Beyond the Door (1975)

Excellent, Without a doubt!!

As Good As It Gets

The first must-see film of the year.

This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

I watched this growing up in the late 80's, my uncle was a huge horror buff and I watched this one shortly after Exorcist when I was around 12 or 13, its really a mash-up of all the classics (Exorcist, Rosemary's Baby and some Omen) all my favorites, YES its a bit cheesy the dubbed English is hilarious at times especially the kids and their potty mouths. I loved the premise of the film, it had some haunting scores and just something mysterious about it, very nostalgic old school Italian horror, one of my personal faves... if you are willing to sacrifice a bit on the cheesy dialogues and story line, fans of Italian horror and films like Exorcist and Rosemary's Baby will enjoy this one, give it a shot...

Oy vey, what a doozy we have here. "Beyond the Door" (also known as "Chi sei" and "The Devil Within Her") has Juliet Mills as a San Francisco woman who becomes pregnant with a Devil child, which puts a hamper on her otherwise bourgeois West coast existence. She also becomes apparently possessed, and does a lot of really wacky and scary stuff. A low budget, unabashed riff on "The Exorcist" and "Rosemary's Baby," "Beyond the Door" is one of the weirdest offerings in the possession horror sub genre of the 1970s, and despite its unashamed ripping off of about every possession film up to that point, there are still moments of technical flair and genuine creepiness here. An Italian production, the film was directed by Ovidio G. Assonitis, who at times seems to be tapping into surrealism with the moody and at times disorienting camera-work; as some other reviewers have said, there are things about this film that are very much dreamlike. Take for example, the first five minutes: we have a sea of candles appear on screen, with overhead narration by none other than Satan himself; the camera pans to the right, as Juliet Mills inexplicably stands amidst the candles in a white nightgown, wearing a brainwave monitor. Three minutes later, we have a random montage of Mills grocery shopping in the bay area set to a hokey funk track by Sid Wayne. Surrealist horror, or funk rock music video? I don't even know, nor do I want to begin answering that.The film suffers tremendously from godawful dubbing, and Mills' foul-mouthed children who look about ten but talk like nineteen-year-olds bring some terribly laughable lines, while the bulk of the dialogue between the family is utterly brainless chatter. Despite all silliness, the real treat of this film lies in the execution of the possession scenes which, despite their derivation, are really well-done and at times genuinely scary. Juliet Mills does a commendable job with the script and is convincingly frightening as she transforms into a complete monster. There are some surprisingly out-there twists in the script that will leave you scratching your head, but also work in favor of the "surrealist horror" train of thought on the film (funk rock music video is still a solid choice though, just for the opening credits alone).Overall, "Beyond the Door" is a divisive film because it has moments of acute technical success and truly spooky moments, but it's also horribly dubbed, generally badly acted, and the plot is a rehash of the decade's earlier possession films with some absurd twists thrown in for good measure. As I said before, it is worth a watch for Mills' possession alone, and for the borderline surrealist filmmaking on display, but the undertone of utter silliness rarely escapes the screen. 6/10.

A somewhat effective mash-up of "Rosemary's Baby" and "The Exorcist," Ovidio Assonitis' "Beyond the Door" (1974) yet has little of the class and sophistication of the first or terrifying shocks of the latter. Released a year after "The Exorcist" kicked box-office tuchus (garnering $89 million; the No. 1 highest earner of 1973, if the book "Box Office Hits" it to be trusted), the film suffers from an aura of deja vu, but still has much to offer to the dedicated horror fan. In it, Juliet Mills (daughter of John, older sister of Hayley, but perhaps best known to American viewers as Phoebe Figalilly from the early '70s sitcom "Nanny and the Professor") plays Jessica Barrett, a wife and mother of two. She lives in San Francisco with her husband (a recording engineer played by Gabriele Lavia) and kids; in a further nod to "The Exorcist," one of these kids is an incredibly foul-mouthed little girl, while the son has the strangest habit of drinking cold Campbell's split pea soup from the can with a straw. (I know...ewwww!) Despite being on The Pill, Jessica finds herself miraculously pregnant, with her fetus growing at an alarming rate. She soon starts to evince some very odd behavior, such as eating banana skins off the street, along with violent mood swings and memory lapses. And that's nothing, compared to the inevitable head spinnings, levitations, sludge pukings and gravel-voiced cussing that soon follow. As a mysterious man from her past, Dimitri (Richard Johnson, star of the scariest film of all time, IMHO, 1963's "The Haunting"), tells her husband, Jessica has been taken over by "negative forces" (the "devil" word, strangely enough, is never used in the film)....As I mentioned up top, though occasionally effective, "Beyond the Door"'s ultimate impact is less than it could have been, especially for those viewers who are already familiar with its two antecedents. Still, there are pleasures here to be had. The film opens very strangely, with Old Scratch himself delivering a monologue in voice-over, while hundreds of ritual candles fill the screen; indeed, this might be the most original segment of the entire film! The picture makes good use of its San Francisco and Sausalito locales, while the sound FX are possibly the film's single scariest component. Some other chilling instances: Jessica's initial leering head swivel; Jessica's booming query "Who are you?" (the film's original Italian title, "Chi Sei?," translates as "Who are you?"); and Jessica tossing her husband about the bedroom while simultaneously cackling and dribbling. Unfortunately, the film also contains much that doesn't make a heckuva lot of sense. For example, after two viewings, I'm still not clear as to whether Dimitri was alive or dead, or, if alive, what he was doing for the 10 or so years since his fatal car crash. His ghostly manifestations toward Jessica, those possessed dolls in the kids' bedroom, and that blank-mouthed baby at the film's end all provided further head scratchings. The film is also a good 20 minutes longer than it needs to be; that interminable scene with the street musicians, for example, could certainly have been done away with. And for those viewers who get a little restless with the film, try playing the game of counting how many times some of the characters say "The child must/will be born"; I counted a good eight. One further comment: the current DVD incarnation of "Beyond the Door," from the good folks at Code Red, looks just fantastic, and comes replete with many fine extras, including modern-day interviews with Assonitis, Mills and Johnson. Johnson, now in his mid-80s, looks and sounds terrific, by the way, and his, uh, devil-may-care attitude is a joy to behold....

Beyond the Door is more than just merely an Exorcist rip-off! Director Ovidio G. Assonitis built a career on ripping off popular horror films, and so not content with merely ripping off William Friedkin's 1973 classic, Assonitis opted to throw in some Rosemary's Baby and what we end up with is a dual rip off, taking parts and ideas from both superior movies. Luckily this film was made before The Omen otherwise I'm sure parts of that film would have featured too! Anyway, it soon becomes clear what sort of film you're going to be in for as Beyond the Door opens with a narration...by none other than Satan. Ahem. The plot focuses on an average family with two kids. The mother has fallen pregnant again, which is a surprise to her since they hadn't been trying for a baby. Of course it turns out that this is Satan's child and carrying Satan's child apparently has a few unwanted side effects - like making the mother be nasty to everyone she encounters. Later, an ex-lover (whose life was saved by Satan) turns up to make sure she gives birth to Satan's offspring.Despite the fact that its terrible, this actually isn't the worst Exorcist rip off out there (that dubious honour falls to Spanish production 'Exorcismo' from my viewing experience) but this one is right down at the bottom of the barrel. The main problem with the film is clearly the fact that there's far too much going on at all times and since most of it isn't explained, it left me scratching my head often. It could be argued that this isn't a big problem since there's little about this film that makes you really care about any of the characters anyway so it doesn't really matter what's going on...but really that just adds to Beyond the Door's woes. The rip-off train eventually gets into full swing and by then we've got the lead character vomiting and spouting obscenities everywhere with none of the same vigour of the 1973 original. The Exorcist rip-offs genre's 'jewel in the crown' for me is Alberto De Martino's excellent The Antichrist; and this film does nothing to even challenge for that title. Strangely, Mario Bava's 1977 film 'Shock' has 'Beyond the Door 2' as one of it's a.k.a. titles...but surely this couldn't have been a success in its native Italy. Could it?