"And you will face the sea of darkness, and all therein that may be explored. "

A couple weeks back, i painted an illustration for Lucio Fulci's "Zombie", an incredibly violent horror film that was Italy's answer to "Dawn of the Dead". While i love that film, my favourite film by the director, Lucio Fulci, is "The Beyond".

Part of the three films that make up Lucio Fulci's "Gates to Hell" trilogy*, "The Beyond" focuses on a woman who inherits a hotel built on one of the seven cursed gateways to hell. Pandemonium ensues, in the form of ghostly blind girls, flesh-eating spiders, acid baths, crucified painters and more horrible things happening to eyeballs than should ever be contained in one film.

This one, like a lot of Italian cinema of the time, is not really about plot, or even characters. It works hard to put together a compelling and unsettling mood through the use of incredibly gruesome set-pieces, and iconic imagery. The vision of hell that is showcased towards the end of the film, and the character of Emily with her stark white eyes are most notable in this department. The score is one of my favourites, though the same composers' score for "City of the Living Dead" might barely beat it in my books.

If you haven't watched many Lucio Fulci films, this is a great place to start.

Check out the trailer here!

* The other two films in the "Gates to Hell" trilogy being "City of the Living Dead", and "House by the Cemetery", another couple favourites.

"The fly with the head of a man...! And the man with the head of a fly!"

Scientist Andre Delambre runs into some unfortunate circumstances when his latest experiment, a matter transporter, accidentally fuses his atoms with that of a common housefly. Andre ends up with the head and left hand of a fly, with his corresponding limbs on the insect.

While his frantic wife desperately searches for the fly with her husband's head and hand, Andre battles his new insect instincts to murder, and presumably eat, his wife.

"The Fly" is a classic! It has a great performance by Vincent Price as Francois Delambre, and unsettling effects. Most notably the final scene of the fly with the human head screaming for help, as it's menaced by a spider.

Here's the trailer!