Nightbreed, boiled down to its essence is a horror-fantasy about a group of monsters and mutants who take refuge under an isolated cemetery. There they are threatened by a mass murderer (David Cronenberg) who wants to see them all destroyed. There's a love story of course but its promptly overshadowed by the garish monster effects.Now by no means is Nightbreed a conventionally good film. While the makeup, set-designs and effects are very good, the mood and the overall story pushes a lot of boundaries and makes for some intriguing social commentary. We are meant to feel sympathy for the nightbreed despite their outward appearance and seemingly satanic customs. Indeed the quasi-religious imagery and constant gross-out horror makes the finished product indigestible to mainstream audiences.The subtext itself is even more subversive when you consider the homosexual undercurrents. Homosexuality as a theme is cloaked under the auspice of uncontrollable bloodlust. Therefore the monsters themselves are metaphors seen as perverse and evil when in reality they are only trying to chisel out a living on the out-skits of society.Now its not quite clear but it seems the nightbreed have a psychic link to those with violent fantasies like the lead Boone (Craig Sheffer) and later Ashberry (Malcolm Smith). Those who cannot be nightbreed such as Boone's lover (Ann Bobby) and the old man at the service station have no violent tendencies whatsoever, despite their desire to join the nightbreed i.e. to not be sexually repressed.The relationship shared by Cronenberg's character Decker and Boone is the most intriguing contextually speaking. They are meant to show unrealized sexual tension and self-loathing on the part of Decker who is also Boone's psychiatrist. While Boone becomes aware of his bloodlust by fighting on behalf of the nightbreed i.e. constructive political violence, Decker cloaks his under a mask lying to himself and the world. Only when his mask is on can he indulge in his most unsavory fantasies.I could be grasping at straws here. After all such themes could be a guise for xenophobia, racism or any social fear of the "other". And while those are arguments to be made its worthwhile to note that Clive Barker came out during the early nineties and his novels and short stories almost always have strong sexual themes. Nightbreed could then be considered almost as a coming out party.Ultimately I'd recommend this film, not only for its challenging social commentary and audacious set and makeup design but also because so many horror films nowadays lack such ambitions. And even if those ambitions aren't cranked up to eleven as they should be you have to admit Nightbreed is a gay ol' time.

Clive Barker's Nightbreed had a difficult production and an equally arduous release. The film was based on Barker's celebrated novella "Cabal," a fan favorite, and was adapted by the author himself, who also took over the directing reigns (his Hellraiser had been a hit only a few short years earlier). The ensuing marketing, release, and reaction was disastrous. First Barker's vision was re-edited and re-tooled without his consent, creating a film that felt oddly choppy and unfinished to many critics and viewers. While the plot was filled with unique characters and monsters (as well as a "the monsters are the heroes and the humans are the monsters" theme), the studio decided to market the film as typical slasher fare, pandering to the lowest common box office denominator. To Barker's horror, Nightbreed floundered in theaters and died a quiet death.Twenty five years after its initial release, Nightbreed has slowly but faithfully garnered a strong cult following. The fan base became so rabid—even starting a website called "Occupy Midian"—that a new cut of the film was created, cobbled together using old VHS quality tapes that became known as "The Cabal Cut, which was much closer to what Barker had in mind before the studio tampered with the film. Although extraordinarily rough in nature (and much longer in length), the new "Cabal Cut" was shown at various festivals to great enthusiasm from fans and even Clive Barker himself. The interest became large enough that Scream Factory, a horror offshoot of Shout Factory, decided to work with Barker and Morgan Creek to see if they could locate the missing film elements. After a lot of hard work and searching the Warner Brothers vaults (the footage had been thought to have been lost), the folks at Shout Factory were able to find the original camera negatives, and with Barker's help added nearly twenty minutes of footage to the theatrical cut thus finally offering fans a brand new look at Nightbreed: The Director's Cut the way Clive Barker had always intended.I've been a fan since I caught the film on video back in the early 1990s. There is a good reason why Nightbreed has become such a cult classic: It's a truly unique monster movie that doesn't attempt to play by the rules. While there's a lot of rubber suits and latex masks, Nightbreed separates itself from the pack by having something other than scares and violence on its mind. The core idea of the film—that the terrors living below Midian are no worse than the terrors living above in the cities—gives the film a lot more weight and meaning. The allegorical nature of the "us vs. them" theme makes the film less a scary monster movie and more a dark poem; while the monsters of Midian are physically grotesque, they only want what we want: do be left in peace to live a life of their choosing. This makes Nightbreed an especially topical film that has held up surprisingly well.The real standout is David Cronenberg as the film's secondary villain, who doesn't really act so much as stand there and look creepy in a mummy mask made of buttons and zippers. Fans of classic science fiction cinema should keep an eye out for John Agar (Tarantula, The Mole People) as a local gas station attendant who gets on the wrong side of Dr. Decker's knife.

Aaron Boone (Craig Sheffer) has disturbing dreams of Midian where monsters live. Psychiatrist Dr. Decker (David Cronenberg) is treating him and convinces him that he committed a series of murders. He tries to go to Midian for real and is rejected by its inhabitants. The police catches up to him outside the gates and Decker tricks the police into killing Boone. Boone is resurrected and he is accepted into Midian. His girlfriend Lori Winston tracks down Boone but she is followed by Decker who turns out to be the real monster.Clive Barker is not quite good enough to direct this. Cronenberg is competent as a villain but he would have been a far superior choice as the director. This is filled with the grotesque and weird monstrosities. Some of it is very effective gore. Narcisse slicing through his own head is amazing although other creatures are less effective. There's only so much real makeup can do and CGI is rather primitive. The movie attempts for grand horror but Barker doesn't have it in him. He is still stuck in a lot of B-movie horror tropes. The cops are too silly. There are not enough good actors for the minor roles.EDIT: Director's Cut It's been so long that I can't tell what's been added in this version. There's almost twenty minutes more. This probably flowed a bit better although it could cut down Anne Bobby's singing. Neither her nor Craig Sheffer are A-list performers. The limitations are still the same in this extended cut. I still don't see why body-horror expert Cronenberg isn't doing the directing. He's right there on set already. The creature creations are pretty good especially considering the limited budget although Midian is short-changed. It needs to be more other-worldly. The secondary acting is still B-level. This will never be better than a relatively good B-movie. I do wonder if a bigger remake could be great.

When I heard last year that a new version of Nightbreed was coming out I was happy to finally see how this flick should be in stead of the mess it was made off when it came out. Clive Barker had nothing to say about the editing just before release. It was not done that monsters were the good thing and humans were bad. So nobody understood the earlier version and it was a big failure. 6 years ago Clive Barker was fed up with it all and tried to restore Nightbreed in it's original form. It was a hell, nothing was found. Mark Miller helped Clive to find the old stuff and contacted the fan base and yes, there it was, a 160 minute flick called the cabal cut. It was edited full with VHS parts that were almost not watchable. I have seen pieces and they knew that they couldn't bring it out that way so they contacted the studio's again and here it is, the director's cut clocking in at 120 minutes restored on Blu Ray, sadly only on region A but no probs for me, I have seen it and indeed this looks more like a flick.The effects used to make the nightbreed creatures are stunning and so typical Barker but some effects are also outdated and were used common at the end of the eighties. But still it's worth picking up. And now seeing it again, David Cronenberg (Dr Decker) was perfect in his role. Finally it's out there so do pick it up. Here and there you do see pixels due the upgrade towards 1080P but hey, finally Midian is back in full glory.Gore 1/5 Nudity 0,5/5 Effects 3/5 Story 3/5 Comedy 0/5