting shoppers. It additionally factors out that consumerism itself is akin to dependancy. Hooked customers find yourself being often called “Stuffies.” All through, Cohen takes on the glib superficiality of latest promoting, all the way down to its endlessly repetitive earworm jingles. The movie’s spot-on fake adverts incorporate among the most iconic signifiers of the period—graffiti artwork, leg heaters, and so forth—together with “testimonials” from celebrities, together with Abe Vigoda and Clara Peller in a parody of the latter’s “The place’s the meat?” marketing campaign for Wendy’s.

Elsewhere, the plight of younger Jason (Scott Bloom), who battles again as his household slowly succumbs to the depredation of the Stuff, gives a darkish commentary on the “household values” vociferously espoused by the Reagan administration. As in lots of ’80s films, from Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining to Bob Balaban’s Dad and mom, the nuclear household proves liable to detonate in some type of murderous rage. Right here that anger is channeled into the necessity to conform—to imagine the mantle of the best household as seen in quite a few tv adverts.

The subsequent clay pigeon Cohen units his sights on is using discuss radio to unfold misinformation. (These days, in fact, the web serves a similar goal.) Right here that’s embodied by right-wing militia chief Colonel Malcolm Grommett Spears (Paul Sorvino), who owns the technique of his personal distribution by controlling a number of Southern radio stations. Spears comes throughout like a mixture of Dr. Strangelove’s Colonel Jack D. Ripper, contemplating their shared fixation on fluoridation, and a venomous political commentator alongside the traces of Rush Limbaugh.

Past its satirical marksmanship, The Stuff is one other Cohen car for the deliriously jazzy riffing of actor Michael Moriarty, the quirky John Wayne to Cohen’s sardonic John Ford, not less than when it comes to career-spanning actor-director partnerships. Moriarty had already starred because the hysterical small-time criminal (and part-time pianist) Jimmy Quinn in 1982’s Q: The Winged Serpent. He would go on to headline three extra Cohen productions. Moriarty stars right here as company spy David “Mo” Rutherford. As he fortunately explains to everybody he encounters, he acquired that nickname as a result of “when individuals give me cash, I all the time need mo’.” A few of Moriarty’s throwaway traces in The Stuff are actually impressed, like “Everyone has to eat shaving cream from time to time.” This has undoubtedly develop into someone’s private mantra.

Picture/Sound

Arrow Video presents The Stuff in a brand new 2160p 4K switch, sourced from the unique 35mm digicam destructive, that appears merely unbelievable. There’s a major increase to the movie’s shiny and glossy shade scheme in comparison with earlier house video releases, particularly the purples, pinks, and whites that represent the Stuff’s advertising and marketing marketing campaign. Advantageous particulars of décor and costume boldly stand out, high-quality movie grain holds true all through, and black ranges in just a few key nighttime scenes seem deep and totally uncrushed. Audio is available in an English LPCM mono combine that sounds wonderful, clearly conveying dialogue and the at occasions hyperactive sound design.

Extras

For this launch, Arrow has unearthed the pre-release model of The Stuff, which runs a complete half-hour longer, with extra fake commercials, prolonged scenes, all new scenes that assist to flesh out the connection between Michael Moriarity and Andrea Marcovicci’s characters specifically, and a wholly completely different rating. Particularly potent is the ultimate picture: a billboard promoting a package deal of the Stuff that’s being consumed by flames in sluggish movement.

For a deep dive into all issues Cohen, there are an entertaining archival commentary observe, an intensive making-of documentary with Cohen and different crew members, and an interview utilizing materials shot for the 2017 documentary King Cohen. There’s some inevitable overlap right here, however the tales are all fascinating and sometimes hilarious. Cohen is all the time an enviable raconteur.

A far-ranging new audio commentary options critics David Flint and Adrian Smith, who delve into Cohen’s profession in movie and TV, situate The Stuff in context with different sci-fi films of the period like John Carpenter’s The Factor, and share tidbits concerning the movie’s manufacturing historical past that aren’t touched on elsewhere. Additionally included is forty second Road Reminiscences, a feature-length documentary concerning the rise and fall of the Deuce, that includes a formidable array of producers, filmmakers, distributors, actors, together with, in fact, Cohen. Of especial curiosity to cinephiles would be the mini-profiles of assorted theaters and their programming proclivities.

General

Larry Cohen’s The Stuff is a barbed satire of Eighties client tradition.