The Bloody Judge (1970) DVD and Blu-ray UPDATED

[Darrel_Griffin]

The Bloody Judge (1970)

corrections and improvements


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R0 America - Blue Underground [2004 release]

(Note the copy I own is copyright 2015, so is presuambly a re-release, but is almost identical in every respect, including having the same case artwork and UPC (barcode). The only difference I have spotted is a slight rearranging of the text on the back cover.)

Soundtracks: English Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono

Subtitles: English for German dialogue (optional)

Extras:
"Bloody Jess" - 2003 interviews with Christopher Lee (in English) and Jess Franco (in French with forced English subtitles) (25:08)
Deleted scene from the Spanish version of Mary attempting to drown herself (5:51, from VHS source, in Spanish with forced English subtitles)
Alternative scenes:
- Scene #1: German opening title sequence (2:10, forced English subtitles)
- Scene #2: clothed love scene in the barn (1:14)
- Scene #3: Judge Jeffries' nightmare montage (0:42)
- Scene #4: Mary's release from dungeon alternate version (1:21)
Theatrical Trailers:
- US Trailer #1 (0:55)
- US Trailer #2 (1:03)
- US Combo Trailer with Blood from the Mummy's Tomb (1:52)
TV Spot with Blood from the Mummy's Tomb (0:33)
Poster & Still Galleries:
- Posters (7 images)
- German Lobby Cards (19 images)
- US Lobby Cards (6 images)
- Publicity Stills (118 images)
- Behind-the-Scenes Stills (98 images)
- US Press Book (6 images)
- Soundtrack Booklet (10 images)
- Video (7 images)
- Credits (1 text page)
Biographies & Filmographies:
- Christopher Lee (20 pages)
- Jess Franco (21 pages)

Notes:
Cover title: "The Bloody Judge".
Onscreen title: "The Bloody Judge".
Includes a 4-page liner notes leaflet "The Bloody Judge" by Tim Lucas.
"The fully restored European version", a composite of the English dubbed export version and the edit of the film prepared for the German market. This version does not have the scene of Maria Rohm attempting to drown herself and being rescued within the film; it appears as an extra deleted scene only. It does have a scene in which Maria Rohm is forced by prison guards to lick the blood of a naked female prisoner hanging down from a ceiling. It also has the unclothed version of the barn sex scene.
Scenes that were never dubbed to English are presented in German with optional English subtitles.
Also available as part of The Christopher Lee Collection with The Blood of Fu Manchu, The Castle of Fu Manchu and Circus of Fear.



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Blu-ray B United Kingdom - 88 Films [2023 Release]

Subtitles: English HoH, English for German dialogue (optional)


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slight improvement to some of the Extras:

Deleted and Alternate Scenes (12:16, in English, German, and Spanish, with burnt-in English subtitles for non-English text and dialogue)
Stills Gallery (43 images, 4:32)


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additions and corrections to Notes:

Cover title: "The Bloody Judge".
Onscreen title: "Night of the Blood Monster".
Scenes that were never dubbed to English are presented in German with optional English subtitles.
The first pressing of 2000 includes a slipcover and a 16-page booklet by Barry Forshaw and Andrew Graves.



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General note regarding runtime differences:

I was investigating the slight difference in runtime between the 2 releases above. This is what I discovered:

1. They have slightly different opening credit sequences, but I think they are mostly the same, with the 88 Films Blu-ray suddenly inserting the alternate US title "Night of the Blood Monster" on a freeze frame for a few seconds, before continuing as before. However, the 2 runtimes are more or less identical.


2. On the Blue Underground DVD, at the end of the end credits, there is a final copyright credit:

"A TOWERS OF LONDON
PRODUCTION
© 1970 Etablissement Sargon, Vaduz, Liechtenstein."

This is absent on the 88 Films Blu-ray, on which the credits fade earlier. This is presumably because a similar credit appears on the "Night of the Blood Monster" title card in the opening credits on the Blu-ray (which is not present on the Blue Underground title card "The Bloody Judge"):

"COPYRIGHT ©MCMLXX
ESTABLISSEMENT SARGON, VADUZ, LICHTENSTEIN.
ALL RIGHT RESERVED"

(Note the slight spelling variations are as they appear on screen)

However, in both versions, music continues over a black screen for a while. The comparison is as follows:

Blue Underground DVD:

end of last shot before credits: 101:45
credits end: 102:30
audio ends: 102:33
disc ends: 102:33


88 Films Blu-ray:

end of last shot before credits: 101:51
credits end: 102:16
audio ends: 102:38 (followed by 0:03 of black silence)
disc ends: 102:41

So overall, the runtime from the end of the last shot until the end of the music is about the same in both cases (0:48 vs 0:47)


3. Considering the above, this still leaves a discrepancy of about 6 seconds during the main body of the movie.

Further checking revealed that the DVD appears to use non-drop frame timecode, whereas the Blu-ray uses drop-frame timecode. What this means is that the Blu-ray is (presumably) running at approximately 23.976fps instead of 24fps, and also that the time display on the player compensates for this.

My understanding is that with drop-frame timecode on 23.976fps playback speed, what happens is that roughly once every 41 or 42 seconds, that "second", as displayed on the player, only contains 23 frames instead of the usual 24. This means that the time display will approximately match real-world time, instead of gradually lagging increasingly further behind. Using drop-frame timecode in this way means that for the same number of frames, the elapsed time as displayed on the player is increased by about 3.6 seconds per hour, compared with non-drop-frame timecode.

In this case, with the movie runtime of about 101:45 (up until the start of the end credits), the total increase is about 6.1 seconds. This would account for the remaining apparent difference in runtime between the DVD and the Blu-ray.

I was not previously aware that drop-frame timecode existed on Blu-rays, but apparently it does!


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source:

I own both

Info on Blu-ray first pressing is from 88 Films Website:
https://88-films.myshopify.com/products ... oody-judge

[James-Masaki_Ryan]

Updated

[Darrel_Griffin]

A few things:

For the Blue Underground DVD:

1. The 2003 featurette is not just in French. The Christopher Lee sections are in English, and the Jess Franco sections are in French with forced English subtitles.

2. There is still an extra hyphen where it shouldn't be:

- Posters -(7 images)


For the 88 Films Blu-ray:

For the Notes section, I recommended the following wording:

The first pressing of 2000 includes a slipcover and a 16-page booklet by Barry Forshaw and Andrew Graves.

This is because both the slipcover and the booklet are limited to the first 2000 copies (and yes, it is an O-ring slipcover, NOT a slipcase as it currently states).
See the following link for evidence of this:
https://88-films.myshopify.com/products ... oody-judge

[James-Masaki_Ryan]

Fixed. Slipcover and slipcase is the same so leaving it as that for the notes.

[Darrel_Griffin]

All looks good now, thanks James

Regarding "slipcases" and "slipcovers", there does seem to be some ambiguity, or at least lack of consensus, regarding the definition of "slipcase" and "slipcover". From discussions I have read online, it seems most people regard the definitions as follows:

slipcover - an O-ring cover, usually made of thin card, with 2 gaps - one at the top and one at the bottom.

slipcase - a case, usually sturdier than a slipcover, with one gap, usually at one side, although there are also examples with one gap at the bottom only, e.g. Vinegar Syndrome's "VSA" (Vinegar Syndrome Archive) range.

slipbox - a sturdy case with one gap, usually at the side, but wider than a slipcase, in order to accommodate more than just one disc case e.g. booklets, multiple disc cases.


Having said this, 88 Films have in the past often advertised items as coming with a "slipcase", when they have meant an "O-ring" cover. Recently, however, they seem to have been using the term "O-ring", presumably to avoid any ambiguity.

On the other hand, Arrow Films seem to use the terms more similarly to how I have described above, although they perhaps do not distinguish between a "slipcase" and a "slipbox". On their website, they state:

"Q. How do you define a slipcover?
A. A slipcover, also known as an O-Card, is a printed soft cardboard case which the plastic Blu-ray case is placed in.

Q. What is the difference between a slipcase and a slipcover?
A. A slipcase is a more rigid cardboard case usually found with boxsets to cover multiple cases while a slipcover is only used for one Blu-ray case."

source:
https://www.arrowfilms.com/blog/news/ch ... -editions/

[Eric_Cotenas]

Slipcover, openings on top and bottom or sides to slide the case in either way.

Slipcase, only one opening, enclosed on all other sides.