Demons

Alternate titles : Demoni

Tagline : "Their Cities will be Your Tombs."

A group of patrons, consisting of some of the seediest individuals ever collected togethor, are attending the grand reopening of an old cinema. But are shocked to find the featured mystery film is a brutal stalk and slash thriller, about a young lad, who turns into a demon after trying on old mask, and proceeds to brutally murder his friends.

Many of the cinema goers are disgusted and decide to leave, only to find the main doors locked, and the fire exits barricaded. Spotting a mask on display in the foyer like the one in the film, one of the girls puts it on for a joke, only to find thats not such a good idea in a horror film.

Soonafter she begins a hideous transformation and attacks the other people in the cinema, who in turn begin to transform and attack others, as the surviving patrons find themselves fighting for their lives in a series of pitched battles, as they attempt to find a way out. Guess they should have known better than to accept free cinema tickets from a strange man in a mask.

Action packed, with some good gore and brutal fight scenes, particularly during the end fight where one lad grabs a motorbike and samurai sword from the display in the foyer, then rides around the theatre decapitating the demon creatures. This is a slick, low budget, rollercoaster ride of a horror film.

Directed by Lamberto Bava and produced by the Infamous Italian horror maestro Dario Argento, it proved highly successful when released onto tape in the UK back in the early 80's and features a fun 80s soundtrack. Including the likes of Go West and rock acts like Billy Idol, Saxon, Motley Crue and Accept which adds nicely to the feel of the movie.

Overall this is a really fun slice of 80s Eurohorror, if you haven't seen it, then check it out at once.

Overall Marks : 7/10.

Terrifying Trivia

• The role of Hanna was played by Dario Argento's eldest daughter Fiore. Director Lamberto Bava also makes a brief appearance as one of the train passengers during the intro.
• The building used in the film was an actual cinema, which had closed. A lot of the internal shots were also filmed there as the building was about to be gutted, so the film makers were free to do what they liked with the place. The building still stands, as of 2018, its currently used as a nightclub called The Goya, and has hosted a number of horror conventions owing to its notoriety due to the film.
• The masked man giving away the free movie tickets at the start of the film was played by the assistant director Michele Soavi. He also turns up as one of the characters in the film playing in the cinema.
• The soundtrack was by Claudio Simoneti of the "Goblins" group, who scored many other Argento horror pics and the European version of "Dawn of the Dead".
• The role of Tony the Pimp was played by prolific Bobby Rhodes, who also starred in Italian cult classics "The Great Alligator", "The Last Hunter" and "The Commander". He also appeared in a different role in "Demons 2". He also reprised his role as Tony the Pimp in a 2011 short film of the same name.
• Lamberto Bava says that "Demons" is his favourite film out of all the films that he's directed.
• In case you were wondering, the lad with the shotgun in the white jeep at the end of the film was indeed a young Giovanni Frezza, who also played young Bob in Lucio Fulci's "House by the Cemetery".
• The initial UK video release suffered 1.05s of cuts by the BBFC, which trimmed most of the gore and removed a close-up where a punk is scraping cocaine off his girlfriends breast with a razor blade. DVD release in 2000 re-instated the gore but still trimmed the scene with the razor blade. The film was finally passed fully uncut in the UK in 2004.

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