Split Picks: Gary P. Cohen's 'Video Violence' Vs. 'Video Violence 2'

Split Picks reemerges to sift through two classic SOV horrors from director Gary P. Cohen. A mysterious tape left in a small town video store's dropbox leads to the shop's owner becoming immersed in an underground ring of homemade murder tapes in Gary P. Cohen's Video Violence (1987). The town's love for violence only grows more outlandish in the 1988 sequel, Video Violence 2. The chief killers, Howard and Eli, invade the airwaves with pirate broadcasts that show submitted tapes of gruesome killings from their most loyal viewers. Vincent Albarano and Aaron Bartuska make their Split Picks debuts to talk about all things Cohen and shot-on-video horror. Albarano is the author of Aesthetic Deviations, A Critical View of American Shot-On-Video horror, 1984-1994. Bartuska, a filmmaker (watch The Yardley Boys) and film teacher, recently spoke with Cohen for a career-spanning interview. With host Craig Wright, they spend some time with the hosts of the Howard and Eli Show and their gruesome tape collection.