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The Bootleg Files: Knights of the Bath

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BOOTLEG FILES 690: “Knights of the Bath” (1951 short film consisting of footage from the 1944 Abbott and Costello comedy “In Society”).

LAST SEEN: It is on YouTube.

AMERICAN HOME VIDEO: None.

REASON FOR BOOTLEG STATUS: The material is copyright protected.

CHANCES OF SEEING A COMMERCIAL DVD RELEASE: Unlikely.

Beginning in the 1930s, a company called Castle Films was a dominant force in the nontheatrical home entertainment market. In the decades before video technology, movie lovers would purchase either a projector and watch their favorite Hollywood films in the comfort of their homes. However, the Super 8, 8mm and 16mm formats did not easily support feature-length films, and the productions were often edited down to fit the reels being sold to the public. In many cases, certain sequences would be excised from the larger works and sold as standalone pieces, usually for one-reel or two-reel exhibition.
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The Queen (1968)

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One of the telling lines of “The Queen” is when show runner Flawless Sabrina explains that the biggest task of organizing the Miss All American Camp Beauty Pageant is finding a hotel that can house all the contestants, and finding a hotel that’s “hip” enough to want to house them. In 1968, being out and yourself was about being as discreet as possible and operating behind closed doors. While “The Queen” is basically a documentary about the cut throat world of Drag pageants, as well as a sobering portrayal of how the LGBTQ community had to function behind closed doors for much of the twentieth century.

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Belzebuth (2019) [Cinepocalypse 2019]

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It’s stunning that there has never been much stride made in the realm of possession movies. It seems like “The Exorcist” was the beginning and end of the sub-genre, followed by decades of films that ranged from serviceable to downright abysmal. “Belzebuth” further proves that theory as it’s a middling horror thriller that’s densely packed, kind of confusing, and ironically manages to deliver some good scares from the real life atrocities it depicts rather than the images of demons, evil Jesus Christ, and exorcisms.

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The Last to See Them (Gli Ultimi Viderli Vivere) (2019) [Cinepocalypse 2019]

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Director Sara Summa paints “The Last to See Them” as the anti-thriller, it’s the calm before the storm, as four family members living in a remote farm in the Italian countryside are doomed to die horrendous murders in the middle of the night. What we see is the hours leading up to their death as… well nothing happens. Absolutely nothing happens. Director Sara Summa’s “The Last to See Them” has all the ingredients for a brutally creepy, and unsettling thriller but it amounts to a disappointingly empty posturing of the antithesis of the genre.

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Attack of the Demons (2019) [Cinepocalypse 2019]

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In a small, isolated town, a green glowing blob of sort attacks animals and humans alike, turning them into a mass of evil that swallows all in its path. Trying to survive this, a local young man, a visitor, and a young lady team up to try and outrun the take of over of this town during its yearly music festival.

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