Severin Films, with sales and distribution expertise provided by MVD Entertainment Group, has a new 4K scan (from the film’s internegative) of legendary genre filmmaker Bert I. Gordon’s 1973 micro-budget psycho-bomber classic, The Mad Bomber, starring former baseball and basketball player, Chuck Connors, who made a name for himself as Lucas McCain on The Rifleman series (1958-1963).
A newly-minted Blu-ray edition will be ready on Oct. 29.
When you have no money and you are a filmmaker, you improvise. When you are a B-filmmaker (in a very good sense) of the caliber of Burt I. Gordon improvisation is just part of the process.
He made some of the best sci-fi films of the 1950s on a shoestring — The Cyclops, The Amazing Colossal Man, Beginning of the End (it is a long and very impressive list) — and he knew how get it done in a hurry, often editing a scene in camera while he was shooting. It wasn’t just sci-fi either, how about Picture Mommy Dead (1966 with Zsa Zsa Gabor), The Magic Sword and How to Succeed with Sex.
So when you are shooting Confessions of a Dirty Cop, which became Detective Geronimo, which became The Police Connection and finally The Mad Bomber, you might expect a disaster. By no means was this film a disaster, instead Gordon delivered a taut psycho-bomber/cop action thriller that also features the like of Vince Edwards and Neville Brand.
The film also has a wicked twist. We know that Connors’ character, William Dorn, is planting bombs around the city, but during his deranged crime spree another — unrelated — crime takes place, which puts Detective Geronimo Minelli (Edwards) in a tough spot. If he can solve that crime then he will have his witness and the identity of Dorn.
Bonus goodies include two viewing options — the theatrical cut and the television cut — a vintage video session with filmmaker Bert I. Gordon conducted by David Del Valle and a commentary featuring author Kier-La Janisee (“House of Psychotic Women”) and retired bomb squad detective Mike Digby.
Also counted among the bonuses are three featurettes — “Patricia Gordon Remembers Her Father,” “To Be in the Moment” and “On the Trail of the Mad Bomber.”
