Matty goes wild for Arrow Video’s swanky presentation of Brian Yuzna’s squishy classic.

The mullets and garish fashions might have dated, but in a world now completely overshadowed by greed and austerity, the message behind Brian Yuzna’s slimy psychosexual satire is more pertinent than ever. “Didn’t cha know, Billy-boy?” creepy playboy, Ferguson (Ben Meyerson), sneers to SOCIETY‘s (1989) high school hero lead, Bill Whitney (Billy Warlock). “The rich have always sucked off low-class shit like you.”

Boasting the same blend of icky terror and sharp social commentary as John Carpenter’s thematically similar Reagan-era swipe They Live (1988), splat auteur Yuzna’s antagonists are even more disturbing than capitalist alien invaders. To say much more, however, would spoil the fun for the uninitiated. It is, though, one of the all-time great reveals: a fiendishly imaginative pay-off that remains Yuzna’s calling card and – quite possibly – his crowning genre achievement.

The first picture to actually be directed by the Re-Animator (1985) producer, Yuzna’s subsequent megaphone-wielding career owes much to Society. The film’s fleshy, ‘shunting’ finale – brought to brilliantly surreal and disgusting life by Japanese FX maverick Screaming Mad George – is the blueprint for Yuzna’s signature brand of kinky body horror; from superb sequel Return of the Living Dead 3 (1993), to unfairly lambasted comic book adap, Faust: Love of the Damned (2000). An infamous and beloved sequence in cult circles, the shunt is a delightful gross-out that’s lost none of its power even post such watershed grue as A Serbian Film (2010) and The Human Centipede 2 (Full Sequence) (2011).

It’s the mischievous, paranoid dread of Society‘s first hour, however, that propels Yuzna’s wicked parable. As Bill himself says, biting into a rotten, worm-filled apple during the film’s enigmatic prologue, it’s only by scratching the surface of the John Hughes-style jock’s privileged Beverly Hills existence that’ll expose the terrible truth that lurks beneath – and Yuzna does so by squeezing every ounce of tension from each strange, ironic, and deeply uncomfortable scenario on his way to it.

Originally announced by Second Sight in early 2013 for release later that year, Society was pushed back to spring 2014 before being shelved indefinitely due to, erm, ‘an unspecified legal snafu’ (read: Second Sight not paying Yuzna the licence fee – naughty!). While a beautiful-looking but extras-light (well, archival Yuzna commentary aside) German Blu popped up in the interim from Capelight, us Brits craving a HD showcase seemed destined for a wait that mirrored Society‘s tardy North American VHS bow, when Republic withheld cassette distribution until 1992 (and even then the film only appeared in an R-rated version shorn of four-and-a-half minutes). Credit, then, to Arrow Video who have gallantly rescued both Yuzna’s classic warped weirdy and Second Sight’s Severin-produced special features. Brokering the rights to Yuzna’s unfocused but effective Bride of Re-Animator (1990) in the same salvage deal (much in the same way Yuzna used his Herbert West follow-up as collateral with Society‘s money men, Wild Street Pictures), Arrow’s canny opportunism has resulted in a stacked must-own that’s a candidate for best box of the year.

Severin’s trio of excellent featurettes headline, with Yuzna, Screaming Mad George, fellow make-up techs Nick Benson and David Grasso, and cast members Warlock, Meyerson, Tim Bartell, and Devin DeVasquez (who shines as Bill’s sultry yet potentially deadly love interest, Clarissa) all offering their own spirited memories of the movie’s making. Bartell’s recollections of shooting his character’s kooky demise in particular are glorious. His exhausting commitment to the gruesomely obscene gag bristles with a surprising amount of emotional resonance amidst the debauched carnage.

Severin’s David Gregory moderates a nice yack-track with Yuzna (completists take note: it does come at the expense of the aforementioned archival one, which dates back to Anchor Bay’s long out-of-print Region One DVD), who candidly addresses his rookie mistakes and offers his thoughts on Society‘s influences, themes, and motifs. The discussion is carried over to the director’s hugely enjoyable thirty-eight minute Q&A (recorded at last October’s Celluloid Screams Festival in Sheffield) and Alan Jones’ liner notes too, the latter explaining how our familiarity with the class system saw the film fare better critically upon these shores than in its homeland.

Of course, the real star is the Capelight-sourced transfer. Correctly framed – like the old Tartan Terror and Tartan Grindhouse DVDs – at Yuzna’s preferred 1.78:1, it’s an appropriately eye-popping 2K scan struck from Society‘s 35mm interpositive. There are little to no signs of intrusive digital tweaking, and Rick Fichter’s sun-soaked photography is finally gifted a filmic sheen (previous editions such as Medusa’s tapes and Anchor Bay’s 2002 disc have looked washed-out and TV movie-esque at times. Audio is served by an English-only 2.0 mix. Hearing composers Mark Ryder and Phil Davies’ sly reworking of The Eton Boat Song blaring out in souped-up DTS 6.1 or something would have been stupendous, but considering Society itself isn’t particularly demanding aurally it works just fine.

A quick 1989 natter with Yuzna from Society‘s London Premiere at the Scala’s Shock Around the Clock festival; the film’s spoileriffic trailer; a typically bizarre music video by Screaming Mad George (in which a Society prop – wink – lends a hand), and an intriguing graphic novel sequel, Society: Party Animal, are also all lovingly included in Arrow’s exquisite, Nick Percival-designed, limited run media book.

SOCIETY is out now via Arrow Video