In the early eighties, producer Charles Band (not yet of Empire Pictures and later Full Moon Entertainment) got into the video distribution business with a trio of related labels (Wizard Video, Force Video, and Cult Video) and hired Ken Dixon (THE EROTIC ADVENTURES OF ROBINSON CRUSOE) to direct a trio of compilation videos showcasing several of the titles on those labels. THE BEST OF SEX & VIOLENCE (1981) was a horror/erotica combo while FAMOUS T&A (1982) focused on the latter. FILMGORE (1983) is a two-hour compilation of viewer's digest of Wizard, Force, and Cult's gorier horror titles with wrap-around quips by Elvira, Mistress of the Dark (Dixon's later, even more dire ZOMBIETHON focused solely on Wizard's zombie film output including many of the Eurocine titles).

First up is Herschell Gordon Lewis' BLOOD FEAST (released by Wizard Video and later Continental Video, who excerpted it for their own gore compilation TERROR ON TAPE), and every gory highlight is presented here in a twenty minute condensation that may obviate the need to actually see the full film for most people (all the good lines - and headlines! - are present, as is the ending). The highlights of TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE (released by Wizard a few years before the easier-to-find Media Home Entertainment VHS) are covered in roughly fifteen minutes, although the film is intense without graphic gore (whoever edited the clip took care to include the makeshift dolly shots as the characters approach the house of doom), and THE DRILLER KILLER (first released by Wizard and then later by Magnum Entertainment) is summed up in about ten minutes.

Cult Video's DRIVE-IN MASSACRE's goriest murder was already sampled in the compilation's interminable eight minute pre-title sequence but it's there again along with the other confusingly-edited kills in less than five minutes. Ted V. Mikel's THE ASTRO ZOMBIES (released by Wizard) is dull, dull, dull; yet there are apparently fifteen minutes of exciting bits. Seven minutes of Cult Video's CARNIVAL OF BLOOD intercuts its cheap, gory murders of nagging women with snippets of the film's dreary love story (and its accompanying love them) and relies on Elvira more than expository dialogue bits to give a sense of the storyline and characters.

Five minutes of DR. JEKYLL'S DUNGEON OF DEATH (first out from Wizard and then later from Magnum) looks by turns terrible and intriguing, while eight minutes of Don Dohler's THE FIEND (intended for television sales but debuting on Force Video and then later from Prism Entertainment) is seven minutes too many. There's a bit more of interest in Herschell Gordon Lewis' TWO THOUSAND MANIACS (released first by Force Video and then by Continental) than the seven minutes of gore on view here (but not much more, although they could at least have included the theme song in its entirety); however, not even the thirteen final minutes of FILMGORE can coherently convey the mishmash of a story that is Cult Video's SNUFF (an Argentinian film about a Mansonesque cult redubbed by sleaze filmmakers Michael and Roberta Findlay), but its climax (shot by the Findlay's to justify the title) provides the perfect ending shot for the entire compilation. FILMGORE's main point of interest is mainly nostalgia over the video presentations in which we first saw some of these titles (most which have since become available in superior digital presentations).