Shunned House, The

Released by: Salvation
Released on: 5/26/2003
Director: Ivan Zuccon
Cast: Giuseppe Lorusso, Federica Quadlieri, Emanuele Cerman, Silvia Ferreri, Cristiana Vacacro
Year: 2003
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The Movie:

Allow me to be blunt here for a moment if I may. With the exception of a handful of Stuart Gordon entries (like Re-Animator, Dagon, and From Beyond), the legacy of H. P. Lovecraft in regards to filmed adaptations of his work has sucked, and most of it has sucked pretty hard. So it was with a bit of trepidation that I approached Ivan Zuccon's shot on video feature, The Shunned House, as not only is it based on three Lovecraft tales (The Shunned House, The Music Of Eric Zann, and The Dreams In The Witch House) but it's also had a lot of people touting it as a return to greatness for Italian horror - after all, I didn't want to fall for the hype and come away disappointed.

The story revolves around a writer named Alex and his well-endowed photographer girlfriend named Rita, who spends much of the running time trying not to fall out of her top. The two of them are working on Alex's latest project: a book on a creaky old building that he discovered as a child. It's not just any house though, this run down and eerie locale has a nasty history behind it, and it's that history that the two hope to uncover with their research as it has the makings of an interesting study on the occult beginnings of the building.

The more they uncover about the unusual happenings that have occurred there over the years, the stranger things get and the film begins to weave three different tales from three different periods in the history of the building into one unusual narrative. There is a very strong supernatural presence still very much alive in the building, and while we're not going to uncover any mystical evil gods with names like Yog Soggoth or Cthulu, there's more than enough horror and insanity going around to make up for it as the film builds slowly but surely to a well executed and gory climax.

Parts of the film are a little tricky to make sense out of but if you pay close enough attention things do come together at the end, though they could have been explained a little better on the way there. The movie is quite atmospheric with a great set as the house almost takes on a life of it's own and is as much a character as any of the actual people in the film.

While it's not a perfect movie by any stretch, it is an entertaining and spooky little affair that genre fans should find much to like about. Performances aren't exceptionally strong but they're sufficient enough to work, and there are a couple of nice little homages to the forefathers of Italian Horror, Mario Bava in particular.

Video/Audio/Extras:

While the packaging from Redemption may boast of an anamorphic widescreen transfer, what we get is simply a flat 1.85.1 picture without any 16x9 enhancement. This was shot on digital video and so it has that look to it and does suffer from some compression artifacts and video noise in a few of the darker scenes. Overall though it looks decent and for the most part you won't have any trouble following what occurs on screen. It's very watchable, just not exceptional.

There are a couple of spots on the Dolby Digital 2.0 soundtrack where it is a bit difficult to follow the dialogue (dubbed into English) over the background music. Dialogue is a bit too low in the mix for my liking, and there were a few times where I had to adjust the volume, as it's not a particularly consistent mix. That aside, there is no hiss or unnecessary background noise on this track and with the exception of the issues mentioned, it's relatively serviceable.

Salvation has issued a few extras on the disc. There are text essays on Italian Horror and on H. P. Lovecraft as well as a handful of deleted scenes that don't really add much to the film. There are two trailers for The Shunned House as well as one a piece for The Bunker and The Playgirls And The Vampire. A short film entitled Blood, which was directed by Philip Ilson is included as is a bad music video by The Nuns for a song entitled White Slave which features attractive women in leather suits vamping it up. It's nice to see the bonus materials there, but none of them are really of much substance.

The Final Word:

The Shunned House is a moody Lovecraftian film that shows a lot of potential for it's director and offers up a few choice set pieces and loads of atmosphere. Worth a look.