Varying vastly in quality and narrative hook, Romero himself ultimately disowned There’s Always Vanilla as well as citing Season of the Witch as an unfinished project he had hoped to remake one day, making this new Arrow Video boxed set an uneven package strictly for die hards eager to see the transitional period which built upon Night towards Dawn . As such, it’s an intriguing if not somewhat disappointing package as neither Vanilla nor Witch bear much solidarity along with The Crazies sporting familiar territory better explored in Dawn . Nevertheless, the Movie Sleuth took a good look at these early works in the zombie horror master’s career and here are our thoughts.

There's Always Vanilla (1971)

Cited as one of the director’s only romantic comedies in his oeuvre and characterized as among the few pictures written by someone other than Romero (penned by Rudolph J. Ricci),is a rough-around-the-edges 60s flower generation 16mm venture featuring much of the cast and crew fromwithout that film’s focus and drive. In other words,not only meanders and struggles to maintain the viewer’s attention, Romero himself went on the record to call it his ‘worst movie’ and added in a video interview included in the boxed set just how little he cares about it.

Following the aimless exploits of former U.S. Army soldier Chris Bradley (Raymond Laine, also appearing in Season of the Witch), the film jumps about between Laine addressing the camera directly through recollections in an attempt to add coherence to the proceedings and following his soon-to-be girlfriend Lynn (Judith Ridley from Night of the Living Dead) fending off a sleazy television commercial director. If it sounds like this film went on ahead without giving the audience something to latch onto, it certainly is. While some fans will get a kick out of spotting Russell Streiner as a hippie working on a beer commercial, it’s difficult to invest in what frankly amount to little more than random scribblings.





Outside of a creepy abortion clinic chase sequence compounded with medical unease, most expecting the Romero who delivered

will find themselves increasingly bored by this misbegotten effort. Arrow Video have done a fine job cleaning up and giving new life to this forgotten film, but chances are most people who buy this boxed set will only ever watch this once before moving on to the director’s more fully realized efforts. Romero places blame of course on the picture being underbudget and largely unfinished, though I doubt this is one anyone feels the need to remake for modern audiences anytime soon.