Mario Bava's BAY OF BLOOD (aka TWITCH OF THE DEATH NERVE, 1971) from Kino 4/16
 

It looks like preorders finally went live for Kino's next Bava disc, the awesome proto-slasher A BAY OF BLOOD (1971). The listings are a little screwy for now (distributor listed as MVD, the blu listed as DVD); I'll do up an extended post once they get fixed. This is probably the title I was most excited about from this whole Bava upgrade series -- the import Arrow release had horrible black levels and bad contrast. I can't wait to see this new edition!

Blu: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00...ag=cinema09-20
DVD: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00...ag=cinema09-20

Nice. I'm hoping they'll be able to improve the sound somewhat over the snap-case release from a few years ago (can't remember the publisher).

image

Will probably stick with my Arrow release. Would love to see the comparisons though!

I'll probably stick with my Arrow release as well. It's not a film I watch often.

Arrow is all Region B though, correct?

No, it's region free. Worked fine on my blu-ray player.

Was just about to buy the Arrow release, but now I'll hold off for the US release. That news came just in time.

I thought the Arrow release was one of their better HD transfers...but apparently its not. Might have to double dip if the Kino transfer is far superior. I always loved this one.

I have the ancient DVD of Bay of Blood, so will upgrade if reviews are good.

The Arrow release is certainly the most detailed it has ever been, and is overall pretty nice, but the black levels lean more towards gray and the colors are a bit more drab than they probably should be. You can see a comparison to Anchor Bay's release here:

http://www.dvdbeaver.com/film2/DVDRe...y_of_blood.htm

A perfect print would be somewhere between the two -- the AB release is probably a little too color boosted.

Image's first release had issues with the audio distortion during louder scenes. They actually fixed the audio and were going to reissue the title (I have a finished check disc with the corrected soundtrack), but it became clear that Alfredo Leone wasn't going to renew the license so they didn't bother.

Even if the new blu-ray is an improvement, I can't imagine it being a big enough one to justify upgrading. I'm just not at the point where I can start upgrading blu-rays to blu-rays.

I did make an exception for Scream Factory's Halloween II blu-ray, but that was mainly for the extras.

I now have two ZOMBIEs, two HALLOWEEN IIs, and two SANTA SANGREs. I'm not proud.

I hated that the colors looked so muted on the transfer and have held off for a better release. I think Santa Sangre's blu-ray is lacking in the color department too - the colors should pop - especially being on blu-ray.

Not necessarily. Often times transfers receive a color/saturation boost and thus sometimes creating a totally different color scheme than what was intended by the film makers. It has been stated several times that Severin’s Santa Sangre transfer is more accurate to how it played and was viewed in theaters. The more saturated color scheme (bleeding colors, edge enhancement) was unauthorized and artificially created when it was released on DVD.

And I don’t know which Santa Sangre BD you own, but Severin’s transfer’s color scheme does “pop”….especially in the [u]reds[/i]. I love that disc. It’s one of my favorite BD’s and one of my favorite flicks. I know the Mr. Bongo release had richer black levels, but I heard it also had compression issues and didn’t have Severin’s exhaustive extras…. So, I am happy enough to stick with the Severin disc and just adjust a few settings on my television.

I don’t know what the case is with Bay of Blood, but I personally thought the transfer was great. But I am often a completest and I own all of Bava’s releases Kino did so far…so what the hell?