I guess I have no one to blame but myself for sitting through this tripe more than once. Thanks to Trakt, though, I won't ever make that mistake again. I kept thinking _"This seems familiar"_ but it wasn't until the dancing tarantulas came prancing out of the woodwork that I realized, _"Oh cripes, I **have** sat through this one before..."_ As a huge fan (back in the day, mind you...it was back in the day!) of Lucio Fulci's _The Gates of Hell_ I wanted to see this one when I found his name attached to it on a horror movie blog. The overall presentation was par for the course for those eye-popping, brain-squishing, shuffling, blind zombie flicks from the 70's and 80's: cheesy horrible music throughout, innumerable macro-lens close-ups of staring eyes, shuffling, moaning, gasping, groaning, tossing the head about in despair while remaining frozen in place (as opposed to the real-life scenario of screaming and running away). The plot had holes in it that were big enough to drive a truck through...and in all my born days, with my true-to-life arachnaphobia, I never realized that if you were lying on the ground paralyzed from a bad fall, that chirping, squealing tarantulas would slowly eat your lips off your face, burrow into your eyeballs, and chew out your tongue while you laid there unable to move or even make a sound. Overall, the eyeroll effect was a perfect ten; the gore was a ten; the stupidity of the characters was a ten; the sudden appearance (from somewhere, still not sure where?) of a whole new round of bullets for his empty revolver rated a ten; the inability to escape from zombies whose speed would make a sloth look like the Flash was most definitely a ten, and Dickie, the German Shepherd: definitely a TEN. (I loved the scene where it prominently showed - in slow motion - Dickie running out of the house, his balls just a-flapping; wouldn't catch a scene like that in today's animal scenes! LOL) So, I suppose if you add all the incredibly, unbelievably horrid parts of this movie together, it rates ... well, at least CLOSE TO a perfect "10" on the "AWFUL" meter. Now that I've sat through it (again) and made notes, hopefully, I'll never make that mistake again. FINAL NOTE: If you're really, really...I mean like **REALLY** into gore movies, then by all means, you'll probably enjoy this one...as long as an actual story doesn't matter. Because there is no story...in fact, most of this doesn't make any sense, but at least it's gory. :face_vomiting: **UPDATE 12/07/25** I guess I'm a glutton for punishment...or at the very least, a sucker for awful, cheesy, unbelievably stupid Italian horror movies. I actually **wanted** to watch this again, simply because I was in the mood for a really bad, gross-out, gory zombie flick, and this one came up on my radar...yes, even with the comments and reviews I've left about not ever watching it again. It was every bit as awful as I remember - including the dancing tarantula scene - but it was exactly what I was looking for in the gross, gory, stupidity factor. Thing about flicks like these, you don't have to think; you don't have to concentrate on what's being said or who's doing what. They're all idiots, and nothing makes any sense. You just sit back and laugh as the gore piles up. And here, it piles up in spades. This is why you watch Lucio Fulci movies; he was known as the "Godfather of Gore" for a reason...and it wasn't his brilliant films, either. This was a lot of fun - in a sick, twisted, masochistic manner - to sit through again and laugh at. And knowing me, there will come yet another Friday or Saturday night when I'm sitting here bored to death and decide I want to watch a really bad, really gross zombie movie...and this will probably get watched and laughed at all over again.

The best horror movie ever made as far as I'm concerned. And for me, I would even say it the best movie ever made.

That ending is still so surreal and epic. Just one of the best endings in horror films. So well done. Lucio Fulci's "the Beyond" has some amazing scenes, some eye-popping bloody special effects, horrible acting, a strung together plot with an amazing/beautiful ending, loads of falling down, brutal deaths, zombies, blood and one of the seven gates to hell. Yes, you could point out some of the flaws in this Fulci film but it is just so damn enjoyable and makes you want to watch more of his stuff. Because I think the ending shows just how amazing Lucio Fulci can be.

The Beyond is the best film Fulci ever did, and it's one of my absolute favourite films. It was one of the films that opened my eyes to horror films outside the established franchises back in the early 90s when I got a copy of this on VHS from my friends uncle. I was totally blown away then, and still am...every time I watch it. If you are a fan of horror, and haven't seen it, The Beyond should be a top priority for you.

3 Thoughts After Watching ‘The Beyond’: 1. Plot holes and continuity issues PLAGUED this movie. And I’m not just talking about unexplained mysteries and unanswered questions. I can deal with that. NONE of the relationships were established. I have no idea how any of these characters knew each other. Not a one. So why are we supposed to care them? 2. There was essentially no solid plot. It was a collection of random ghastly moments. You could probably loosely build a plot out of the haunted hotel that’s apparently a gate to hell, but we the viewer shouldn’t have to. 3. The atmosphere and practical effects were fantastically effective. From the high-pitched, jarring squeaks of the gurney to the cringey sounds of the gnawing spiders. Properly discomforting. And New Orleans is always fun for horror. If only these awesome moments were properly connected, there could’ve been something great here. Bonus Thought: John not catching on to the zombie headshot method was INFURIATING.