The Necro Files is a cheap, trashy ‘n’ sleazed slice of late 90’s SOV splatter, featuring a zombie rapist serial killer, shouty middle-aged cops, bumbling Satanists, oh and a floating ‘n’ taunting dead baby. It’s a gory, very bad taste, at times wackily amusing ride- sure it’s cheap & largely terrible acted, but there is a good pace throughout, and an often gleefully deranged flair on display.  From the folks at Visual Vengeance, the retro low-budget/ SOV label of Wild Eye Releasing is a new Blu-ray release of the film. With the disc featuring a new commentary track, a host of archive stuff including Necro Files 3000- the film's 2017 sequel.

Released in 1997 The Necro Files (working title Psycho Zombie Love Butcher) was directed by Matt Jaissle, and co-wrote by Todd Tjersland & Sammy Shapiro- who are seemingly California-based extreme horror-loving buddies. Jaissle has ten directors’ credit to his name, and these go from the cheapy satanic horror of Back From Hell (1993) to the bad-action/ sci-fi of 300 Killers (2010), and more recently Detroit Driller Killer (2010).

The film kicks off in the sleaze, as we get a full-frontal shower scene of a tattooed woman. Looking down from above is a blank white masked figure. She dries herself, though starts wondering around the nighttime Appartement- her dressing gown flapping opening. The masked figure breaks in, knocks her out & starts raping her- as well as pulling out guts, and nipple cutting ‘n' chewing going on!. In burst bespeckled, middle age, and shouty sweary detectives Martin Manners(Steve Sheppard), and Orville Sloane(Gary Browining).  They bloodily gun the killer down…

Fast forward nine months and a group of bumbling and clueless satanist go to the graveyard in the daytime, to sacrifice a baby and call back to life the killer..after throwing the bloody infant doll down, and pissing on the grave- up arises the rapist-killer- he’s now a demon clawed hand, decaying grey, and very deranged- pulling off the pissing member, and going off on stalking- he breaks in and attacks a doing S & M couple, his length member doing damage, going onto attack sex-up campers, etc…ohh, and in time the baby is resurrected- it starts floating along taunting folk with a high pitched voice.  

The film is a splatter-bound romp, full of tattooed flesh and bad taste humour- it slides in at the seventy-two-minute mark, and for the most part it flows well, with a little bit more structure/ sort of sense than some splatter-bound SOV fare.  

Moving onto the region-free Blu Ray- and once again Visual Vengeance do a great job with the disc itself/ extras. First off, we get neat animated menus with a deep chuckling zombie, flying baby, etc. On the new extras side, we get a director/producer's commentary from Matt Jaissle- and this is a largely down-earth affair, with some great titbits of info/ observations. He starts off by informing us it was mostly shot during April 1996 in Olympia Washington- where he was living at the time, with many shots captured in the apartment he was renting. He tells us the film was meant to be an OTT parody of SOV films, with his first two films being 16mm shot. We find out most of the female cast came from a Seattle stripper club called The Lusty Lady.  The picture was shot on a Super VHS camera, which was used at points by news channels. We get talk about the two who played the cops- one of them was in a local 1970's punk band called Child Prostitutes. Jaissle confirms he did everything on the film aside from effects, and details how he set up some of the more difficult shots/ trying not to laugh when the actors said dumb lines. Later on, he informs us that some of the props for the film were purchased from a LA prop shop- which was run by Anton Le Vay's daughters, with a picture painted by one of Le Vay's followers turning up in the film. He talks about influences on the film, including Abel Ferrara's Bad Lieutenant. He comments on the kinkier props in the film, as well as the other locations in the film. Also, on the new side, we get a nearing seven-minute on-camera interview with Jaissle- this fittingly takes place in a graveyard.

Otherwise, we get a good selection of archive stuff- some of the director's super 8 shorts (12.47), a clip from a Chilean TV show about the film (4.06), Dong of The Dead (19.49) a making-of doc, and The corpse (19.49) a super 8 film. There’s also another commentary track Audio with Matt Desiderio of Horror Boobs and Billy Burgess of the Druid Underground Film Festival. But the biggest extra here is Necro Files 3000- which is the 2017 sequel to the film- this runs at just over the hour mark, and really wasn’t quite what I was expecting. Firstly it’s acted out with children's dolls, and secondly, it’s often rather silly. That said I was held though-out the runtime, there is doll gore, and even doll porn. And quite a few laughs, though not all of it hits home- lastly the zombie killer is brought back, as a rather creepy, mouth agape blood skulled skeleton.

Like the other Visual Vengeance releases, we get a nice presentation to the packaging/ presentation- with an ltd slip, double-sided cover, two-sided insert, mini poster, retro VHS sticker set, and most bizarre The Necro Files official Condom!...really nice to see the company putting so much thought into this side of things too.

The Necro Files is one hell of a trashy, sleazed, and humorously deprived ride- and Visual Vengeance has pulled up the stops with the release, which is guaranteed to put a smile on any trash cinema lover's face. Really looking forward to seeing what the label has in store for us next!.