Kaustic Plastik

Kaustic Plastik, frequently co-billed with fellow Italian house Infinite Statue, works the corners of cinema other makers leave alone: the black-and-white monsters, the cult heroes, the faces film history actually remembers. The specialty is the licensed likeness, and the range of them is remarkable, from Bela Lugosi's 1931 Dracula and Boris Karloff's Monster to Count Orlok of the silent Nosferatu, more than a century old and still unsettling at one-sixth scale.

The Horror shelf runs deep. Alongside the Universal classics sits Hammer's Horror of Dracula, with Christopher Lee's Count and Peter Cushing's Van Helsing squaring off in separate releases, and Re-Animator's Herbert West and Dr. Carl Hill, whose two-figure set includes Rufus the zombie cat, a bonus accessory this Archive regards as load-bearing.

Then the register shifts from horror to homage: a Toshiro Mifune tribute in Ronin and Samurai presentations, Peter Sellers as Inspector Clouseau in three editions, Bud Spencer as Bambino, a Chuck Norris Missing in Action homage, and Agent Dale Cooper of Twin Peaks with the coffee presumably implied. The modern wing opened with the Maestro Line and The Crow's Eric Draven in four editions.

One collector's note the catalogue teaches quickly: nearly every property carries an Exclusive tier sold only through the maker's own site, never at retail. If an edition ladder looks complete at your usual shop, check the source before calling it done.