From Florida's own William Grefe (the low budgeted, independent director of such epics as DEATH CURSE OF TARTU, STING OF DEATH and MAKO JAWS OF DEATH) comes this revenge tale that follows the formula of the previous year's WILLARD, giving us one of the director's most entertaining efforts. A hit when released to drive-ins in 1972 (it sometimes played on a double bill with MGM’s NIGHT OF THE LEPUS), BCI's STANLEY disc displays the company's appreciation of the Crown International film library with this full-blown special edition which not only has a ton of great extras, but finally grants the film the definitive home video transfer it deserves.

Longtime Soap star Chris Robinson (THE CYCLE SAVAGES) plays Tim Ochopee, a Seminole Indian and recent Vietnam vet who has had enough of the "white man" and decides to live in a primitive cabin along the Everglades with a horde of pet snakes (he sells the venom to a local hospital for medical purposes). His favorite of these is a rattlesnake named Stanley, which he mates with a female one called Hazel, sporting a wreath of flowers around her neck. Sleazy snake-clothing manufacturer Thomkins (Alex Rocco) and his pair of snake-slaying goons (Steve Alaimo, Mark Harris and Paul Avery as the pill-popping “Psycho”) naturally come into harm’s way as Tim uses his scaly, slithering critters to enact brutal revenge. Stanley and his pals also attacks a nauseating middle-aged couple (Marcia Knight and Rey Baumel) who create a tasteless yet sensational night club act where a snake's head is bitten off, and later, Tim kidnaps Thomkins’ lovely daughter (Susan Carroll) prior to the whacked-out, fiery climax.

Robinson is pretty good as a guy who sleeps and talks with snakes, becoming increasingly insane and disillusioned, and the actor obviously had no fear of handling the slithering reptiles, constantly in contact with them, and almost always wearing the one known as Stanley (played by a handful of different rattlers) around his neck. The film works because Robinson plays it completely straight, and even though there’s some bits of black humor (Stanley bites one of Tim’s foes in the ass), the proceedings are handled seriously and the snake attack scenes are sometimes unsettling. A number of snakes (and at least one tiny mouse) are abused or just outright destroyed, so the ASPCA would be all over this one if filmed today. Though the script doesn’t allow for much more than a typical revenge plot, it's the quirky characters and various scenarios involving the snakes (which the film even manages to give some empathy to) that make STANLEY satisfying drive-in fodder, and director Grefe makes the most of the Floridian landscapes with some truly scenic cinematography.

STANLEY was previously available on DVD as part of Rhino’s Horrible Horrors Collection Volume 2, but the full frame transfer looked to be the same one that VCI issued on VHS in the 1980s, with tons of video noise and murkiness, and it was also a heavily censored TV version. BCI now does STANLEY justice by presenting the fully uncut theatrical version, running about 107 minutes long. It’s presented letterboxed in its original 1.85:1 theatrical ratio with anamorphic enhancement. The film looks better than ever, with excellent color, crisp detail and a blemish-free transfer with clear mono audio, so there's really nothing to complain about here.