Heavy metal must pay the devil his due in Vinegar Syndrome's Blu-ray/DVD combo restoration of the New York eighties slasher/cop film hybrid BLUE VENGEANCE.

In prison for ten years after his killing spree as "The Mirror Man", criminally insane Mark Trax (John Weiner, SHATTER DEAD) fakes a suicide attempt, kills a prison doctor and an orderly, and escapes, heading back to New York. Obsessed with the one hit wonder metal band Warriors of the Inferno who once pledged themselves to Satan, Mark tracks them down to see if they have honored their pact, murdering each of them brutally when he discovers that they have sold out: lead singer Mark Baylor (Johnny Stumper, COVERT ACTION) to the eighties punk scene, and composer Buster Hyman (Steven Salter, SEARCH AND DESTROY) now writing corny jingles. Detective Mickey McCardle (director Ingvordsen billed as "John Christian") suspects that they killings are the work of "The Mirror Man" but he is believed to be dead after having killed a motorist and faking his own death in a truck explosion, and he is just as unpopular with the homicide department as the rest of the squad since he accidentally shot and killed his own partner (Buzzy Dannenfelser) in the act of apprehending Trax the first time. McCardle carries out his own investigation with the unwilling help of band photographer Tiffany (Garland Hunter). No sooner do they find a connection between the victims and the identity of the next one than McCardle and Tiffany are on the run from the police force when Trax frames him for the murder of Tiffany's boyfriend (Kris Randall) with his own service revolver.

Long overshadowed by the likes of other New York 1980s low budget filmmakers from the likes of Troma Films and Roberta Findlay to Bill Lustig, Frank Henenlotter, and Larry Cohen, J. Christian Ingvordsen was distributor Shapiro-Glickenhaus' go-to guy for action films throughout the eighties. Although the extras reveal some sequences to have been shot a year ahead of production for presales promos and some drastic changes were made to the more supernaturally-oriented story in the midst of shooting, BLUE VENGEANCE is a surprisingly accomplished work that comes in terms of technical proficiency and creative ambition way ahead of Troma's productions of the time (not to mention JASON TAKES MANHATTAN) and somewhere below more mainstream urban serial killer films that would follow in the nineties. While Weiner is entertainingly off-the-rails and Hunter gives the film some heart and spunk, Ingvordsen gives more low-key support in front of the camera while being more ballsy as a director to stage major sequences without permits on the Brooklyn Bridge and the New York subway system as well as the amusing yet suspenseful sight of Hunter pursuing a fleeing Weimer on a bicycle with a basket, and bicycle versus motorcycle jousting climax. It's no MANIAC COP, but BLUE VENGEANCE rocks!

Although produced as part of a three picture deal with Shapiro-Glickenhaus – along with SHOCKTROOP and MOB WAR (in which Ingvordsen played a different character named Mickey McCardle) – BLUE VENGEANCE was unreleased stateside theatrically or home video even though it did business in other territories (with likely-unauthorized German and Dutch fullscreen DVD releases). Scanned in 2K from the original camera negative, Vinegar Syndrome's 1080p24 MPEG-4 AVC 1.85:1 widescreen transfer is virtually spotless apart from an early in-camera scratch, boasting some vivid blood reds and neons while retaining a grainy and gritty appearance appropriate to the style and the circumstances of guerilla-style shooting (cinematographer Michael Spiller would go on to work for Hal Hartley before his own Emmy-winning television directing career). The DTS-HD Master Audio 1.0 mono track boasts clear music and dialogue (enough so that the ADR calls attention to itself throughout) while optional SDH subtitles are also provided.

The film is accompanied by two commentary tracks: the first with director/actor Ingvordsen – who also provides a short optional video introduction – moderated by Michael Gingold in which the Ingvordsen discusses how the home video boom of the early 1980s and the demand for product meant gave him and his partners the opportunity to make as many movies as they could handle yearly and paints a vivid portrait of the New York guerilla film production scene before Giuliani offered incentives to Hollywood for New York location filming. He also describes how they were able to make films based on foreign pre-sales, working around sequences actually shot a year earlier for a promo (which explains why Weimer's hair is shorter in the shot of the truck exploding early on), and how working without a star for this film meant that they could be more spontaneous with the filming on the tight schedule. He also explains that the film is a slasher but that he, co-writer/actor Weimer, and co-writer Danny Kuchuck (CRYPTIC) were less concerned with the constrictions of genre than to put everything they wanted to see into a movie, with the fantasy cutaways of Weimer and Ingvordsen battling each other in loincloth and armor stemming from their love of the Conan comics. Gingold provides some context about the other New York exploitation cinema players of the period and points out some of Ingvordsen's horror homages from FRIDAY THE 13TH to LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT. On the second commentary track, actor/co-writer Weiner describes how he became involved with Ingvordsen as a production assistant on MODEL BEHAVIOR in which he found himself thrust before the camera for a bit part that lead to greater responsibilities in subsequent films. Of the film, he points out the various "hidden movies" in the film stemming from the producers demanding they turn their film about a cult of heart-eating killers into a cop thriller, and the incorporation of other material from the promo and shot for other projects – the exploding truck shot was one of a number of pyrotechnics shot on a "day of explosions" for footage to be used in action cutaways in various productions – and the learning about filmmaking and storytelling through doing and the importance to him at the time of the theme of "selling out" in the script.

"Making BLUE VENGAENCE" (19:26) is a retrospective making-of documentary featuring comments from Ingvordsen, Weimer, Kuchuck, sound man turned director Bob Gosse (I HOPE THEY SERVE BEER IN HELL), assistant camera Matt Howe, and Whitney Ransick (SHOCK TELEVISION) discuss how they learned more by making films during the period than they had in film school, being expected to become jacks of all trades compared to the more regimented Hollywood production model, and the value of "the art of the sneak" in New York location shooting in the 1980s. "On BLUE VENGEANCE" (13:28) is a conversation between Ingvordsen and Gingold in which his story of wanting to make a New York cop thriller like THE FRENCH CONNECTION only for Shapiro-Glickenhaus to demand a slasher is the opposite of Weiner's claim on the commentary but he also touches upon his beginnings working for Larry Cohen, learning stunt work and make-up effects on the job, stepping in front of the camera out of necessity, the opportunities for filming from the domestic VHS and foreign theatrical markets, and how the production model pretty much ended with BLUE VENGEANCE as it was no longer possible in the 1990s to make such films without some star to help sell them.