Kevin Tenney's once-disowned direct-to-video chiller THE CELLAR is ripe for reassessment on Blu-ray from Vinegar Syndrome.

Unable to find work in Austin, Mance Cashen (Patrick Kilpatrick, SCANNER COP 2) takes a job as an oil rig worker deep in the Texas wastelands, bringing with him his second wife Emily (Suzanne Savoy, COHEN AND TATE) and their newborn daughter April. Since Emily wants to raise horses, the couple buy a ranch from reluctant old-timer T.C. van Houten (Ford Rainey, HALLOWEEN II) who has been strong-armed into selling the property by local oil baron and bully Kyle Boatwright (Lou Perryman, TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE PART 2). When Mance's ten-year-old son Willy (Chris Miller) arrives for his annual summer visitation, he discovers the presence of something malevolent lurking in the cellar and beneath the soil of the ranch. Mance puts imaginative Willy's fears down to acting out, but Willy learns from T.C. and local Native American medicine man Chief Sam John (Michael Wren, STONE COLD) that the land is haunted by a demon god that feeds on the souls of the young and pure, and that both Willy and his baby sister are in grave danger unless the demonic force can be contained and destroyed.

A work-for-hire for genre director Kevin Tenney, THE CELLAR has long been a skeleton in the director's closet, feeling more like his earlier WITCHBOARD and later PINOCCHIO'S REVENGE than the likes of his NIGHT OF THE DEMONS films in its emphasis on character relationships over gore and effects. The plotting, however, is lopsided in its family film-like focus on the young Chris' confrontations with the monster while it feels like Tenney would rather deal with Mance's fears that he will lose his son's love if he does not come across as strong and brave (as well as his fears his family does not really need him apart from providing a paycheck). Although there are scenes earlier on in which the audience realizes that Mance is indeed afraid that there might be something more unnatural than his son's vivid imagination responsible for the odd occurrences befalling the family, the later half of the film has his behavior whipping back and forth from tolerant to jerky to effect the climax in which he does not so much follow his son's lead in fighting the monster as following through with the boy's plans when a shotgun just will not cut it. In spite of good performances – from the leads, that is, as there are some dire examples of acting from supporting players – the drama ends up falling flat while the monster action is really not enough for this one to even qualify as a sleeper or guilty pleasure.

Although Tenney took over the film a week into production and worked within the time limits to create a better result, his own cut of the film was significantly altered before it received theatrical play overseas and direct-to-video release stateside via Hemdale Home Video. While the theatrical cut of the film turned up earlier this year in a new widescreen transfer on streaming services courtesy of rights owner Filmrise, Tenney had revealed on social media that his own surviving element for his director's cut would see the light of day. Vinegar Syndrome's 1080p24 MPEG-4 AVC 1.85:1 widescreen Blu-ray features new 2K restorations of the director's cut (84:19) from Tenney's 35mm lab print and the theatrical cut (85:51) from the original 35mm camera negative. The director's cut looks relatively clean apart from minute scratches, a cool color bias, and lesser shadow detail compared to the negative-sourced theatrical cut where the shared scenes generally look cleaner, brighter, and better-detailed while the subsequent reshoot material not directed by Tenney stands out in terms of style and lighting. Both transfers feature a DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 rendering of the Ultra Stereo mix (fortunately finished before the producer's alterations) with clear dialogue and directional effects while neither score is particularly engaging. Optional English SDH subtitles are provided for both versions.

Tenney provides an introduction to the director's cut (1:34) in which he notes himself and actors
Kilpatrick and Savoy provide commentary on both versions of the film. On the director's cut, Tenney reveals that he came in when original director John Woodward fell behind schedule during the first week, that he had no input on pre-production but did rewrite some of the screenplay. He points out scenes or bits of scenes that he was stuck with since he was not allowed to do any reshoots while Kilpatrick and Savoy recall the rigors of the location shoot with hot days and freezing nights, working with child actors, but have generally warm memories of the shoot. On the theatrical cut track, they relate some of the same information and other anecdotes while Tenney points out the reshoot scenes including the new opening, the shuffling of scenes, and the replacement of the score for the third time (Tenney's brother Dennis having composed the first score which the producers apparently liked but nevertheless replaced on the director's cut with another original score and then a mismatched patchwork score of licensed cues from several composers for the theatrical cut). While Tenney is of the opinion that his cut is better, even he notes that it is not a particularly good film, and that the producers did not realize that his work was only "better" than what had come before with Woodward's material.