The Beyond.

Another film to be re-released under Quentin Tarantino's Rolling Thunder Pictures Distribution Company was Lucio Fulci’s ultra violent midnight movie classic The Beyond (1981). Originally released in a cut version in America in 1983 it was not until the mid-nineties that the film was digitally premastered with a subsequent DVD release, uncut and completely uncensored in its entire goristic spender and in that form is still currently available through Grindhouse Releasing.   

New Orleans, Louisiana, 1927. Two rowboats full of hard faced men row quietly up a river joining others who have driven by road to meet outside the Seven Doors Hotel. They enter the building carrying lighted touches and metal chains and proceed to room 36. There they find an artist painting a strange hell like creation. Attacking him with the chains they rip off his skin and nail him to the wall accusing him of participating in the dark arts. Finally they cover this poor soul in quick lime that burns what’s left of his flesh leaving him unrecognisable. This brutal act is instrumental in opening one of the seven gateways to hell[1] that when opened allow the dead to cross over into the world of the living!  Our story now moves on some 50 years to 1981 and we find the Hotel being renovated by Liza Merril (Catriona MacCall) who has inherited this run down establishment. Strange things begin to happen, the bell from empty room number 36 keeps ringing, a painter falls from a scaffold while painting the front of the building and a plumber is contracted to find out why the basement is flooded but there’s no water in the hotel. Liza unwittingly becomes drawn in the mysteries of the old Hotel bound up with ancient Book of Eibon.

 

The wonderful Cinzia Monreale 

No less than three eye gauging scenes!! 

Lucio Fulci director of classic giallo, A Lizard in a Woman’s Skin (1971) and Zombie horror, Zombie Flesh Eaters (1979), pull’s out all the stops with The Beyond.   Make up artist Giannetto de Rossi certainly deserved a bonus matched only by the vivid colours of cinematographer Sergio Salvati both of whom, along with Fulci’s direction and augmented by the Gothic backdrop of New Orleans, make this one of the most beautiful cinematic splatter fests ever to be committed to celluloid. No less than three eye-gouging scenes compete with an horrendous scene where dozens of tarantula’s literately eat a mans face (had to hide behind my note book for this one) and the Alsatian dog who when infected by the Zombies attacks its blind owner (Cinzia Monreale) and rips out her throat and bits off her ear all executed in brilliant bloody detail!  But don’t worry there are plenty of other ‘bad deaths’ to keep even the most ardent fan of horror movies happy, in fact an outstanding template for this type of genre. It’s a film that relegates World War Z (2013) to the level of CBBeebies.

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[1] Beware all seven ‘Gateways to Hell’ are hidden in seven different places!

A Lizard in a Woman’s Skin.

It’s strange that some films are remembered more for a court case rather than the film it self. Lucio Fulci’s 1971 psychodrama murder mystery thriller, or giallo, A Lizard in a Woman’s Skin is a ‘case’ in point. In a scene in the later part of the movie our main protagonist Carol Hammond opens the door to a room where there are dogs that appear to have been experimented on, they are cut open with their hearts and guts still pulsating. This scene was so graphic and realistic that several crewmembers were forced to testify in court to disprove a charge of using live animals. But it took the appearance of Carlo Rambaldi, the man who set up the special effect, to save the films director from a two-year prison sentence by producing the fake dog prop that was used. This was the first time in film history that an effects artist had to prove his work was not real in a court of law!

My first experience of Italian directors work was when Ian McCulloch came to the RBC Film Club in Dumfries to introduce Zombie Flesh Eaters (1979) probably Fulci’s best known work and famous for two scenes in particular. The first features a zombie fighting an actual Tiger Shark underwater; this was filmed in a large salt-water tank with the shark being fed horsemeat and sedatives before the filming began. The other infamous scene is where a woman has her eye gouged out on a splintered piece of wood very slowly and very painfully.

The murder victim.

A Lizard in a Woman’s Skin is the story of Carol Hammond (Brazilian actress Florinda Bolkan) who is the daughter of an English politician. She experiences vivid psychedelic nightmares that consist of depraved bisexual orgies and the consumption of copious amounts of LSD. In a particularly intense nightmare she dreams that she murders her decadent neighbor Julia Durer (Anita Strindberg) whose late night wild sex and drug parties have been the main subjects of her hallucinatory type dreams. When she wakes next morning she find that the woman has been murdered and the police have started an investigation.

The lovely Brazilian actress Florinda Bolkan.

Although this is an Italian film it is set in England with some exteriors filmed at Woburn Abbey and Alexandra Palace, some of the dialog has been dubbed and some is in English and we also get the odd subtitle. As well as actors from various country’s we also have two well-known British thespians in the shape of Leo Genn who plays Carols father and Stanley Baker as Inspector Corven who has an irritating habit of whistling while people are talking to him! I would disagree that the ‘dog’ scene is the most upsetting; it’s the flying rodents in the form of bats that attack Carol and get tangled up in her hair that really gives me the willies. Still the fans of this genre get a grand helping of flesh and blood and the odd lesbian love scene. Known as Schizoid in America this is quite an interesting wee movie even taking into account a certain amount of corny acting and it’s wishy-washy soundtrack.

Zombies Flesh Eaters in Dumfries.

The Lady got something in her eye!!!!

A great coup for the RBC made for a terrific Monday night at the RBC Film Club when it was arranged for the star of Zombie Flesh Eaters Ian McCulloch to come and introduce it. The evening began with a short but interesting introduction by Mr McCulloch who explained how and why he agreed to appear in this 1979 Italian Zombie horror movie directed by Lucio Fulci.  The film was originally scorned on its release for its extremely bloody content. Two scenes particularly lead to the film being banned in several countries including Great Britain. The first of which features a zombie fighting an actual Tiger Shark underwater, this was filmed in a large salt-water tank with the shark being fed horsemeat and sedatives before the filming began. The other infamous scene is where a woman has her eye gouged out on a splintered piece of wood very slowly and painfully. In fact the film was not released in its uncut version until 2005 when our guest speaker recorded a commentary for its DVD release.  The first part of the movie is in fact pretty boring, but the remaining 30 minutes with its hyper realistic gore and blood fest was great and brought the Zombies to life along with the Film Club audience.

Playing the Mark Kermode role to perfection, Darren then interviewed Ian, when he answered many of the well researched questions with honestly and humour while various clips were shown, mainly from Ian’s television work, including The Professionals, Crown Court, Doctor Who, Survivors and Ian own favourite Colditz, This all made for a great film club night which every one seemed to enjoy. Perhaps we should think of a similar night for next season?