In October’s last weekend, BEYOND FEST was taken over by Clive Barker. Making just his 8th trip out of his house in the past two years, the wildly popular and influential horror author and artist arrived in Hollywood to screen his NIGHTBREED, given the subtitle THE CABAL CUT to distinguish itself from the castrated version that found itself in theaters in 1990.

After an arduous search led by producer Mark Miller, long-lost footage from Clive Barker’s original shoots was found, and has been compiled into this two hour and 20 minute “kitchen sink” version that throws every snippet of film into the cut. The result is a long film, with at least 45 minutes of never-before-seen footage, all of which is “VHS quality” (the worst fate any movie could ever have). It’s disjointed and discordant to jump from normal quality to the dark, crackling, and fuzzy “new” footage. It adds another level to the experience, to be sure, making it seem like you’ve happened upon some lost relic, but there are several scenes where you can’t see whole characters or are unable to decipher the gist of the action. It makes the rest of the picture feel like pristine IMAX in comparison, and the news that Scream Factory is hard at work to restore and rework the footage onto a DVD and Blu-Ray planned for a 2014 release, is Christmas come early for NIGHTBREED fans.

Overall, seeing Clive Barker’s true vision, unadulterated, is an unmitigated pleasure and a testament to his devout fans that we even got a chance to see such a thing happen. The movie is all over the place and confusing, but I can’t even imagine how it would’ve been without the 45 new minutes of the film, with such crucial plot points and character development nested within. Best of all, the entire film is infused with MONSTERS, monsters everywhere, as we get more glimpses of Midian than I even remember in CABAL (the story in which the film is based). All the monsters are great, with some awesome practical FX giving us a wide variety of bizarre creatures. Throw in Doug Bradley (Pinhead himself) as Lylesburg, a scene stealing maniac in Narcisse (Hugh Ross), David freakin’ Cronenberg as the villainous Dr. Decker, and a stirring love story between Lori and Boone and you have the elements of what should’ve been a big hit. Couple that with the actual presence of Clive Barker and you have a magical night of horror that makes you excited for the future of NIGHTBREED and Barker’s work.

Nerdy Sidenote: Craig Sheffer’s Boone/Cabal had to inspire Joss Whedon’s Angel. The black leather jacket is reminiscent of his trench coat, the hair, the plain white and black shirts, the fact that Craig Sheffer LOOKS like David Boreanaz, he is the chosen one, he is also dead, and he has an ugly face when he becomes his true monstrous self (Angelus/Cabal). The parallels are all there, though I’m completely making something out of nothing because of my Whedon obsession. Carry on.

CLIVE BARKER AND MARK MILLAR Q&A:

The filmmaker and producer sat down with the LA Times’ Geoff Boucher to talk the film. There were a tons of wonderful nuggets, and I’ve tried to Cabal them all together for you.

• NIGHTBREED had a lot working against it, as the two producers disputed over the content in the film. Joe Roth was all for the monsters, and their depiction as the good guys, a view not shared by James Robinson.
• The end result killed Clive Barker (not literally, but it certainly didn’t help his deteriorating health). He couldn’t admit to it being his vision, was embarrassed that he was attached. He wanted to talk about how it sucked on the press tours.
• Mark Miller found out about the possibility of new footage in 2008 on IMDB, and that’s when the project truly began, resulting in THE CABAL CUT we saw 5 years later.
• For a while, “no one knew or cared about the missing footage” according to Barker, believing it to be lost in one of FOX’s many anonymous warehouses scattered across the country, like Hangar 51 in INDIANA JONES.
• NIGHTBREED cost only $11 million to make, impressive as is, but once you’ve seen all the new footage, and all the FX and painstaking creatures created for the film, that number sounds even more implausible. Clive Barker got all kinds of mileage out of that money.
• When the real NIGHTBREED was put together, Clive Barker cried like a baby, finding something that he thought he had lost. It validated him and his vision.
• Morgan Creek and Shout Factory/Scream Factory have come to an agreement to release the Director’s Cut in 2014. This will feature even more footage, but will also be shorter and condensed compared to the CABAL CUT, and likely a lot of editing and remastering of the footage for DVD and Blu-Ray purposes.
• On the film: NIGHTBREED “is about monsters, monster movies and why we need monsters.” If that doesn’t get Monster Kids blood pumping, I don’t know what will.
• Just days before this screening, it was announced that Clive Barker would be writing a remake of his own HELLRAISER for Bob Weinstein.
• He couldn’t watch the HELLRAISER sequels, calling them “abominations.” The mythology is close to him and didn’t like what happened. Neither does anyone.
• Clive Barker is clear, that as of now, he’s only writing the script for the new HELLRAISER and that he and Mark Miller will produce. No word on whether he’d direct or want to, but the implication might be that he’s not healthy enough to get back in the chair. But he hopes his script and producer credit will allow his vision to come through.
• What does he plan for the new HELLRAISER? Since a lot of what made HELLRAISER so crazy back then is now normal, Barker wants to give a new generation a HELLRAISER film with even more balls, to push a lot harder and be more extreme. It has to be a hard R. Believes that all horror movies that aren’t R are fighting a losing battle, music to the ears of the horror faithful.
• He has new things planned for Pinhead, but declined to tease anything about them.
• Clive Barker has at least one more story left in him for the world of CABAL. He originally planned NIGHTBREED to be a trilogy, which obviously didn’t work out. He claims he has enough stuff in his head to write until he’s 81 (twenty years).
• The “demise of Pinhead” novel probably won’t be coming until 2016. Barker expresses frustrations over timelines and his lack of control over them, apologizing to the fans for not getting the books to them sooner.
• The first draft of “Cabal” was entirely dictated, as he was having issues with his hands at the time.
• Barker thinks with his eyes and doesn’t know what he thinks until he draws it. Believes it all comes from the unconscious.
• Mark Miller was searching for the lost footage of NIGHTBREED all over the place, and ended up finding it… in Clive Barker’s closet. Next to a big pile of porn, Clive Barker jokingly asserts.
• Mark Miller: You can’t guarantee an artistic vision when making something through the studio, you have to do it yourself, which obviously is happening a lot these days.
• Clive: If you have freedom, use it. Don’t worry about making a buck. Do something your proud of.

Seeing Clive Barker — and gorging on chocolate truffles, cupcakes, and champagne afterwards — was one of my favorite experiences at the Egyptian Theatre, and there have been many over the past few months. Clive’s recovery and his beliefs are inspiring. He’s overcome so much, and continues to stick to his guns, his heart, and we’re lucky to get to see the results in the form of his art.