The Sweet House of Horrors (1989)

After their parents are brutally murdered by a burglar, Marco (Giuliano Gensini) and Sarah (Ilary Blasi) are put in the care of their Aunt Marcia (Cinzia Monreale) and Uncle Carlo (Jean-Christophe Brétigniere). While their Aunt and Uncle are waiting for the children’s home to sell, Marco and Sarah are contacted by the ghosts of their dead parents who don’t want the children to leave. Once they witness some supernatural phenomenon for themselves and begin fearing for the children’s safety, Marcia and Carlo hire an exorcist to cleanse the house of evil spirits.

Along with House of Clocks, Lucio Fulci directed The Sweet House of Horrors for Italian television. After reading a very negative review of this film several years ago, I put it on the imaginary “oh well, I’ll never watch that one” shelf. Well, after Doomed Fulci-Thon, I say all bets are off, people. It’s time for me to buckle down and watch every dang thing that the “Godfather of Gore” ever directed.

Here’s the paragraph where I slam the film. The writing is quite confusing and lame. Some of the comedy works but the backhoe scene is unspeakably stupid. Here’s another script featuring characters speaking their painfully obvious thoughts out loud for the audience‘s sake. The subplot with the burglar’s comeuppance is okay but seems more like an afterthought. There is a plethora of cheesy and mostly embarrassing optical effects if you’re into that kind of thing. Most annoying though, is the film’s terrible English dubbing rendering most of the characters even dumber than their dialogue.

And now I must praise the film. There is some attention-grabbing gore in the first few minutes and a couple more gruesome moments later in the film that were excellent. The lighting, Sebastiano Celeste’s camerawork (fisheye lens and soft focus!), and the set design are all surprising good for an Italian television production. Most importantly, a clearly inspired Fulci establishes a very bizarre and often creepy atmosphere that holds up throughout most of the film.

The lovely Cinzia Monreale of The Beyond and Beyond the Darkness graces us with her presence. The kids, Ilary Blasi and Giuliano Gensini, aren’t terrible child actors by any means but when they’re voiced by adults pretending to be children, things get ugly. The most bizarre casting has to be the Abraham Lincoln lookalike in a turtleneck (French actor Vernon Dobtcheff) as the Russian (who speaks German) exorcist.

Once again, I’ve done myself a disservice by avoiding a Fulci film based on a poor review I barely even remember reading. Without a doubt, The Sweet House of Horrors has its problems but it’s definitely a watchable title. There’s a lot to like here especially for Fulci completists like myself. As my standards have been severely lowered by Door to Silence, I’m probably not the most reliable reviewer of this stuff anymore. Shocked? Me neither. But I know one thing… I do loves me a séance sequence! I can’t wait to watch this again.

“Don’t believe him. Grownups are all liars.”