Demonia

A team of archaeologists are exploring the ruins of an ancient crypt in Sicily where five heretic nuns had been stoned and crucified by superstitious villagers.One of them Liza starts to suffer terrible nightmares about the nuns and other members of the team start to die in particularly horrible ways."Demonia" is a mediocre Lucio Fulci's nunsploitation flick that offers surprisingly little amount of gore including a tongue nailed to a barrel an,eye-gouging and an "Inferno in Diretta"-style decapitation between two springy trees.Still the film is well-shot,picturesque and enjoyable enough to give it a 6 out of 10.However if you are new into Fulci I suggest watching first "The Beyond" or "City of the Living Dead".

No, it's not the name of a disinfectant used by exorcists, but rather the title of Lucio Fulci's 1989 film about demonic possession on the island of Sicily.

Brett Halsey and Meg Register star as a pair of archeologists, one sensible and scientific, the other sensitive and superstitious, whose latest dig is plagued by a series of violent, non-Mafia-related deaths. It seems a local Medieval nunnery was once the site of devil worship, flagrant carnality and ritualistic murder - until the locals banded together to exorcise the evil by crucifying the nuns (depicted in the film's prologue). Turning a deaf ear to the warnings of the village leader and the local butcher, the archeologists carry on digging, and ultimately loosing the hounds of Hell, Fulci-style.

DEMONIA is a largely uninteresting affair, sluggishly paced and directed with apparent indifference by Fulci. Everything seems a bit tame (artfully placed blankets throw cold water on the orgy scenes) and second hand, from Giovanni Cristiani's corny, tympani-heavy score to the use of such hoary spook-cinema devices as double exposures to suggest ghostly apparitions and echoey dream voices (has anyone in your dreams ever spoken with an echoey voice?). Fulci stumbles further by having his heroine plagued by nightmares that offer no information beyond what we already saw in the prologue.

Fulci himself turns up late in the film as an inspector from Scotland Yard, only to turn up clues to a mystery that is no mystery to us; worse yet, Fulci's Inspector Carter's last scene finds him eyeballing a piece of cloth (torn from the habit of one of the murderous ghost-nuns), identifying it as centuries old, and then disappearing from the film entirely). Al Cliver (aka Pier Luigi Conti) appears as Porter, a fellow archeologist who meets an untimely end at the hands of a transparent, headless, speargun-toting haint (Fulci regular Cliver is billed in the credits as Al "Clever").

The film perks up a bit halfway through, when the local medium (a character similar to one played by Rada Rassimov in Mario Bava's BARON BLOOD) meets her predetermined demise by dint of half a dozen cat hand puppets, but DEMONIA is still slow going. A third act disemboweling of one of the dig members is gross but unconvincing, and the film climaxes on an ambiguous note that fails to satisfy or justify the investment of an hour and a half.

Not the worst of Fulci's films (MANHATTAN BABY wins that dubious distinction in my book...) but DEMONIA takes so long to get to any of the classic Fulci "good-stuff", that you'll probably be asleep by then.

Two archaeologists are digging around Sicily, and the locals don't like it too much. Apparently a group of nuns who were into group sex and Satanism once resided at the site of the dig. The locals don't like the scientists messing around in their backyards, and when some strange deaths occur around the dig-site, all hell breaks loose.

Luckily, DEMONIA does come with the "goods" towards the end. A good tongue-hammering, and a guy split in half are a couple of the notable scenes - unfortunately, the story isn't interesting enough for you to care by the time you get there. Drawn out and boring storyline isn't saved by a few cool gore scenes. Worth a look to the TRUE Fulci fan - don't expect a gore-fest masterpiece...5/10

Demonia (1990)

** (out of 4)

Five nuns are brutally murdered and five hundred years later their spirits get a chance for vengeance. Archaeologist team Professor Paul Evans (Brett Halsey) and his partner (Meg Register) begin to realize early on that something isn't right.

DEMONIA is a later day Lucio Fulci film, which is actually slightly better than its reputation. By this time the Italian horror market was taking its last gasps of air so if you're expecting something that looks or feels like ZOMBIE or THE BEYOND then you're certainly going to be disappointed. With that said, if you've seen Fulci's later day films like THE GHOSTS OF SODOM then you'll be happy to see that this here is better than that.

The biggest issue with DEMONIA is the same thing that haunted a lot of these films and that's the fact that there just wasn't enough money to pull everything off. The story here is an interesting one but it's never fully developed, which is really too bad. As I said, the budget was certainly very low here but Fulci still managed to build up a nice atmosphere and there's some minor gore, which his fans will enjoy. I also thought both Halsey and Register were good in their roles and they at least keep you interested in what's going on. Al Cliver (ZOMBIE) also appears briefly.

DEMONIA certainly isn't a classic movie and if you're new to Fulci it's certainly not the place to start watching. With that said, there are a few interesting ideas and moments scattered throughout.

Director Lucio Fulci's DEMONIA opens in 1486, with the execution of five nuns accused of Satanism. In 1990, a team of archaeologists, led by Professor Paul Evans (Brett Halsey), sets up camp near the long-abandoned monastery where the event took place. It's not long before discoveries are made, secrets are uncovered, and hell-on-Earth begins.

Sort of.

Those accustomed to the Director's earlier work might find this movie a bit slow-building. It's suspenseful, but not in Fulci's usual, ultra-gory way. Oh, there are some bloody deaths, even decapitation, it's just not as continually visceral as his other films. DEMONIA's true mayhem is reserved for the finale.

Still, the story is solid, and the characters are interesting, especially Liza (Meg Register) and Lilla (Carla Cassola), the town medium. Certainly worth a watch for Fulci fans...