City of the Living Dead
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DVD details
Actor: Antonella Interlenghi, Carlo de Mejo, Christopher George, Janet Agren, Katherine MacCollBrand: RYKODISC
Cinematographer: Sergio Salvati
Composer: Fabio Frizzi
DVD: Region Code 0
Audio: English (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround; Italian (Original Language)
Format: Color, Dolby, DVD, NTSC, Widescreen
Picture Format: 1.85:1
Running Time: 93 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2007-02-27
Audience Rating: Unrated
Studio: Blue Underground
Product features:
- The Seven Gates Of Hell have been torn open, and in three days the dead shall rise and walk the earth. As a reporter (Christopher George of Pieces) and a psychic (Catriona MacColl of The Beyond) race to close the portals of the damned, they encounter a seething nightmare of unspeakable evil. The city is alive - with the horrors of the living dead! Directed and co-written by the legendary Lucio
DVD Reviews of City of the Living Dead
DVD Review: city of the living dead (aka the gates of hell)
Summary: 5 Stars
oh man, i L-O-V-E it. i soooo love the part where the girl in the truck w/ her boyfriend vomits her entire insides out. GROSS AS HELL!!!!!! i tell you, i L-O-V-E it. THANK YOU!!!!!!DVD Review: Uneven, But Effectively Nightmarish
Summary: 3 Stars
Of Fulci's Zombie "trilogy", City of the Living Dead (aka Gates of Hell) is usually considered the red headed stepchild of the bunch. The dialogue is often hilariously bad; the plot is almost nonexistent and the ending is a terrible, tacked on mess. Still, I like this more than The Beyond or Zombie---mostly because this one lacks the slow spots of those films. It also, because of its non-linear plot, maintains an effectively illogical and nighmarish tone from start to finish. And give Christopher George some love here. Saddled with some uncomfortably bad dialogue, he still makes for a charismatic hero. That is, until he gets his brains scooped out. The only thing that bugged me about this is the fact that the zombies are even more of an afterthought here than in the Beyond, with most of the scary set pieces revolving around the reanimated/ghostly Priest. Also, they are more "ghosts" than actual zomibes--with the ability to appear and disappear at random. Curious also that these "ghost zombies" aren't cannibalistic, but instead get their kills in by scooping out the brains of their victims with their hands.DVD Review: Bad Advertising
Summary: 1 Stars
This movie was misrepresented. I hope someone fixed this error so no one else will recieve the wrong movie.DVD Review: The film formerly known as "The Gates of Hell".
Summary: 3 Stars
I had originally discovered this film on video under it's more popular guise of "The Gates of Hell" and was fairly impressed by it. This was when I was in Junior High and Gore films were one of those things that a younger me was crazy about it. It was probally because it was that sense of rebellion at something that was considered so taboo by everybody else. Italian Horror films were the best at delivering the grueseome goods but most lacked any subtlety and were hardly comparable to the works of a George Romero or David Cronenberg for intellectual Splatter.
So we have this typically ridiculous Lucio Fulci gorefest with atmosphere to spare but it is a missed oppurtunity upon reseeing this a decade later.
The film attempts to tell the story of how a Priest hangs himself and opens up the gateway to hell. A few people including a New York reporter,a psychic and a psychiatrist are the only ones that may be able to avert hell on earth.
Fulci handles the suspense well, generating tension as the race to doomsday commences and he's most effective at allowing his camera to pan among the spooky surroudings.
The first half hour is particularly spooky with the emphasis on the horrors of the mind, the fear of the unknown. The soundtrack is permeated by strange noises, quick unsettling images and strange, violent occurences are happening everywhere. The scene in the bar with the random ghostly occurences are a standout.
Unfortunately, his greatest weakness was always his need for ridiculous, over the top gore that drowns most of the horror he attempts to deliver. Most of the time, the admittebly good effects, appear gratutious and disgusting without actually generating any scares. The film's most infamous scene, the "drill in the head" scene is completely pointless and adds NOTHING to the script or the story. Than again neither did the charcater who met that fate!
It probally dosen't help that the script is largely incoherant and burdened by the same awkward dubbing that highlighted most of the Italian Horrors of this period and that the editing is fairly mediocre. The last shot for example makes absolutely no sense and is bizarre.
Acting is typically melodramatic and lame, though Christopher George tries to evoke a sense of charisma into his role of the reporter who finds a surprise fate towards the conclusion. Most characters are your typical splatter variety of "arrive and die" sort and that's a turn off from what could have been a potentially intelligent genre offering.
The score is highly derivative of the one that was used for George Romero's "Dawn of the Dead(1979)" and while effective, it becomes very glaring for the veteran Horror fan not to notice.
Gore fans will enjoy this immensely and will most likely add a star to the review, but overall despite some creepiness this is mediocre fare. Not nearly as fun as "Zombie(1980)" and not intelligent enough to comapre to any of the classic films of the genre, this is purely a curio piece for the gorehound.
Extras on the DVD include Theatrical Trailer, Radio spots and image gallery.
DVD Review: Clumsy Fulci
Summary: 1 Stars
I wouldn't exactly rank Lucio Fulci with Ingmar Bergman, but some of his films were pretty skillfully made examples of their "type" ("Zombie" is a borderline classic of the genre). "City of the Living Dead," however, isn't one of them. I'm as fond of extreme gore as any closet psycho, but I need a little bit more bang for my buck. The ONLY worthwhile element of this movie is the gore; the story makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. I fantasize about a 2-hour director's cut that actually includes a plot (something that might slightly explain what the heck is going on).
The brain-drilling scene, for example: Who are these people? Why does one guy feel like cutting a hole through the other guy's cranium? Just for the heck of it? Or just for the gross-out thrill? I'm not asking for Freudian explanations here; I just want to comprehend what I'm watching on a very basic level.
Fulci should've given us the basics in addition to the gore. He didn't, and the result is a very clumsy, sloppy mess of a movie in an otherwise marvelously demented canon.
Description of City of the Living Dead
"WOE BE UNTO HIM WHO OPENS ONE OF THE SEVEN GATEWAYS TO HELL, BECAUSE THROUGH THAT GATEWAY, EVIL WILL INVADE THE WORLD."The Seven Gates Of Hell have been torn open, and in three days the dead shall rise and walk the earth. As a reporter (Christopher George of PIECES) and a psychic (Catriona MacColl of THE BEYOND) race to close the portals of the damned, they encounter a seething nightmare of unspeakable evil. The city is alive - with the horrors of the living dead!
Directed and co-written by the legendary Lucio Fulci (ZOMBIE, THE BEYOND), CITY OF THE LIVIND DEAD features some of the maestro's most shocking and controversial sequences of all time. This is the definitive version of Fulci's hallucinogenic masterpiece of horror: uncut, uncensored and presented in all its brain-ripping, gut-spewing, head-drilling glory!
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