#palace video

[vhsorifice]

[sillymovietrailer]

Palace Video - Evil Dead Opening

So, yesterday I posted about my first encounter with Palace Video, today I’ll have a bit about the actual history of the company, and some of the other things they released.  Founded by Nik Powell (one half of Virgin Records when it started) & Stephen Woolley (who ran the now legendary Scala Cinema in London), Palace were a huge force to be reckoned with in the early days of VHS, with a lot of big names in world and cult cinema getting UK releases through them.  One of their biggest early moments was, as you can see from the video above, distributing the original Evil Dead in the UK, which of course meant that they got swept up in the whole Video Nasties debacle.  The DVD of the Evil Dead has a good little bonus feature about this, and how they were later exonerated by the courts.  Palace Video later spun off Palace Pictures, producing titles like The Company of Wolves, High Spirits, Absolute Beginners, Hardware, and much more.  Sadly, some box office disappointments, the changing nature of the video market, and the closing of the Scala following a court case related to the screening of A Clockwork Orange, Palace quietly died out in the early nineties, but they did leave a mark on the whole industry.  Powell and Wooley are still producing, with the latter making one of my favourites of recent years Their Finest, the Scala is still the gold standard for repertory cinemas, and a whole generation has that terrifying video logo burned forever into their memories.

This reel shows the sort of collection that made the Palace name.  Of course it leads into the Evil Dead, one of the most significant horror releases in UK history, not least because it was first to have a simultaneous cinema and video release.  Also in here are little promos for grindhouse favourite Basket Case, French thriller Diva, and David Lynch’s classic Eraserhead. That was Palace, championing lessor known indie titles, alongside schlock horror, European cinema, and true arthouse pieces.  I think the best modern answer to Palace would be Arrow Films, they definitely seemed to have inherited the same sort of spirit, even down to getting on board one of the classic cover artists from the time, Graham Humphreys.  God bless you Palace Video; you shaped my childhood viewing, and made a permanent mark on the world of cult cinema I would later come into.

[sillymovietrailer]

Palace Video Children’s VHS Reel

Dusting off this old blog once more, as I need to get back into the habit of writing again.  Looking through my drafts folder, I realised that this would be a good place to start, as it represents both an important part of my childhood, but also links to a lot of my later interest .  When I grew up in the late 80s, early 90s, I obviously didn’t really understand who Palace Video were, but since I then I have discovered that they were an important part of the history of film distribution in the UK.  Back then though, I just knew that logo scared me. Seriously, that sudden zoom into the castle, with the synthesiser music going is terrifying to a child!  Now that I know that they made their name with horror titles, it makes sense, but back in the day, it just added that extra spice to watching some favourites. 

So this reel came from a tape of The Dark Crystal, but I remember this exact same reel in this order with a few kids VHS tapes I had back in the day, including Asterix and the Big Fight (now Asterix would be a good topic for a mini marathon on here ...). I rewatched these tapes so many times that when I found this on YouTube it bought back a lot of sensations (although I'd need to see it on an old CRT for a full effect). We have a little selection of Muppets clips, which was my first glimpse of some of their content. I don't clearly remember seeing that animation Granpa in full, but knowing it was by the team behind The Snowman, I suspect that there would have been some tears before bedtime if I had. Also, hey, Peter Ustinov doing the voice acting, I may have to track this one down. Finally came a real favourite of mine; Grim Tales, which is where I first encountered the irreplaceable Rik Mayall. That series was wonderful, with Mayall being a great storyteller, and some lovely animation work for all of the stories too. When he passed away almost five years ago, I had to look up a few of the episodes on YouTube as a memorial. So yeah, I have a lot of fond memories linked in to this reel, and I am actually feeling a bit wistful thinking back to these days. Of course, now I know a bit more about Palace Video's other works, this has some extra significance to me, but I'll discuss the history of Palace in terms of proper film next time

[improfusionberlin]

Lasst es euch vorschmecken!

Voici un avant-goût !

[sillymovietrailer]

Evil Dead II

As a little addendum to yesterday’s title, here’s a British TV spot for Evil Dead II Palace Video produced, featuring a couple of very familiar faces.  My god they were both so young back then!  A lot of people tend forget that Ross started out as a film journalist, a few years later getting to have a full interview with Raimi for his series The Incredibly Strange Film Show.  I miss the days when trailers and TV spots would do little specially filmed segments like this, not giving away anything that happens in film, but let’s you know what to expect.  This one actually does a pretty good job of letting you know what playful tone to expect from Evil Dead II, making clear that the silly, funhouse horror aspect had been kicked up a notch.  Actually, several notches, as I don’t think I need to explain how big of a cult classic part 2 is!  Hell, it had an episode of ReBoot paying tribute to it!  Groovy!