#33 - Dellamorte Dellamore (1994)
(dir. Michele Soavi)
Francesco Dellamorte works as a watchman at the cemetery in the small town of Buffalora, Italy, where he is kept busy by the constant stream of the living dead. In his spare time, he likes to read the phone book and cross out the names of the deceased. His only company is his assistant Gnaghi, a mentally disabled man who is helpful enough but who can't talk. He has no other friends, but when he meets a grieving young widow in the cemetery he falls in love hard - until she is bitten by the risen corpse of her dead husband. Dellamorte start to go a little mad, and he is visited by the figure of Death who asks him to stop killing the dead - it's much easier to just shoot the living in the head so they never have a chance to come back.
This movie was really good, and it kind of straddles the line between "genre film" and "art film". It definitely has a very morbid and dark sense of humor, but is also a bit of a meditation on love and death (the title more or less translates into "Of death, of love"). Important questions are asked, like, "Can a severed zombie head really feel love?" The answer is yes. Rupert Everett is really awesome in the lead role, and is believable as both a lonely and morbid soul as well as a nonchalant killer. This movie has developed a cult following, and I think that his performance is a big part of that.
Soavi worked as assistant director on a number of films by Argento, Bava, and other great Italian horror directors, and while their influence is apparent here, this movie also has it's own surreal kind of tone and style that is closer to something like Evil Dead 2 - in fact, I think fans of that film would really like this one. If you like zombies, dark comedy, and the occasional moment of thoughtfulness in your horror films, I highly recommend this one.
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