The homage can be a glorious thing. It must tread a fine line between consideration, admiration and abomination. With Maxi Contenti  THE LAST MATINEE it is also a broad expanse of genre, rather than specificity, that drives it. A cinema screen, the stalls, the flicker of lights. On a cold, wet day in 1990s Montevideo, in a decaying cinema, a man enters with a simple goal. Hiding in the dark, stalking those watching the late evening showing of a horror film. Ana father is old and needs to cut down on his work, so she takes projection booth duties. Its a 35mm print show, so easy to deal with. She doesn’t expect anything worse than a broken reel or a burned-out bulb to scupper the showing. But the auditorium menace will see that her night is to be filled with problems, maybe even murder…

I cant say that Contenti isn’t working hard to create a loveable embrace to all of those movies he watched as a youth. I got the DEMONS nods, the last Argento films worth a damn, that being OPERA and its poster on the walls. The Frankenstein movie that is from 2011 and is obviously a replacement for any and every horror film knock off from the states in the 90s but is from the 2010s. But in total the film is actually an homage to the experience of the cinema and life in the darkened shell of dreams and desires. I think the added pieces that make the film sometimes fun, sometimes tired and often just another fan boy love in, are dispensable to the whole other thing going on. Though you might not fully embrace this, Contenti grasps the space as a place he finds inspiration from and maybe, pleasure. The rest of the slasher, Giallo, Horror (or whatever genre adage you wish) is simply a mechanism to do just that.

DISC

I have complained recently that Arrow have been giving us substandard extra content. Here this is far from the case. The best pieces are the Puppet Pal V feature or Contenti’s first film. It might be an assault of aspiration of realisation but its very good. Then the clever The Matinee Massacre – a 3 part series of mockumentary shorts exploring the events of the movie as if they really happened, which frames the events as real but asks the telling question of actualisation and participation. Maybe the most telling of Contenti’s thoughts are just that. He watched a series of films and then replicated their troupes and made his own film. Commentary with director Maxi Contenti defines this wisely. He comes across, a lot like myself. We missed the intitial slasher craze as we were too young. We then caught up in the 90s and 00s, Then became seduced by its epic ability to subvert and divert the expectation.

• High Definition Blu-ray (1080p) presentation
• Original uncompressed stereo and 5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio sound
• Optional English subtitles
• Audio Commentary with director Maxi Contenti
• Behind the scenes
• VFX featurette exploring the special effects of the film
• Interview with director Maxi Contenti
• Killer Attractions: Maxi Contenti & Ricardo Islas in Conversation, discussion between the film’s director and star Ricardo Islas, director of Frankenstein: Day of the Beast
• At the Premiere, featurette on the film’s premiere
• Music video for ‘Espada’ by Phoro, directed by Maxi Contenti
• The Matinee Massacre – a 3 part series of mockumentary shorts exploring the events of the movie as if they really happened
• Puppet Pal V, Contenti’s first feature film
• Six short films by director Maxi Contenti: The Plastic Kingdom (2011) Popping Eyes (2009) Hobby Metal (2006) Les Escaliers Fruitiers (2005) La Galleta aka The Cookie (2003) Miedo aka Fear (2001)
• Trailers and teasers
• Image galleries including behind-the-scenes and promo stills, concept artwork, storyboards and posters
• Fan artwork image gallery
• Double-sided fold-out poster
• Illustrated collector’s booklet featuring new writing on the film by Anton Bitel
• Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Marc Schoenbach