‘Nightbreed’ Screening at HorrorHound Weekend!

More Decker please!!!

And in other holy sh!t news, an uncut version of Clive Barker’s Nightbreed will be screened at HorrorHound Weekend in Indianapolis, which runs March 26-28! Please, please, please let this mean that a DVD and Blu-ray are in the works!

For those of you unfamiliar with Nightbreed’s back story, let me explain. Basically, the studio screwed Barker by forcing him to release an edited version of his original cut. Poor marketing and a cruddy video release made the film fade away. Thankfully, fans supported it and it was elevated to something of a cult flick. Hardcore Barker fans wondered for years if the lost footage from the film actually existed, until recently when Mark Miller, a friend of Barker, learned that it was indeed alive and well. In fact, it was sitting in a film vault. When Miller spoke to a studio exec about the discovery, he was told that the film didn’t warrant the money needed to produce an extended cut. Barker fans took to the web and pleaded in defense of the film. Hopefully this will be convincing enough for execs to get on board with that DVD! Here is how you can help.

For years, people talked about 25 minutes worth of scenes excised from the final version, but it turns out that a 145 minute version of the film’s mid-1989 workprint exists. From Barker’s website:

“We just finished watching a 145 minute version of the film’s mid-1989 workprint! That’s 44 minutes longer than the theatrical release!! And it’s even more significant than that since there are none of the later re-shoots of Decker’s murders, so the actual deleted footage is far more than 44 minutes!

Yes, there’s (lots) more violence as the Sons of the Free invade Midian, yes there’s some deleted stop motion footage, yes, Narcisse gets decapitated, yes Lori stabs herself on a hilltop and Boone bites her… Yes, yes, yes!

Now, this is just a VHS copy so it’s not of releasable quality, so… thank you for your continuing messages of support – let’s keep working to get a proper DVD release for an extended Nightbreed… ”

Fingers crossed and I am truly jealous of those of you who will be able to attend this screening. Indianapolis never really seemed appealing to me until now.

Nightbreed is based on Barker’s novella, Cabal and tells the story of Aaron aka Boone, who dreams of a city called Midian, populated by hoards of creatures and creeps known as the ‘Nightbreed’. Boone is framed for murder by his crazy therapist, Decker (David Cronenberg–droool!), killed and then resurrected by the magic of Midian. He takes up arms with Midian’s creatures to fight the real evil–humanity.

Image: Bauer-Griffin