Bava's Last Bow

 SHOCK-1977-After leaving a mental hospital, Dora Baldini (Daria Nicolodi), still recovering from the suicide of her first husband returns to their old house with her new husband Bruno (John Steiner) and young son Marco (David Colin Jr.). At night while the couple have sex, Marco wakes up in his room and yells “pigs” several times. He asks mom “What is death?”. His hand turns ghoulish when he touches his sleeping mom. Bruno is a commercial pilot and is away a lot. As the story progresses Dora fears she is beginning to lose her sanity once again. Marco acts very weird and says thing like “I have to kill you,mama” and seems to be possessed by her late husband....or is it just in her mind? It's revealed later that Dora killed her late hubby in a drug fueled fury and Bruno hid the body in a wall. Dora kills Bruno with a pick and then after being attacked by furniture, slits her own throat. Marco has a tea party with his invisible dad.

 (imdb)

This Italian production (it played in the US under the title BEYOND THE DOOR PART 2) was the last film directed by the great Mario Bava with some help from his son Lamberto, who co-wrote the screenplay. Nice little possession/ghost horror movie that looks great (the elder Bava was also the uncredited cinematographer) and manages to tie up everything nicely (well kind of anyway...). Son Lamberto went on to make his own horror films. Lead actress Daria Nicolodi wrote the screenplay for the Dario Argento horror movie SUSPIRIA the same year (they were a couple for many years but never married). Italian horror vet Ivan Rassimov plays Dora's doctor.

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SinBaaad...

SINBAD OF THE SEVEN SEAS-1989-Terrible “Hercules” like tale which according to the credits is based on a story by Edgar Allan Poe! 

Sinbad (Lou Ferrigino) has a mixed crew (a Chinese warrior, a viking, a dwarf, etc.) who argue with each other and occasionally fight but mostly the story is held together by a narrator, a mother (Daria Nicolodi) telling her kid a bedtime story. Maybe they lost the soundtrack or were too lazy to dub everything. An evil sorcerer (John Steiner; hamming it up more than usual) and a sorceress (Teagan) are the main villains and there's some unintentional comedy. 

Director Enzo G. Castellari made this Italian production after several movies with the words “The Bronx” in their titles.

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Rip-Off

THE DEVIL WITHIN HER-1975-Former exotic dancer Lucy Carlesi (Joan Collins) gives birth to a rather large and strong baby (at least that's what the doctor's say; it looks like any normal baby). Weird things happen almost immediately. Baby scratches mommy and later bites their housekeeper. Her Italian husband Geno (Ralph Bates with an accent) hires a nanny but the baby pushes her into a pond and she dies! Lucy reveals a strange story to her girlfriend (Caroline Munro) about the last time she danced and how a dwarf actor "cursed" her ("You will have a baby as big as I am small! A monster!"). She believes her baby is possessed and even sees the dwarf's face in place of her son's. Their doctor (Donald Pleasance) doesn't believe it but when he visits he's decapitated. Dad winds up dead by hanging and his body is stuffed in a drain pipe. Dad's sister, a nun (Elleen Atkins) suspects no good and eventually performs an exorcism but by then everyone is dead! John Steiner is also in it as a Cockney club owner. Much of it doesn't make sense and there's some unintentional humor and it all seems to be inspired by THE EXORCIST, IT'S ALIVE and ROSEMARY'S BABY. 

Director Peter Sasdy did better with previous efforts like TASTE THE BLOOD OF DRACULA, COUNTESS DRACULA and HANDS OF THE RIPPER. For some reason it has recently been re-titled SHARON'S BABY.

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