City of the Living Dead (1980) by Lucio Fulci

Director: Lucio Fulci
Year: 1980
Country: Italy
Alternate Titles: Paura nella citta nel viviento muertes; Fear in the City of the Living Dead;
Genre: Zombie

Plot:
Following a priests' suicide in a local cemetery, a psychic brings her boyfriend and friends to the cursed town trying to find a way of stopping the supernatural horror afflicting the town when the dead emerge from their graves and get caught up in their plight as well.

Review:

This was one of the most enjoyable and entertaining Italian gore efforts. Among the numerous great qualities of this one is the utterly outstanding atmosphere present throughout here that literally drips off the screen. This manages to include an old-school Gothic horror sensibility within the confines of a true gore-drenched epic that's utterly nauseating while generating the kind of atmospheric dread that's just infectious as so many scenes here exploit this setup, from scenes with heavy doses of fog, disappearing and reappearing corpses, strange, supernatural incidents, music, setting, and even camera movements are used. This is only the tip of the iceberg, as there are numerous other gory bits, as the worm-infested carcasses, rotting corpses, and other such things throughout here which make this a great mix between these styles.

The opening here, which shows the priests' death in the cemetery that enacts the curse, is a prime example while other great scenes here from the early scenes of the town falling victim to the after-effects of the curse become even better. Breaking windows, cracked walls, disappearing and reappearing bodies, half-eaten corpses showing up out of nowhere, bleeding apparitions and ghostly zombie-like beings that appear out of nowhere all contribute to giving this a feverishly delirious pace as these demented scenes produce an amazing atmosphere continuously being utilized one after another by the grand decision on making this one so supernaturally-charged. It's entirely possible for hallucinations, raining maggots and decomposing bodies to walk around here in what's set as a traditional zombie effort here by infusing that story with the supernatural themes present here from the curse that starts here from the opening actions.

These are not only incredibly fun but get wrapped into the zombie effort which gives this one some outstanding and gruesome zombies scenes, from those early attacks and appearances of the ghouls running loose through town in the last half, the attack on the bar patrons and the spectacular scenes down in the underground tunnels that are littered with Gothic overtures in the skeletons and the general vibe of the crypt which is wonderfully dark, chilling and makes for a superb setting here with the walk-through of them rising amongst the skeletons and zombies while the action to finally end the curse offers incredibly enjoyable Gothic action as they go up in flames rather nicely. On top of all this great atmosphere, the film features two legendary gore gags that make this one of the messiest, bloodiest films in the genre, which comes from the fact that there's some gruesome makeup on the zombies to give them that familiar decayed look that works so well here.

All of these make this one so much fun that the few flaws are inconsequential. The fact is that the finale, through no fault of its own, is one of the most haltingly disjointed and confusing entries that ever was released and manages to really end this on a downer-note as that's something that must be dealt with here. The other big issue here is that despite this being billed as a zombie movie, the zombies are in only two scenes with a total amount of screen time of about a minute. They needed more to do than just simply show up, even if their appearance is incredibly atmospheric watching their hands pop up slowly out of the ground. The few times they come off as zombies, they simply appear and disappear at will seem to pop up and transport all over the place which is a new change to zombie films. Otherwise, there's not much else wrong here.

Overview: *****/5
With absolutely no zombies and a new idea for tackling them, this may disappoint some hardcore zombie fans. Gorehounds will have absolutely no problem with the movie and will eat it up as will fans of the creative crew or Eurohorror aficionados, while those with sensitive stomachs and conservatives need to stay extremely away from this.