Friday, March 18, 2011

LUCIO FULCI: THE BEYOND (1981) CATRIONA MACCOLL, DAVID WARBECK, CINZIA MONREALE

The seven dreaded gateways to hell are concealed in seven cursed places... And on the day the gates of hell are opened, the dead will walk the earth!
 A young woman from New York named Liza (Catriona MacColl) inherits a Louisiana motel that has been unoccupied for nearly 60 years. While restoring the old building, many of the workers meet mysterious and untimely deaths, each more ill-fated than the next. Furthermore, Liza is visited by a blind specter named Emily (Cinzia Monreale) who lectures from a 4000-year-old book of collected prophecies that explains the motel is situated above one of seven portals to hell. As her sanity dwindles, Liza finds some much-needed stability in a local doctor named John McCabe (David Warbeck), who is determined to find a rational explanation for the recent state of affairs. Nevertheless, the protagonists are led through a maze of bizarre confrontations with beings beyond the realm of the living, and into an apocalyptic world of unknown horrors. 
THE BEYOND is at once the quintessential Lucio Fulci film and a staple in the overall Italian horror genre. The director's epic masterpiece is a blend of atmospheric surrealism and nightmarish visions (a grisly tarantula attack, flesh-melting acid spills, a softball-sized gun blast through the skull of a young zombified girl, and an eyeball impaling, or two) that are definitely unsuitable for those with weak stomachs.

1 comment:

  1. Love the screen grabs Roy. A concise and enticing review too... makes me want to see this jewel of Giallo.
    Thanks!

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