I keep hearing rumours of a renaissance of physical media and in-person creative events, and as one who keeps buying books, cd's, blu-rays, etc., I for one welcome such as renaissance. We're in a golden age of boutique labels and distributors bringing rare and near-lost treasure of film and television to us in both cinemas and for home viewing, and news of a new label is always welcome. Especially if that label is fronted by Kier-La Janisse, one of our best writers, historians, and person with seemingly endless knowledge of obscure indie films of the 20th and 21st centuries.
Spectacular Optical, the indie publishing imprint of Canadian genre veteran Kier-La Janisse, has expanded its remit to include theatrical, streaming, and home video distribution of a selection of films curated by Janisse with a focus on landscape and design, music and counterculture, and experimental genre works. Janisse is the author of the influential horror memoir House of Psychotic Women, director of the award-winning documentary Woodlands Dark and Days Bewitched: A History of Folk Horror, and creator of The Haunted Season, an annual Shudder holiday horror anthology series. The new distribution label will launch this month with a diverse slate spanning new titles and exciting restorations.
“After decades of writing and film programming, there are certain films that never leave me,” says Janisse. “And though I’m known most for my explorations in genre, what inspires me is a broad cross-section of multidisciplinary work. And so this label is very personal to me, not so much a commercial enterprise as a dedicated compulsion to share films that have moved me—or even changed me—with a wider audience.”
The company’s first release will be BAFTA-winning documentarian Christopher Morris’ 2023 film A Year in a Field, which documents a year in the life of a 4000-year-old Cornish standing stone. The rollout will include a special Earth Day TVOD release on April 22, followed by a collectors’ edition Blu-ray. The film was shot between the Winter Solstices of 2020 and 2021, as the world had been quieted by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Spectacular Optical will be partnering with Severin Films to co-release a new 4K restoration of Waris Hussein’s Melody (1971), scripted by Alan Parker (Bugsy Malone) and reuniting Oliver! stars Mark Lester and Jack Wild alongside then-newcomer Tracy Hyde in the puppy love story that inspired Wes Anderson’s Moonrise Kingdom. Featuring songs by the Bee Gees, this restoration from the original camera negatives will mark the film’s first official release in North America in nearly 50 years.
“Melody has been my white whale for almost two decades,” says Janisse, “Truly the most adorable film ever made!”
The company has also begun restoration on Bert Deling’s 1975 Australian underground classic Pure Shit for its first-ever North American home video release. Depicting 24 hours in the life of Melbourne junkies in search of a fix, the film was initially banned following a raid on the theatre where it premiered. Featuring a driving soundtrack of local bands and a bevy of now-familiar faces from the first era of Australia’s independent film scene, including Gary Waddell and Phil Motherwell (Stir), and a small role by future Monkey Grip author Helen Garner, Pure Shit is being restored with elements held at Australia’s National Film and Sound Archive.
Andrew Horn’s 1984 independent melodrama Doomed Love, starring avant-garde staple Bill Rice (Decoder, Vortex), will see its first worldwide disc release with a new restoration from the original camera negatives housed at the Deutsche Kinemathek. “A true lost classic of the 1980s New York underground, and a marvel of visual ingenuity” (Le Cinéma Club), the film features incredible Expressionist-style two-dimensional sets by artists Amy Sillman and Pamela Wilson, a screenplay by experimental dramaturge Jim Neu, and a score by the Lounge Lizards’ Evan Lurie.
All films will be available theatrically, on digital platforms, and on physical media. Wide distribution of Spectacular Optical’s home video releases will be handled in the US by Severin Films.