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Beyond the Darkness: Buio OmegaRating:
Release Date: 30 April, 2002 Retail Price: $24.95 OUR Price: $22.46 You SAVE: $2.49! Cast: |
Beyond the Darkness: Buio Omega Reviews
Vile and Repulsive Gothic Horror Story...
The mid-seventies to mid-eighties was a prolific period for italian horror directors like Lucio Fulci and Umberto Lenzi who constantly pushed the boundaries of bad taste with increasingly exploitative and gore soaked epics like Zombie, The Beyond, Cannibal Ferox and Eaten Alive.
One of the genre's most productive directors was Joe D'Amato, who was primarily a director of hardcore porno films, but who contributed some impressive entries to the Euro-horror genre with Anthropophagus, Emmanuelle and The Last Cannibals and Beyond The Darkness.
D'Amato never flinched at fusing soft-core pornographic content with over the top gore and extreme violence. While a film like Emmanuelle and the Last Cannibals is a successful attempt to meld softcore porn and gross out horror, Beyond The Darkness simply presents violence as pornography. The viewer is assaulted with just about every nausea inducing visual imaginable: eye gouging, dissection, dismemberment, cremation, cannibalism...its all here in vivid technicolor to disgust the audience resulting in a unique viewing experience.
I must say I had mixed feelings about this film at first, and there were times when I seriously considered hitting the eject button on the DVD player, thats when I realized what a triumph this film must be. As a jaded horror film enthusiast I have seen just about everything (Last House On The Left, I Spit On Your Grave, Fulci's catalogue of films), and this managed to disturb and shock the heck out of me.
The story is simple enough, a young man named Francesco and his maid Iris preside over a large estate secluded in the italian countryside. When Francesco's lover suffers an untimely demise, Francesco sinks into dementia and psychosis resulting in an orgy of murder and necrophillia. Aided by Iris, the pair torture and murder any passerby unfortunate enough to discover that Francesco has stolen his lifeless girlfriend's corpse and is preserving it within one of the bedrooms. This leaves ample time for Francesco and the much older Iris to indulge their bizarre sexual relationship as well(students of the Oedipal complex take note).
The DVD booklet lists a series of obscure influences that Beyond The Darkness draws from, I found it amusing that no mention of Robert Bloch's Psycho was made-it is evident that D'Amato borrowed liberally from Bloch's story and Hitchcock's classic film adaptation of the same name. The climax in particular with the discovery of the preserved corpse in the cellar is almost a direct steal from Hitchcock's far superior work.
Directors like Jacques Tourneur and Alfred Hitchcock showed us a long time ago that horrors that are not explicit and that are left to the imagination are far more effective. The power of suggestion goes a long way to creating mood and atmosphere, something that this film sorely lacks. Had D'Amato not so completely relied on excessive gore as a cheap gimmick, this film could have truly been a classic. As it stands the film is just not frightenning and creates no tension, except maybe in the final fifteen minutes. It is absolutely shocking for its unrelenting portrayal of gruesome scenes, but left me feeling that this film could have been much improved in the hands of a more capable director. As it stands I cannot imagine watching this disgusting spectacle again anytime soon and I would question the sanity of anyone who actually enjoys watching this repeatedly. A film this extreme is prime fodder for those conservative groups who argue that subversive films have a detrimental effect on society, and in this instance I cannot say I disagree totally. This should absolutely never be seen by children, people with weak stomachs or weak minds.
What we do have here is a feast for gorehounds and sleazy exploitation fans with a fair amount of nudity, hot european chicks and tons of very convincing gore effects. So convincing that a rumour persists that real corpses were used in parts of the film.
Finally, Shriek Show has done a great job on this DVD, the perks include: Reversible cover art for the DVD, a wonderful interview with actress Cinzia Monreale and a bunch of trailers for Shriek Show's other releases including the tedious House On The Edge Of The Park. The video looks pretty good for a low budget film this old, though I found the audio to be average at best. Also, there is a hidden bonus feature: go to scene access, just before chapter six you will see an icon of a naked woman, click on this and you will see a gallery of posters for Joe D'Amato's hardcore (...)titles.
Classic Italian Exploitation
Buio Omega is one of my all time favorite films.
An Italian shocker about a man named Frank who cant cope with the loss of his grilfriend. He decides to unearth her corpse, remove its intestines and preserve it, so he can continue to love her. At this Maniacal state, Frank (with the help of Iris) kills whoever will come in between him and his obsession.
Full of visceral images such as decapitation and dismemberment, discetion, acid baths and throat rippings, Buio Omega is one hell of a movie. Joe D'amata is a man who knows how to shock.
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