Behind the Couch

1982 Dir. Dario Argento After a detour into Gothic, witchy, fairy tale horror with Suspiria  (1977) and Inferno (1980),  Tenebrae  marked director Dario Argento's return to the gialli which he helped popularise in the early Seventies. Based on the filmmaker’s own experiences of an unhinged fan obsessed with his work, Tenebrae  is generally regarded as one of his finest films. It follows the story of American mystery-thriller novelist Peter Neal, whose arrival in Rome to promote his latest title coincides with a series of violent murders – the perpetrator of which claims to have been inspired by Neal’s latest book. When the author himself begins to receive death threats from the killer he must use his literary know-how to snare the slasher before he becomes the next victim. Unfolding as a cunningly reflexive critique of the Italian giallo, violence in cinema, and indeed Dario Argento’s own body of work, Tenebrae directly addresses the misogyny he has often...

1972 Dir. Aldo Lado When the young daughter of Venice based sculptor Franco is heinously murdered, he and his estranged wife begin an investigation to track down the killer. Meanwhile the body-count continues to grow as the crazed maniac bloodily dispatches anyone who strays too close to discovering the truth about their identity. Set in Venice and featuring the story of a grief-stricken family crippled by the death of their child, Who Saw Her Die? is in many ways uncannily similar to Nicolas Roeg’s startling masterpiece Don’t Look Now , which was released only a year after. Opening with the shockingly frank and brutal murder of a little girl on a snowy mountain in France, Lado’s film pulls no punches, however while its central mystery constantly intrigues as it twists and turns unendingly, it never really manages to repeat the power of this opening scene. Focusing on Franco’s obsession with finding his daughter’s killer, the film unfolds as in typical giallo fashion, with red...

1972 Dir. Sergio Martino Alcoholic writer Oliviero (Luigi Pistilli, Bay of Blood ) and his long-suffering wife Irina (Anita Strindberg, Lizard in a Woman's Skin ) live an isolated, self-destructive existence in their crumbling villa. When Oliviero’s mistress is the first victim in a series of vicious murders, he becomes the prime suspect – and when his niece Floriana (Edwige Fenech, Strip Nude for Your Killer ) suddenly arrives for a visit, things become increasingly complicated as a series of double-crossings and shifting character dynamics add to the air of stifling paranoia. Irina finds comfort in Floriana’s arms – and bed – and the two decide to bump off Oliviero, Diabolique -style. Throw in a few lesbian sex scenes, an ominous and seemingly ubiquitous black cat, lush gothic trimmings, several vicious murders, and you have a fantastically moody giallo that rates right up there with the best of ‘em. Your Vice is a Locked Room and Only I Have the Key – the absurdly extr...

1965 Dir. Mario Bava AKA Terror en el Espacio Two interplanetary ships on an exploratory expedition into deepest, darkest, unchartedest space receive a distress signal from Aura, an unexplored and seemingly deserted planet. When the ships are pulled into its gravitational pull and crash land on the ominous surface, the surviving crew members gradually fall victim to the disembodied inhabitants of this strange world, who begin to possess their minds when they sleep. They also possess the bodies of the dead and use the animated corpses to stalk and kill the remaining survivors in an attempt to get off the planet which is about to go postal... Based on Renato Pestriniero's short story “One Night of 21 Hours”, Planet of the Vampires is a bit of a misnomer – the alien entities that possess the bodies and minds of the crew are more like ‘body-snatchers’ than blood-thirsty vampires. That’s by-the-by though; the title is as wonderfully garish as the film itself. In short – it’s ...

Asia bares her fangs... Dario Argento is currently ensconced in shooting his adaptation of Bram Stoker’s classic vampire novel, 'Dracula'. Filming began in Hungary (where Argento previously filmed Phantom of the Opera and produced Michele Soavi's The Church ) in June and the film stars Rutger Hauer (as Van Helsing), Thomas Kretschmann (as Dracula), Marta Gastini (as Mina) and Asia Argento (as Lucy). A few on-set photos have found their way online courtesy of Asia Argento…  According to Alan Jones’s on-set reports , filming has gone well thus far and the shoot has proved something of an Argento ‘family’ reunion. Working with him again are the likes of special effects artist Sergio Stivaletti (who has worked on the majority of Argento's films since Phenomena in 1985), cinematographer Luciano Tovoli (who also lensed Argento’s gothic masterpiece Suspiria and edgily reflexive giallo Tenebrae ), production designer Massimo Antonello Geleng ( The Stendhal Syndrome,...

2010 Dir. Franck Richard For several years now, some of the most extreme, controversial, sadistic contributions to horror cinema have been coming out of France. Kick started by the likes of Alex Aja’s influential Switchblade Romance/Haute Tension , other titles in this ‘new wave’ of French horror, or ‘New French Extremity’, have included the likes of Inside/À l'intérieur, Sheitan, Ils, Martyrs , Frontier(s) , the Belgian film Calvaire and the work of Gaspar Noé. The latest horror offering from France, the folk-horror tinged  The Pack,  offers twists, turns, grotesquely violent imagery and a socio-political subtext about the plight of rural farming communities left in the wake of industrialisation.  Beginning as a tautly wound riff on the likes of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, Wrong Turn and The Hills Have Eyes , an impetuous young woman, Charlotte (Émilie Dequenne), is driving through deepest, darkest rustic France when she picks up a hitchhiker. Stopping at a r...

John Michael Elfers’ feature debut Finale untwisted as a stunningly shot love letter to the Golden Age of Euro-horror cinema. It follows a family struggling to come to terms with the death of the oldest son - who seemingly died by suicide. Helen, the boy’s mother, is convinced that her son was the victim of a bizarre satanic cult and her investigation not only threatens to tear her family apart, but also her own sanity. As she begins to descend into a dark world of paranoia, death and despair, where the line between nightmare and reality becomes increasingly fractured, she is stalked by a demonic, mirror-dwelling figure and the members of the mysterious cult who seem to have a strange connection with it… As evidenced in such recent films as Amer , Julia’s Eyes and Andreas Marschall’s forthcoming Masks , the legacy of the Italian giallo continues to bleed into the work of contemporary filmmakers. Wearing its influences on its boldly blood-spattered sleeve, Finale drew on the sup...

2011 Dirs. Luca Boni and Marco Ristori Another month, another zombie flick; Eaters: Rise of the Dead follows the tried, tested and arguably tired formula of pitching a small band of apocalypse survivors against the marauding undead. Somewhat typically, it opens with a montage of news footage documenting the spread of a mysterious virus, a zero birth rate, the threat of nuclear intervention from governments and the fall of civilisation as we know it. When we pick up with the main characters Alen and Igor (Guglielmo Favilla and Alex Lucchesi), post-apocalypse is full-steam ahead. They are two of a number of survivors hiding out in an abandoned building outside the city. Shades of Romero’s Day of the Dead echo through these scenes as the group; largely made up of military men, tussle with boredom and fatigue, while a shady scientist searches for a solution. In terms of the zombie movie, Italy really jumped on the band wagon after George Romero’s seminal classic, Dawn of the ...

Unfolding in the spring of 1890, ' Oscar Wilde And The Vampire Murders ' is the fourth instalment in Gyles Brandreth’s series featuring writer/poet/wit/dandy/philosopher Oscar Wilde as a highly sophisticated, eloquent and, in typical “Wilde” fashion, self-indulgent sleuth. Aided in his investigations by fellow literary luminaries Arthur Conan Doyle, Bram Stoker and his eventual biographer, Robert Sherard, the Philosopher of Aestheticism finds himself irrevocably embroiled in a series of nasty murders, the grim details of which suggest they were carried out by a vampire… Amidst the lavish locations and copious amounts of Perrier-Jouët decadently guzzled by Wilde and co, is an irresistibly macabre mystery which will undoubtedly please those who enjoy classic murder-mystery whodunits in the vein of Agatha Christie or indeed, Conan Doyle’s own Sherlock Holmes. To read my full review, head over to Fangoria . The following review was published on Fangoria.com in June 2011 Os...

1981 Dir. J. Lee Thompson In the run up to her 18th birthday, Ginny (Melissa Sue Anderson) begins to experience bizarre blackouts and fragmented flashbacks of a traumatic event. To make matters worse, someone begins murdering her close circle of friends in morbidly inventive ways. Is Ginny responsible for the murders during her mysterious blackouts? Could the killer be someone from her past? Why is she unable to remember a significant event from the previous year? Ginny must work fast to figure out what's going on and unmask the killer before it's too late… Released in the wake of the success of Halloween and Friday the 13th , Happy Birthday To Me is a typical example of the myriad slasher movies unleashed during the early Eighties. With every new title (usually referencing an anniversary or holiday or significant calendar date) the main focus of the slasher film, as established by Friday the 13th , was to drape its plot around a series of inventive death scenes; boa...

2011 Dir. Wes Craven Ten years have passed since Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell) survived violent attempts on her life by the ‘Ghostface Killer.’ She has rebuilt her life through writing about her experiences in a newly published self-help book. Returning to her hometown of Woodsboro on the anniversary of the original massacre to promote her book, she is reunited her with old friends, bumbling cop Dewey (David Arquette) and ruthless reporter Gale Weathers (Courteney Cox). However, her return sparks another killing spree, suggesting someone else from the past seeks a reunion with her; albeit a reunion sodden in blood… The legacy of Scream is undeniable. A smart, suspenseful and scary deconstruction of the slasher film, it was hugely successful because it was not only a taut and terrifying thriller, but also a savvy commentary on the horror genre, particularly slasher movies. In its wake of self-awareness, ironic humour and biting reflexivity, horror was never the same again. A...