Geekscape Reviews The Rocky Horror Picture Show Blu-Ray!
This week we celebrate the 35th anniversary of Richard O’Brien’s The Rocky Horror Picture Show with a special edition Blu-Ray. Ah… the 35th Anniversary. Historically the most important anniversary of all, because the number 35 is… Wait, why are we celebrating the 35th Anniversary of The Rocky Horror Picture Show again? If you answered “because they’re not going to wait fifteen years to make money off of the Blu-Ray market” then you’re one smart cookie. And really, there’s no point in bitching over something with such an enormous upside: the anniversary itself may be nothing special, but the new Rocky Horror Blu-Ray release is one of the best home video presentations of the year. Loaded with special features and boasting a fabulous transfer by any standard, there’s no reason why even the most casual of Rocky fans shouldn’t own this movie right fucking now.
For those of you who currently reside under a rock (yet still have access to the internet, curiously), The Rocky Horror Picture Show is a musical send-up of classic science fiction pictures, loaded with catchy tunes and astute commentary on the repressed sexuality in both “polite society” and those Production Code-era movies that clearly inspired it. There are many movies in which a mad scientist plays God by creating life. In Rocky Horror that mad scientist creates life solely so that they can have sex with it, although that’s not to say that they’re not already having sex with everyone else.
The film is marked with camp sensibilities, naïve charm and bizarre pacing choices that allow plenty of room for audience reaction, and of course audience reaction was powerful indeed. The Rocky Horror Picture Show remains a midnight staple at movie theaters throughout the world, where legions of fans unite every single weekend to relive the experience and enjoy a rebellious (and often sexually adventurous) social atmosphere that can be hard to find anywhere else. Moreover, these midnight screenings have over the years become inseparable with “Shadowcasts” in which live performers mimic the actions on-screen, sometimes with impeccable accuracy and sometimes with giant cardboard penises to stick in the mouths of the movie stars Susan Sarandon, Tim Curry and Barry Bostwick. It depends on the Shadowcast, really.
It’s easy to forget in the(se) midnight dens of depravity that Rocky Horror isn’t actually a ‘bad’ movie. It’s exactly what it’s trying to be and people have responded to it in a manner rarely equaled in any art form. In this respect The Rocky Horror Picture Show may be one of the greatest movies ever made, but even in all the other respects it’s actually rather intelligent filmmaking. Many say that the home video releases of Rocky Horror deprive an audience of the live experience, but that viewpoint is so dominant now that, in a way, these kinds of home video experiences are actually protecting this movie from being overshadowed by its own Shadowcasts. Rocky Horror still exists in its early, arguably incomplete form, but it’s this film that inspired the cultural (r)evolution that is now the Rocky Horror live shows. It’s actually pretty ironic that biggest fans of this movie never seem to want to actually watch it. Maybe that feels too much like following the rules?
The highlight of the special features is The Search for the 35th Anniversary Shadowcast, an hour-long documentary in the “American Idol” tradition that’s mostly a competition between various Rocky Horror Shadowcast members from across the globe auditioning for the lead roles in the other special feature highlight, a special Shadowcast recorded just for this release. At its best it’s a lovely bit of filmmaking that exalts the Rocky Horror live experience, illustrates the different forms of this movement from across the globe, and allows the biggest fans of the film to demonstrate what this movie classic really means to them. At worst, you can always ogle the hot chicks in fetish outfits. Watching the documentary before the Shadowcast is surprisingly illuminating, making what could have been just a cute special feature into an uplifting, though not necessarily powerful experience. You can tell these people are happy to be here, and you revel in their successes throughout the entire Shadowcast.
Many of the final Shadowcast members prove themselves remarkable entertainers. (Max “Riff-Raff” Mayhem in particular seems destined for a “Rolling Stone” cover at some point.) But I of course am legally obligated to prefer the various Sins O’ The Flesh cast members from Los Angeles’s Nuart Theater who landed roles in the Blu-Ray Shadowcast. Really it’s an excellent production, if a little too straightforward for its own good, copying the actions on film carefully but without many surprises. Yet what it lacks in extempore it makes up for with superb casting and strong choreography, so it remains one of the more remarkable DVD special features in recent memory. Other special features include digital Rocky Horror props, an audio track full of classic Rocky Horror audience participation gags, karaoke numbers and most if not all of the special features from the old (and still excellent) DVD release of the film, like a solid commentary track by writer/director/star Richard O’Brien and actress Patricia Quinn. This is a loaded set, making the superlative video quality of the film all the more impressive due to memory constraints on the disc.
Rocky lives, that’s for damned sure, and Rocky will live on and on theatrically even without the aid of a Blu-Ray release, which is why it’s so nice that these home video presentations of Richard O’Brien’s masterpiece are always treated with so much love and affection that they rival even the best Criterion releases in quality. The Rocky Horror Picture Show: The 35th Anniversary Edition is no exception. You should buy it. I can already see you quiver with antici…
