NOTE: The below Blu-ray captures were taken directly from the Blu-ray disc.

ADDITION: Radiance Blu-ray (October 2023): Radiance have transferred Juanma Bajo Ulloa's The Dead Mother to Blu-ray. It is cited as being from a "4K restoration of the film supervised and approved by director Juanma Bajo Ulloa". This is a highly interestingly shot film by cinematographer Javier Aguirresarobe and the dual-layered transfer, with very high bitrate, supports the film exceptionally well in 1080P. There are some beautiful sequences and colors are balanced with controlled contrast. I had no issues with the image quality.

NOTE: We have added 50 more large resolution Blu-ray captures (in lossless PNG format) for DVDBeaver Patrons HERE

On their Blu-ray, Radiance use a linear PCM 2.0 channel track (24-bit) in the original Spanish language. The Dead Mother has aggressive effects; gunshots, fights with plenty of head butts by Ismael and there is bass response. There is a score by Bingen Mendizábal. He first composed the music for Juanma Bajo Ulloa 's short film El reino de Víctor (included in the supplements) in 1989. He is a lover of traditional Basque music and Irish folk and there are representations in his film music. He has worked for Spanish and international directors. The score here supports the film's ambiguous elements very well. Radiance offer optional English subtitles for both the feature and the Spanish-language commentary - on their Region FREE Blu-ray.

The Radiance Blu-ray offers a new commentary by the director / co-writer (with his brother Eduardo) Juanma Bajo Ulloa in Spanish with optional English subtitles. He talks about the only scene in his career that he had to shoot twice and many production related details and hurdles overcome while shooting the film. It's pretty informative. The Story of La Madre Muerta is a 40-minute documentary on the making of the film featuring behind-the-scenes images and interviews with the cast and crew. It is also in Spanish with optional English subtitles. Radiance include Victor's Kingdom [El reino de Victor] a 1989 short by Bajo Ulloa that won a Goya Award. In it Sara (Luisa Solaguren) reads a story to Victor (Javier Jiménez) at night about a grieving princess and a brave prince. Eventually aspects of the story converge in their real lives lading to a tragic outcome. This short is also restored in 4K. There is a gallery of behind-the-scenes and promotional imagery and a trailer. The package offers a soundtrack CD featuring Bingen Mendizábal's score, a limited Edition booklet featuring new writing on the film by Xavier Aldana Reyes, author of Spanish Gothic: National Identity, Collaboration and Cultural Adaptation, and newly translated archival writing by Juanma Bajo Ulloa, co-writer Eduardo Bajo Ulloa and an appreciation by Nacho Vigalondo and there is a reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Time Tomorrow.      

Juanma Bajo Ulloa's The Dead Mother offers quite a fascinating and unique story. Wikipedia describes that this film "contributed to the creation of an aura of cult auteur around the director." I can understand why. The lead character is a nasty sociopathic criminal. I can't recall the number of people he head-butted people in the film. The Dead Mother is shocking at times, but never exploitive. What evolves is a connection between the violent Ismael and emotionally damaged Leire (Ana Alvarez) that appears to lead to a redemption for Ismael. No question this is a memorable film and a great choice for Radiance Films to bring to Blu-ray. The package is stacked from a director commentary, short film, booklet, CD and more. Certainly recommended!

Gary Tooze