Il gatto nero

so we all know that the first two demons movies are pretty much as good as it's going to get. i am not going to lie to you after seeing all (seven?) 'demons' movies, I can truly say that the first two entires are masterpieces and the rest are an eclectic bastard lovechildish creative, bad, and completely crazy entries.

This movie is so awful in a good way. It's also pretty hard to track down (insert obvious reasons.) It's referred too as like 7 different titles, but the one I was watching was English dubbed audio with Japanese hard subtitles. The movie shamelessly poses as 'Suspiria 2' but at the same time also seems to acknowledge what they're doing is pretty awful so they throw in a lot of funny crazy effects to distract you from the plot that includes a grand total of 4-5 people and pacing that fluctuates between wayyyyy to slow and holy crap what just happened and why?

it's not as good as the first two demons movies, but if you like to chuckle at a truly goofy and poorly made movie, this movie is a gold nugget. There's so many unintentionally hilarious moments you can't capture unless you are truly trying to make a serious effort and it just unfolds like a pile of unsorted laundry. Pretty much anything you can think may or may not explode and smoke and leak green worms and intestines WILL AND SHALL. That part's never really explained but a lot of other things are.

Hilarious dated effects guaranteed to open your eyes wider than a syfy movie creature shot. I had a fun time with it :)

"i'm in the mirror. No - i'm in the rifridgerator , Wait - I'm back in the mirror *blarchhhhh*"

Demons 6 (1989)

* (out of 4)

Here's yet another example of the Italian horror genre and their crazy titles. Lamberto Bava made DEMONS and DEMONS 2 but when DEMONS 3 had its title changed to THE CHURCH the producers then took Bava's THE ORGE and made it DEMONS III. Then, for no reason, Michael Soavi's THE SECT was released as DEMONS 4 while Mr. Bava made THE DEVIL'S VEIL, which was pretty much a remake of his father's BLACK Sunday, only it was released under the fake title of DEMONS 5. Then, that same year, director Luigi Cozzi made a film called THE BLACK CAT, which then was released as DEMONS 6. Oh yeah, Cozzi also intended this to be the third chapter of Dario Argento's at the time incomplete "Three Mothers" series, which had SUSPIRIA and INFERNO. I'm certain most fans aren't going to consider this to have anything to do with the Argento movies and I think it's fair to say that in reality there are only two movies in the DEMONS series. The rest were simply named to cash in on something.

The film has an actress (Florence Guerin) and her director husband (Urbano Barberini) getting ready to make a movie based on the witch in SUSPIRIA. They plan on making the movie but the actress/wife begins to be haunted by the witch who doesn't want a movie based on her. Soon bodies are starting to pile up as the actress slowly loses her mind and crosses over into the world of possession. No matter if you call this DEMONS 6 or THE BLACK CAT, there's no denying that this is one major disaster that doesn't work on any level let alone fit in with the Argento films or even the earlier DEMONS flicks. There are several scenes where the Argento movie is mentioned so director Cozzi certainly wanted to at least link his films to SUSPIRIA but let's get real here. This is just a major hack fest that doesn't have a single thing going for it. For starters the screenplay is a downright joke as it never really makes too much sense. We start off with the actress making a version of Poe's The Black Cat and then we jump back and forth to other events. Most of her visions have the witch showing up in a mirror and one sequence has the mean witch puking up green slime and blood. There are a couple gory deaths scenes but they too look incredibly silly including one where a woman's heart begins beating so fast that it explodes out of her chest. Another throat slashing doesn't impress either. The performances are hard to judge thanks in large part to the horrid dubbing but Euro favorites Caroline Munro and Brett Halsey appear as another actress and producer.

Il Gatto Nero aka The Black Cat does not belong to the best horror movies Italian style, but still - the atmosphere is dark and creepy, the visuals top notch for a B-movie of the early 80s, on top we get some hand-made gore (not that CGI-nonsense of modern days). The story is maybe a little too confusing and misses some momentum here and there, but anyway, The Black Cat is classic horror Italian style and beats most of today's Hollywood "horror" movies easy, and it got that shot of nightmare-like state that makes it rather special. Recommended if works of Mario Bava, Lucio Fulci, Umberto Lenzi and Dario Argento are regulars on your menu.

'Black Cat' (1989) (aka 'Demons 6: De Profundis') I saw this today on Amazon Prime Videos. It's an Italian made horror film. This description intrigued me "Ann Pritcher is a new mother and actress in her husband's film. A film about a terrible witch, Levana, whom Ann is playing. But when Ann starts researching the part of Levana, she is haunted by visions." I like older Italian made horror films like those starring Barbara Steele. Often they had a haunting Gothic look and off beat stories compared to run of the mill American made movies. I cut all foreign films some slack because maybe the English dubbing isn't always the best and the film might be better in its native language. This film even beyond the laughable dubbed English is a total mess. The effects are laughable and the story is dragged out with nothing of real interest to it. Who ever did this seems obsessed with bright neon like lights for a scary effect. They like to have the bright light, especially green, emitting from windows, refrigerators, drinking glasses, eyes...everything but the black cat's butt. And the gore was also laughable. They also seem to like using green goo...just looks like pea soup. I don't like overly gory films, this didn't bother me because it was so phony looking. It seems anyone using the title 'Black Cat' or the like can pretend it's based on a story by Edar Allen Poe to attract viewers. About the only tie in to this is Mr. Poe's name may have been mentioned someplace in the dialog. Frankly this film, and I use the word "film" loosely, was not worth my time. I give it a 0 rating but the IMDb forces me to make 1 the lowest.

I am usually very "forgiving" when it comes to horror movies, to the point where I can acknowledge and value the general idea and overlook the narrative flaws. If the film as a whole is fun to watch, it has a well developed atmosphere and it features a decent amount of horror elements, I'm pretty much okay with it ... but the story has to make SOME sense, at least. Well, "The Black Cat" (or any of the many other titles that this movie has) is an example of a flick that is just frustrating to sit through. Director Luigi Cozzi may not entirely be at fault, perhaps the producers forcibly squeezed things into the movie for the sole purpose of shock value... or something. I have read many times that several directors end up unhappy with the final results of their films, because they were asked to add random creatures, murders or over-the-top sequences, even if they only add confusion to the story, just to make the film more marketable. I don't know the reasons behind this mess, but this is just a really confusing and convoluted film that had no business being that way, because it could have been told in a much simpler way. Actually, the first half an hour of the film is decent and it keeps it simple, but "The Black Cat" progressively becomes more and more random, to the point where inexplicable situations just happen constantly, and eventually, you just stop even trying to make any sense out of it (at least, I know I did). I can only assume that several random sequences and shots were probably added at the last minute because it was unused footage from a different film and they didn't want to let it go to waste. It's the only reasonable explanation I can come up with.

As for the photography, the director clearly took inspiration in Dario Argento's "Suspiria" and "Inferno" (both films are referenced here), but the strident color scheme ends up being a little bit over the top. Besides the artificial color palette, the use of CGI, which is very frequent during the second half of the film, cheapens the visuals considerably and it could have been a lot better without it.

A few creative deaths and stylish sequences don't save this film from being a big pile of randomness, so, skip this, unless you just want to have a good laugh. "The Black Cat" is just a frustrating experience and a waste of time.