Curdled (1996) Kino Lorber 4K Ultra HD / Blu-ray Review

Verdict
3

Summary

A quirky(ish) indie that more or less went unnoticed when it was first released in the mid-90s when edgy indie films were very much in vogue, Curdled from writer / director Reb Braddock (who never made another film) is sort of a failure to launch movie for me. The concept is good, and the ingredients are all there for a bitingly awesome and sexy film, but the movie just never takes shape the way you hope it would. Kino Lorber brings Curdled to 4K Ultra HD / Blu-ray, and they’ve given the film a big boost visually as well as in the special features category with several commentaries, interviews, intros, shorts, and more.

Plot:

A cleaning lady tending to a crime scene encounters the handsome killer at the scene of the crime, leading to unexpected results.

 

Review:

Gabriela (Angela Jones), since her childhood in Miami, has always had a bit of an unhealthy fascination (bordering on obsession) with morbid death scenes after being very close to one such scene (a beheading) from childhood. Being single, she allows herself to keep a scrapbook of ugly news clippings, with no one to tell her how odd it is, and her dating life is teetering on oblivion when she tries dating a guy who doesn’t “get” her. Meanwhile, there’s a handsome and charming lady killer (literally) named Paul (William Baldwin) doing nasty things to rich, cultured women in Miami: He charms them, goes home with them, and then brutally murders them, sometimes beheading them, leaving gnarly crime scenes in his wake. After he kills his latest victim (played by Bond girl Lois Chiles from Moonraker), she leaves crucial evidence behind that would clearly implicate Paul in her murder. Knowing this, he locks himself in a room with no way to get out (because he has no choice in the moment), and if he can find a way out, he’ll need to dispose of the evidence first chance he gets. On the flipside, Gabriela gets herself a job cleaning up crime scenes, and one of her first gigs is to clean up the mess Paul left behind … which means that she inevitably crosses paths with him when he finally finds his way out of the locked room. When the killer meets his biggest fan, nothing goes the way either of them could possibly imagine.

 

A quirky(ish) indie that more or less went unnoticed when it was first released in the mid-90s when edgy indie films were very much in vogue, Curdled from writer / director Reb Braddock (who never made another film) is sort of a failure to launch movie for me. The concept is good, and the ingredients are all there for a bitingly awesome and sexy film, but the movie just never takes shape the way you hope it would. Jones plays a character I never quite connected with, and Baldwin’s serial killer isn’t really defined or interesting enough to “side” with or understand. He’s just a creep, and the script never gives him a dimension that makes any sort of sense to me. When the two characters meet, the film basically becomes a one-location film, but there’s never the sort of “dance” between these two that gives them an emotional connection. It just goes one way, and when it’s done, it’s not quite satisfying or has any gravity to it. The soundtrack is heavy with salsa / mambo type music, and it becomes grating to the ear after awhile, so even the aural texture of the movie is a little on the annoying side. Still, I appreciated the concept, just not the execution. Quentin Tarantino produced it.

 

Kino Lorber brings Curdled to 4K Ultra HD / Blu-ray, and they’ve given the film a big boost visually as well as in the special features category with several commentaries, interviews, intros, shorts, and more.