Repost: House by the Cemetery (October 9th at the Nightlight Cinema)

[HOUSE BY THE CEMETERY screens Friday October 9th at 11:30 pm at the Nightlight Cinema.]

Review by Bob Ignizio

Trying to explain my love for Lucio Fulci's early 1980s horror films to any rational person is a losing proposition. I realize I'm defending the indefensible, and my attempts to explain away the director's trademark incoherence as “nightmare logic” have the ring of desperate rationalization to them, but that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Even by Fulci's loose standards, though, HOUSE BY THE CEMETERY is especially shoddy work. Like most Italian movies made from the sixties through the eighties that weren't directed by Fellini or Antonioni, this is nothing more than a cheap attempt to cash in on the popularity of another film or genre. In this case its something in the ballpark of THE AMITYVILLE HORROR meets THE SHINING, only with considerably more gore and considerably less artistry than Kubrick's film. Hell, it even makes Stuart Rosenberg's workmanlike direction on AMITYVILE look good.

Repost: Zombie (October 10th at the Nightlight Cinema)

[ZOMBIE screens Saturday October 9th at 11:30 pm at the Nightlight Cinema.]

Review by Bob Ignizio

Right from its opening scene, Lucio Fulci's ZOMBIE announces its intent to be a completely unrepentant gore fest. Dr. Renard (Richard Johnson, Dr. Markway in THE HAUNTING) shoots a man wrapped in a white sheet in the head. The camera immediately zooms in to give us a nice, long, unflinching look at the various hunks of bloody flesh and bone exploding from the wound, and Renard informs someone offscreen, “The boat can leave now. Tell the crew.”


The action then moves to New York City as said boat drifts into the harbor, no one at the helm. When a couple of harbor patrolmen investigate, they soon learn that the reason Renard shot the guy in the head is that he was a zombie. They also learn that Renard must not have been too thorough, as another zombie on board (presumably the one who ate the crew) attacks and kills one of the patrolmen.

31 Days of Halloween 2013: Zombie

Review by Bob Ignizio

Right from its opening scene, Lucio Fulci's ZOMBIE announces its intent to be a completely unrepentant gore fest. Dr. Renard (Richard Johnson, Dr. Markway in THE HAUNTING) shoots a man wrapped in a white sheet in the head. The camera immediately zooms in to give us a nice, long, unflinching look at the various hunks of bloody flesh and bone exploding from the wound, and Renard informs someone offscreen, “The boat can leave now. Tell the crew.”


The action then moves to New York City as said boat drifts into the harbor, no one at the helm. When a couple of harbor patrolmen investigate, they soon learn that the reason Renard shot the guy in the head is that he was a zombie. They also learn that Renard must not have been too thorough, as another zombie on board (presumably the one who ate the crew) attacks and kills one of the patrolmen.

31 Days of Halloween 2013: The New York Ripper

Special guest review by Ed Mishic of Crimson Screens magazine

Long ago, when I was first getting into horror movies, I wanted to see everything that I could.  This would often mean that entire weekends were spent in the basement, watching as many movies as I could fit into my waking hours.  After a while, I would program my own themed movie marathons.  Sometimes I would watch a days worth of ghost movies.  Other times it would be zombie movies.  Even other times, it would be slasher movies.  Every once in a while, I would pick out what looked like the most violent movies I could find.  These would be the boxes with the sickest covers, bloodiest artwork and often directed by names which I had started to notice.  One of those names was Lucio Fulci.  Back in the day, if you wanted to see the complete, uncut version of a movie, you might have to look beyond a video store.  The description of THE NEW YORK RIPPER in the latest Midnight Video catalog made it seem as if it was a gorefest like I had never seen before.  Soon enough, I had my own bootleg copy of the movie and it went right to the top of my programming schedule.

House by the Cemetery (February 16th and 19th at the Cleveland Cinematheque)

[HOUSE BY THE CEMETERY screens Thursday February 16th at 8:35 pm and Sunday February 19th at 6:30 pm at the Cleveland Cinematheque.]

Review by Bob Ignizio

Trying to explain my love for Lucio Fulci's early 1980s horror films to any rational person is a losing proposition. I realize I'm defending the indefensible, and my attempts to explain away the director's trademark incoherence as “nightmare logic” have the ring of desperate rationalization to them, but that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Even by Fulci's loose standards, though, HOUSE BY THE CEMETERY is especially shoddy work. Like most Italian movies made from the sixties through the eighties that weren't directed by Fellini or Antonioni, this is nothing more than a cheap attempt to cash in on the popularity of another film or genre. In this case its something in the ballpark of THE AMITYVILLE HORROR meets THE SHINING, only with considerably more gore and considerably less artistry than Kubrick's film. Hell, it even makes Stuart Rosenberg's workmanlike direction on AMITYVILE look good.