Blu-ray Review: 10 to Midnight - Twilight Time Limited Edition

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Boutique label Twilight Time specializes in strictly limited edition Blu-ray releases of a wide variety of films. Recently they unearthed the pulpy Charles Bronson thriller 10 to Midnight (1983), issuing a run of 3,000 copies as part of their ever-growing series. One of the things that's great about Twilight Time's catalog: they're not discriminatory when it comes to filmmakers, genres, or overall reputation of a given film. It may seem unlikely for a blood-and-nudity exploitation pic like 10 to Midnight to coexist in a series that also includes the likes of Judgment at Nuremberg, but there it is.

Directed by the late J. Lee Thompson (an Oscar nominee for The Guns of Navarone in 1961), 10 to Midnight pits Bronson's stone-faced LAPD detective Leo Kessler against serial killer Warren Stacy (Gene Davis). Kessler has a rookie partner, Paul McAnn (Andrew Stevens), and together they try to piece together enough of a case to bust Stacy. Student nurse Laurie (Lisa Eilbacher) is Kessler's daughter and you can bet your bottom dollar she'll get wrapped up in Stacy's madness eventually. 
 
10 to midnight BD.jpg Anyone nostalgic for the so-bad-they're-good films produced by the Cannon Films team of Menahem Golan and Yoram Globus will surely get a charge out of this one. There are no surprises, plot-wise, but the monolithic lead performance by Bronson coupled with copious amounts of gratuitous nudity (psycho killer Warren prefers his victims to be nude; he also prefers to be nude himself while committing these atrocities!) make it a cheese-fest worthy of midnight viewing parties.

I bet the folks behind 10 to Midnight, including cinematographer Adam Greenberg (an Oscar nominee for 1991's Terminator 2: Judgment Day), never expected this cheapie to look so great in a home video format. Twilight Time's Blu-ray looks pretty snazzy in a high definition transfer struck from what seems to have been a generally clean source print. The lossless DTS-HD MA mono mix is similarly clean and free of any issues.

Late composer Robert O. Ragland's score is presented as an isolated track, as per Twilight Time custom, in DTS-HD MA 2.0 stereo. The big extra, however, is an audio commentary track hosted by film historian David Del Valle with 10 to Midnight producer Pancho Kohner and casting director John Crowther. The disc also includes the film's theatrical trailer and some radio spots.

For ordering info, while supplies last, visit Twilight Time's exclusive distributor Screen Archives.

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Chaz Lipp writes for The Morton Report.

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