La mansión cerca del cementerio

The son of the researcher is a fair haired boy who is frightened repeatedly throughout the film and seems to spend his entire time banging on doors and calling for his mommy. The boy has the single most annoying child's voice ever heard on film and this alone makes him a character who needing killing off in the first minutes.

Not great but made worse by the kid.

For an hour i was thinking to myself 'this kid has one of the worst dubs in the history of cinema'. And then that scream happened. Now it's official. It's the worst voice dubbing in movie history. Why on earth someone thought it wise that when a boy of 7/8 screams he sounds like a prime scream queen i'll never know, truly one of the most ridiculous and startling things i've come across.

As for the rest of the movie, there are 3 brutally bloody scenes (one in particular towards the end is rather gross out) which explains why it was a video nasty in it's day. The story tries to set up a little mystery with possible suspects including the nanny and the dad but the choppy editing and scene placement make it hard to believe anything other than the supernatural. Not one of Fulci's best, it's still got enough good moments to warrant at least one viewing.

Here is an effort from the infamous director Luci Fulci, who is probably best known for his ultra-violent zombie movies. This is one of them, although strictly speaking it is a haunted house/zombie combination. The story has a family move into a new home where it turns out a zombie called Dr Freudstein (yes, really) lives in the cellar. And from this premise much bloody mayhem does ensue. The highlight of the movie overall is the practical effects work from Giannetto De Rossi which kick into gear during the various scenes of over-the-top bloody violence. It's a fairly run-of-the-mill film aside from this really but it is also notable for having a very effective, intense ending. Last and by all means least is the child actor playing the character called Bob - he has been dubbed with the most ridiculous and inane voice that you would be forgiven for hoping he will wind up being torn apart by the resident zombie. But will he?

This is enjoyable. If you are looking for a serious horror movie that makes sense, give this one a skip.

In some ways, you get a sense Fulci was trying hard to make this more "respectable" than some of his other movies. The camerawork is careful, creating atmosphere as well as a sense of polish. The makeup and gore effects (except for the ridiculous bat scene) are also well-crafted, and the Dr. Freudstein character is fairly creepy to see. Also, there are fewer splatter scenes, and they come more out of the story than any gratuitous attempts to add gore. However, the story (which has shades of THE SHINING) is pretty slow-moving, so after a while you wish Fulci *would* throw in some gratuitous splatter! And like many of Fulci's other movies, a lot of things are simply not explained. (I will admit I got a good laugh at the sudden burst of "explanation" by one character at the end, which comes out of nowhere!) Quite frankly, viewers who have heard about Fulci but not seen any of his other movies will be wondering at the end of the movie why he's received so much fuss. So only for Fulci fans, or people with more than a passing interest in Italian horror movies.