The Convent — The Convent( Blu Ray)
The Convent is a cheesy ‘n’ splatter-bound horror comedy- ribbed with camp characters, neon/ fluorescent colourings, a fair bit of kick-ass action in its last quarter, and a soundtrack that shifts from the creepily moody to pumping techno. The early 2000s picture regards a group of frat-boys & their girlfriends visiting an abandoned convent- encountering nun ghosts, posh ‘n’ pompous occultists, and glowing blue-veined ‘n’ green-eyed, sharp-teethed demons. Here from Synapse Films is a Blu-Ray release of the film, taking in a 4k scan, two commentaries, and a few other extras..
The Convent is from 2000, being an American production directed by LA-born Mike Mendez. He has seven other feature lengths to his name, these went from crime thriller/ satire Killers (1996), sci-fi/ horror parody Bimbo Movie Bash (1997), heist thriller featuring Henry Rollins The Last Heist (2016), and action horror featuring Dolph Lundgren Don't Kill It (2016). As a side note, Synapse Films has also reissued Mendez’s debut Killers recently, and it’s well worth a look.
The film opens with a flashback to the 60s, as we see a shade-wearing, leather jacketed, cigarette smoking, and high-heeled young woman (who we later find out is teenage Christine) going into a convent to gun down and set fire to the nuns.
We then flash forward to the ‘present’ day to be introduced to a group of frat boys/ jocks, their girlfriends, and an always willing to please lanky/ geeky pledge. They are all going along to tag up the old/abandoned convent, and getting a lift with them is a sassy female goth girl curious of the real crime.
The film rolls in at a short/ largely nonsense runtime of one hour and nineteen minutes. With the film shifting from creepy ‘n’ campy, onto mixes of horror ‘n’ comedic characters, before settling into a kick-ass neon blood spurting, limb ‘n’ head lopping, and gun toting action bound last quarter.
Along the way, they meet unpredictable and smoking it-up cops Ray (Bill Mosely) and Starkey (rapper Coolio). A group of posh ‘n’ pompous occultists, who do at points get a tad grating. With Adrienne Barbeau appearing later as the now aged Christine, who still has her shades and leather jacket.
The Convent is a through and through popcorn horror comedy, with a few good chuckles along the way, dumb/cliched characters, some neat moments of creepy atmospherics, and OTT splatter gore/violence.
This recent region-free Blu-ray takes in a 4k scan of the film, this nicely enhances both the more murky/ shadowy moments, as well as the gore-bound/ glowing elements. We get two commentary tracks- one with the cast and crew, and the other with Saul and Dickie Boy from Lords Of Hell(?!). I played the first of these, which is a decidedly chatty affair, though we do get some interesting stories/ facts/ reveals. The track has six parties involved, including director Mike Mendez, an actor, an actress, and the composer of the film's score. They begin by talking about how the opening flashback scene didn't go down well with some of their religious parents. They point out locations as they appear, mentioning issues with some places. They discuss how well the whole cast got along together, and moments of pretending to pet/ interaction when the pug in the film was on off days. We find out they didn’t have a permit for some locations, so they had to film from their vehicles. They talk about the origin of the film's story being influenced by a real-life case, when a priest slept with a parishioner who landed up getting pregnant, and the church was shut down. We find out some of the scenes were improvised. Later on, they point out some of the film's more generally creepy moments, and how due to the small size of the budget, they could only afford a few squibs – so they had to make their own for some of the effects. They talk about the film's finale, how pleased they were with it, though they did have to rush it -having only two/ three hours to film it. It's a down to earth track, with, as I said, some worthy bits and pieces being revealed.
Otherwise, we have the following new extra tour of the locations from The Convent and Killers (14.33) with the film's director. On the archive side, we have behind-the-scenes footage (8.33), deleted scene (0.31), vintage press kit, photo gallery and a trailer.
The release comes with a glossy six-page inlay booklet, which features a new four-page write up about the film by Corey Danna.
All told, The Convent is a hell-of lot of fun horror comedy with some decent enough gore, a few laughs, and general good old-fashioned entertainment. It’s great to see this film getting Synapse Films release, as it does deserve to be seen by more people.