I think we have to consider ourselves lucky as film-collectors in the UK. Skinner (1993) was nigh on lost if it were not for the efforts primarily of its writer Paul Hart-Wilden (along with help from others along the way), added to the fact that the BBFC would once have ruined this with censorship (they've today decide to mercifully leave it complete), as well as the chances of today's easily offended factions of society having something to be offended at being quite high (unfortunately that kind of whining has way more sway than it should, post millennium). And then factor in that this is now mastered in 4K from an uncut source and put out - with decent extras - on Blu-ray, in the UK as technically the best edition in the world and ever (!), is all in all a miracle to behold.
In essence a tale about a serial-killer, back when they were quite popular on film, Skinner follows around the titular character (Skinner by name and nature - Ted Raimi) as he continues a compulsion to kill and remove/wear his victims' flesh. Complicating matters is the detail that one of his former victims (a very tragic portrayal by Traci Lords) still lives. Badly scarred she now seeks out Dennis Skinner in order to eventually execute her own revenge. Along the way he lodges with an appealing young woman (Ricki Lake, surprisingly), forming a half-complete relationship with her while her husband takes immediate dislike to both the man and the boarding situation. It's not quite hitting all the nails that could have made this a genuine cult classic, but it's not a million miles away from that classification either. What I do like about it is its feeling of being a little bit underground, a bit sludgy and taboo. It's quite nasty in places (very nasty in one particular prolonged sequence), not too fussed about pushing a few buttons as things weren't back then, and quite uniquely grim.
101 Films picked this up for UK distribution and added a few bells of their own. Firstly the transfer is excellent, widescreen and sourced as mentioned above from a new 4K master using unrated elements that were very close to never seeing the light of day again. There was once a very rough DVD of the film (succeeding prior VHS tapes and a LaserDisc), the only factor retaining value being its 4:3 presentation (i.e. opened up, as opposed to matted on the new edition). But of course this new master, most likely now framed as intended, is leaps above anything else in terms of image colour and detail. Shared with its US (Severin) cousin disc, there's a 20 minute interview with Hungarian-born director Ivan Nagy (shot around 2007 before his death a few years later) where he talks about how he got into directing and what he thought of the script, etc. His controversial relationship with Heidi Fleiss is more than touched upon too (interestingly, the pursuing woman once nearly killed by Skinner was called Vicky in the script, but renamed Heidi in the filmed version...). Ted Raimi provides a 15 minute interview where he expresses appreciation for being a part of the film. The writer himself delivers a 17 minute insight into what he was thinking when he wrote the film and the story of the script essentially being taken away from his (London-bound, self-shooting) intentions through to loss and rediscovery. Then we have a 10 minute piece that's a lot more fascinating than I expected it to be, a talk with the lucky guy who brought the elements back together in the 90s in order to cut (or recut) it for its then distributors. Rounding out the extras on the discs are a 14 minute time-coded selection of outtakes from the brutal skinning sequence that centrepieces the film's horror statement, plus a trailer of course. Aside from Severin's (who shot/compiled the extras footage) tiring inclination to repeatedly insert shots from the film as interviewees talk (e.g. someone mentions a door closing, cut to a shot of Ted Raimi in front of a door...), i.e. I would really just watch the interviews uninterrupted with pointless footage from the pertinent movie, this is a fantastic selection of talks from the people involved in Skinner.
But wait... here in the UK 101 released this (dual format Blu-ray and DVD) as part of their premium Black Label, whereby the standard edition is embellished with a quality slipcase and booklet containing (alongside stills) a fantastic essay by Paul Hart-Wilden detailing his blossoming interest in relocating the elements to Skinner and the arduous decade-long search that ensued, culminating with how it finally landed on Blu-ray in the beautiful edition that we have here. If you are in the US the Severin disc will probably suffice, but 101 have edged it by putting out the best edition worldwide. It's also available as a standard version here in the UK for when that Limited Edition goes out of print, but I would grab the LE if I were you.
