The Puppet Master Trilogy
December 11, 2010 by Editor
Filed under Film Reviews
The Midnight Horror Collection: Puppet Master 1-3 (1989 – 1991)
Directed By: David Schmoeller / Dave Allen / David DeCoteau
Review Written By: Horse
Mondo Film & Video Guide Review Contributor
I’ve been back and forth with myself about how to do this review and how I feel about this DVD set even existing. I figure these films are classics so most will know them, although I always forget as I get older that there’s a whole bunch of kids growing up who may have not even heard of them. Who do I cater to? Why would anyone who owns the box set possibly want this mini-set, especially when part 3 ends with the promise of part 4? Why is Full Moon releasing this through Echo Bridge when they have their own distribution? I don’t know how many of these questions I can answer, but I’ll try.
Puppet Master:
1939, Andre Toulon is a famous puppeteer in war-torn Germany. He escapes the war and ends up at the Bodega Bay Inn in the US. Here he chills with his puppets until some black-suited goons come for him and his secrets. This puppeteer is special, since he can make his puppets move without strings or anything else. As the goons close in, Toulon eats a lead sandwich. Years later a crew of psychics crashes the now condemned hotel in hopes of finding out more about Toulon. What they find are his puppets who have an appetite for murder.
Puppet Master 2:
The puppets dig up Toulon and resurrect him using the secret juice that brings the puppets life. Another team of psychics descends on the Bodega to investigate the missing team from the first film among other oddities. The oddest thing is no one is shocked or suspects anything shady when Eriquee Chaneé shows up. Of course it’s really Toulon. Dude is covered in bandages like the fucking mummy and has such a weird accent which makes his nonsense sound even less sensical, but everyone is like “oh, O.K. Some guy lives here; he’s covered in bandages, people have disappeared here, nothing strange about that.” Most die like they deserve to for gross fucking stupidity! Here we do find the puppets have gears and shit inside them, and are introduced to Torch.
Puppet Master 3: Toulon’s Revenge
In war-torn Germany we find another actor playing Andre Toulon. The first film says Toulon killed himself in America in 1939, so it’s no surprise we find him in Germany in 1941, cuz who cares what the other film said! He’s doing political satire puppet shows and the Nazis don’t like it. This is probably my favorite of the series since we get to see many of the famous puppets being made, and find out they all house souls along with the magic juice to make them live. Great cameo/bit part by Michelle Bauer and her awesome rack. We also met Toulon’s wife just before she is killed, along with plenty of bad and not quite as bad Germans for the puppets to practice their killing on.
If you own the box set of all the pre-2010 films then the only thing this set has to offer you is the first film in widescreen. Yep, 1.78 anamorphic widescreen for the first film just like the new Full Moon DVD and Blu-ray. This is a welcome surprise as I would’ve bet the farm on all being the same old FS transfers. Parts two and three most likely are re-ports of the old DVD transfers, although part two shares side A with the first film and both suffer dearly for it. Two looks like straight shit. Now I never got the old box set, so I unfortunately cannot compare the transfers, but two is fuzzy, soft and icky looking. Part one looks decent but not great.
Every once in a while I’ll get in a chat about how some people can’t tell the difference between a well-mastered, up-scaled DVD vs. Blu-ray. I’m kind of one of those, barring long city or landscape shots, I often can’t see much difference. This never looked even close to HD to me; the transfer is soft and suffers massively from sharing the same side of a single layer disc with the second film. Had side A been dual layer, both would’ve looked so much better. Part three looks decent, probably as good as it ever has. I’ll bet that is a direct rip of the old DVD, since there’s the behind the scenes feature for part three on it’s B side of the disc, nothing but chapters and play for the first two films stuffed onto side A.
I would also be remiss to not mention the version of the first film. Once again we have the R-cut. My old full screen Puppet Master disc from Full Moon is also the R version, but my case for this says the first is unrated. Well, I was in Wal-Mart a couple weeks ago and there were ten copies of this set (for a whopping $5 each, at that price, it’s a steal), six said the first film was unrated, four said it was rated R. I’m guessing they changed the cover and ones saying unrated are errors, esp. since they share the same disc ID with the covers that say R (proven through DVDprofiler). Justin tells me the new Puppet Master DVD and Blu-ray from Full Moon are actually uncut, but I cannot vouch for that at press time. If they are, then they made two different widescreen prints, no question this is the R cut.
So whether you want to revisit some classics from the late 80’s/early 90’s or are new to the series, this is a great spot to start. Many would say the first three films are all that matters and all that’s good. I can’t recall anything past 3 so I can’t say, but after getting done watching 3 I want to at least see part 4 now. Maybe we’ll get another set with 4-6 soon, if not Full Moon keeps printing, errrrrrrrrrr, finding warehouses full of the old sets. With a new 16X9 WS version of the first film this Echo Bridge set is bargain bin heaven baby, no strings attached!
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