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Hilariously (and charmingly) gonzo horror film about a horror film director who's latest movie about a witch, but who unintentionally actually resurrects the witch who then uses the director's wife, Caroline Munro, to take over the world. At one point this film was proposed to be the third film in Dario Argento's then incomplete Three Mothers Trilogy and you can easily see that this film was trying to create a Suspiria/Inferno type of vibe, with crazy music by Vince Tempera and some wildly colorful photography, but the overall effect is very low budget version of Argento's style and the end product feels like a cheap knock-off. However, the film does have a goofy charm to it's low-budget inventiveness, which endeared the ridiculousness of the proceedings to me.
Rated 2.5/5 Stars •
Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars
01/31/23
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before I get started this movie was also called in the USA title the black cat which aired on SCFI network years ago remember see it back then so it been years since I see it for some reason I started looking for it again last year but could not find it on YouTube unit this year when I found it so is this a classic to me well just say not up there not even close but that Levana witch sure was ugly worms all over her face they did a great with makeup scary witch so the movie is well about them want to make a movie about Levana but somehow she came back from the dead and let say cause a lot of problems she even haunt anne a mom of a little boy who want to play Levana in the movie so though out the movie Levana played mind games with her a lot though out the movie and cause people to died bye having there heart blow up and have them cutting there throat which I thought was can of scary and also lame there was some good parts but not a lot leading to the end which can of suck I was hope for a better ending but should of know because this was a low budget movie and I must say the music was great and creepy too well anyway it rating time so I will give this a movie a rating of 4.5 out of 10 stars for OK in closing have to say it was fun to watch it again and review the movie I want to review for months so if you want to watch it the full movie is on YouTube now do note it will make you go wtf.
Rated 4/5 Stars •
Rated 4 out of 5 stars
02/26/23
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Il Gatto Nero (Luigi Cozzi, 1989)
I suppose it is possible, in some warped alternate universe, that Il Gatto Nero, released in English-speaking countries as Demons 6: De Profundis, actually was meant as the third part of Dario Argento's Three Mothers trilogy, as at least one other reviewer has noted. From my point of view, having just suffered through this obscenity, it seemed a whole lot more like a cash grab that borrowed liberally from Argento without actually giving him a credit. (Unfortunately, though, that doesn't explain a cameo from Argento protege Michele Soavi.) If you've seen Mother of Tears, Argento's canonical third entry in the trilogy, and wondered why we had to wait twenty years for what is at its best a below-average movie, take heart: it's Oscar material compared to this mess.
Loosely based on Poe's short story that lends the movie its title, Il Gatto Nero concerns itself with Marc Ravenna (Urbano Barberini, who showed up in the original Demons), a scriptwriter who's trying to find funding for his new project, De Profundis, based on the same Thomas de Quincey book that inspired Argento's Suspiria. It concerns another witch, Levana, who as it turns out is real (rather like Argneto's Mother of Sighs), and who haunts the production because, as far as we can tell, she's really unhappy about Marc's wife Anne (Black Venus' Florence Guérin) playing her. But Levana may not be the worst thing haunting the production-the producer himself, bitter, cranky, wheelchair-bound Leonard Levin (Demonia's Brett Halsey), is almost as annoying, if perhaps not as deadly.
Il Gatto Nero (which, it should be noted, only features black cats as set decoration) is an excellent illustration of how quality can vary within genre. The movie itself sets up comparisons to Suspiria, which despite its unbearably cheesy ending is one of the highlights of Italian horror film in the seventies. On the surface, both films share a number of qualities that mark them as bad genre film-the ludicrous dubbing, sets that look as if they were cobbled together with what the set designer could find at the local thrift store, crude special effects. But Argento, during his salad days, was a stylist as much as he was a director; where he put the camera and what he did with it in any given shot was just as important to the way the movie came out as was his ability to get decent performances out of actors ranging from the sublime to the ridiculous. Cozzi, on the other hand-who had worked with Argento at least as far back as said salad days (he was a directorial assistant on Argento's first great film, 1971's Four Flies on Grey Velvet)-never picked up any of those tricks from Argento in the way Soavi did. Il Gatto Nero has far more in common with the work of Lamberto Bava (Demons 2) than it does with Argento. Bava was supposed to be another Argento protege; the two worked together on the original Demons, supposedly with Bava directing and Argento producing. Anyone who's watched the original and the first sequel, directed by Bava solo after Argento had left the fold, knows how true that is. Cozzi is the same way, though unlike Bava, he knew when to admit defeat; after one more attempt at directing, he rejoined the fold and became one of Argento's second unit directors.
In case I haven't quite spelled it out yet: this is a phenomenally bad movie. An outrageously bad movie. The kind of movie that makes you want your hour and a half back when you're done watching it. If you never have the chance to do so, consider yourself spared. 1/2
Rated 0.5/5 Stars •
Rated 0.5 out of 5 stars
02/11/23
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Audience Member
Mostly dull attempt by Luigi Cozzi to ride Argento's coattails, this is (I guess) supposed to be the final Three Mothers picture. A few good gore effects, but otherwise very dopey. (Of course, Mother Of Tears isn't much better, but...)
Rated 2/5 Stars •
Rated 2 out of 5 stars
02/03/23
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Audience Member
The soundtrack was the best part of this demon/witch hunt. So what ever that tells you.
Rated 3.5/5 Stars •
Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars
02/17/23
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Audience Member
Wow...took me two sittings but I finally finished it...this would have been so much better with Crow T Robot and Tom Servo...
Rated 1.5/5 Stars •
Rated 1.5 out of 5 stars
02/12/23
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