The New York Ripper: 4K Remaster – Blue Underground (4k UHD/Blu-ray Combo)

Theatrical Release Date: Italy, 1982
Director: Lucio Fulci
Writers: Gianfranco Clerici, Lucio Fulci, Vincenzo Mannino, Dardano Sacchetti
Cast: Jack Hedley, Almanta Suska, Howard Ross, Andrea Occhipinti, Alexandra Delli Colli, Paolo Malco, Cinzia de Ponti, Cosimo Cinieri, Daniela Doria, Babette New, Zora Kerova, Paul E. Guskin, Antone Pagan, Josh Cruze, Marsha MacBride, Rita Silva, Giordano Falzoni, Lucio Fulci, Barbara Cupisti, Martin Sorrentino, Violetta Jean, Cesare Di Vito, Elisa Cervi, Chiara Ferrari

Release Date: August 25th, 2020
Approximate running time: 93 Minutes 7 Seconds
Aspect Ratio: 2.40:1 Widescreen / 2160 Progressive / HEVC / H.265 / Dolby Vision HDR10
Rating: NR
Sound: Dolby Atmos English, 7.1 DTS-HD English, DTS-HD Mono English, DTS-HD Mono Italian, Dolby Digital Mono French, Dolby Digital Mono Spanish
Subtitles: English SDH, French, Spanish, English for Italian language track
Region Coding: Region Free
Retail Price: $49.95

"A blade-wielding psychopath is on the loose, turning The Big Apple bright red with the blood of beautiful young women. As NYPD detective Fred Williams (Jack Hedley of For Your Eyes Only) follows the trail of butchery from the decks of the Staten Island Ferry to the sex shows of Times Square, each brutal murder becomes a sadistic taunt. In the city that never sleeps, the hunt is on for the killer that can't be stopped!" - synopsis provided by the distributor

Video: 5/5 (4K UHD), 4.75 (Blu-ray)

The New York Ripper comes on a 66 GB dual layer 4K UHD

Disc Size: 60.1 GB

Feature: 55.7 GB

This release was sourced from Blue Underground’s 2019 restoration, which they used for their 2020 Blu-ray release. This is a transfer for those who were blown away by Blue Underground’s 2019 restoration. Noticeable areas of improvement include colors, image clarity, and black levels, and there are no issues with compression. That said, it should be noted that at the eighty-four minute mark there’s a brief thirty-second sequence where the colors look different than they do for Blue Underground’s Blu-ray.

The New York Ripper comes on a 50 GB dual layer Blu-ray.

Disc Size: 41.6 GB

Feature: 24.9 GB

Audio: 5/5 (Dolby Atmos English)

This release comes with six audio options, a Dolby Atmos mix in English, a DTS-HD 7.1 mix in English, a DTS-HD mono mix in English, a DTS-HD mono mix in Italian, a Dolby Digital mono mix in French, and a Dolby Digital mono mix in Spanish. The Dolby Atmos mix is new to this release, while the other five audio tracks are the same tracks from Blue Underground’s 2020 Blu-ray release. The Dolby Atmos track sounds great, the dialog comes through clearly, everything sounds balanced, and range-wise, this audio mix takes full advantage of the sound spectrum. This release comes with four subtitle options: English SDH, French, Spanish, and English for the Italian language track.

Extras:

Extras on the 4K UHD disc include a English language theatrical trailer (3 minutes 24 seconds, DTS-HD mono English, no subtitles), and an audio commentary with Troy Howarth, author of Splintered Visions: Lucio Fulci and His Films.

Extras on the Blu-ray disc include a poster & still gallery (67 images), English language theatrical trailer (3 minutes 20 seconds, Dolby Digital mono English, no subtitles), a locations featurette titled NYC Locations Then and Now (4 minutes 8 seconds, Dolby Digital stereo), an interview with Stephen Thrower, author of Beyond Terror: The Films of Lucio Fulci titled The Beauty Killer (22 minutes 34 seconds, Dolby Digital stereo English, no subtitles), an interview with poster artist Enzo Sciotti titled Paint Me Blood Red (17 minutes 14 seconds, Dolby Digital stereo Italian with non-removable English subtitles), an archival interview with actress Zora Kerova titled I’m an Actress! (9 minutes 30 seconds, Dolby Digital stereo Italian with removable English subtitles), a new interview with Zora Kerova titled The Broken Bottle Murder (9 minutes 24 seconds, Dolby Digital stereo Italian with non-removable English subtitles), an interview with actress Cinzia de Ponti titled The Second Victim (12 minutes 14 seconds, Dolby Digital stereo Italian with non-removable English subtitles), an interview with actor Howard Ross titled Three Fingers of Violence (15 minutes 8 seconds, Dolby Digital stereo Italian with non-removable English subtitles), an interview with screenwriter Dardano Sacchetti titled The Art of Killing (29 minutes 14 seconds, Dolby Digital stereo Italian with non-removable English subtitles), and an audio commentary with Troy Howarth.

Extras not carried over from Blue Underground’s 2019 Blu-ray release include a lenticular slipcover, reversible cover art, a CD that contains the score for the film, and a 20-page booklet. This new release comes with a slipcover.

Summary:

The New York Ripper was co-written and directed by Lucio Fulci, a prolific and diverse filmmaker who, over the course of his career, worked in just about every cinema genre. He is most remembered for his work within the horror genre. Notable horror films directed by Lucio Fulci include Zombie, The Beyond, City of the Living Dead, and The House by the Cemetery.

The New York Ripper would in many ways mark the end of an era for Lucio Fulci. The films that he directed after The New York Ripper would be hampered by a lack of budget, and he would part ways with several of his key collaborators, many of whom he had worked with since Zombie.

A key collaborator on The New York Ripper was Luigi Kuveiller, who had previously worked with Lucio Fulci on A Lizard in a Woman’s Skin. His other notable films as a cinematographer include A Quiet Place in the Country, Property Is No Longer a Theft, and Deep Red.

Another key collaborator on The New York Ripper was composer Francesco De Masi, whose other notable scores include The Weekend Murders, The Inglorious Bastards, and Lone Wolf McQuade. He delivers a superb score that perfectly captures the mood of The New York Ripper.

From the opening moments, The New York Ripper establishes a grim tone that is in your face, violent, and undeniably gruesome. While there are slight lulls in between moments of bloodletting, The New York Ripper never stays too far away from its bread and butter: a killer with a chip on their shoulder who’s hell-bent on dissecting their victims in a symbolic way, which holds the key to their modus operandi.

On the opposite end of the spectrum is a detective who’s become disinterested in his job. That is until fate intertwines his destiny with that of the killers’. There is even a moment later in the film in which the killer specifically targets the detective by killing someone close to him. There are a few well-placed red herrings along the way, with the only constant in the killers’ identity being the killers’ duck-like voice.

The entire cast is more than adequate in their respective roles. The English dubbing is generally very good, even if some of the lines are unintentionally funny. With the most memorable performance being Howard Ross's (Five Dolls for an August Moon) in the role of a three-fingered deviant named Mickey Scellenda, other notable performances include Zora Kerova's (Cannibal Ferox) in the role of a sex exhibitionist named Eva, who performs like sex acts, and Alexandra Delli Colli's (Zombie Holocaust) in the role of Jane Forrester Lodge, a nymphomaniac housewife who spends her time looking for men to fulfill her sexual desires.

When it comes to violent murder set pieces, no Italian filmmaker does it better than Lucio Fulci. And with The New York Ripper, he delivers the most sadistic moments of his career. Some choice moments include a woman who’s stabbed in her vagina with a broken bottle and a woman whose breasts and eyeball are sliced with a razor blade. That said, The New York Ripper’s strongest asset is the POV camera, especially during the kill scenes. Ultimately, The New York Ripper is a grueling cinematic experience that is not for the faint of heart.

The New York Ripper makes its way to UHD via an excellent release from Blue Underground that comes with a solid audio/video presentation and a wealth of informative extras, highly recommended.

Note about the 4K screenshots: It is not possible to make Dolby Vision or HDR10 screenshots that faithfully match the experience of watching a film in motion on a TV. Instead of not having any screenshots, all of the 4K screenshots are m2ts taken with a VLC player and lossless PNGs.

Written by Michael Den Boer