Cementerio Del Terror

Mexico has a long and powerful history of horror cinema, particularly from the early 50’s to the 1970’s. This, of course, not counting the mexican luchador films. Movies like La Maldicion De La Llorona, Misterios De Ultratumba, El Espejo De La Bruja and Alucarda gave us horror scares with class and gothic sensibilities that could compete with the works of Mario Bava and Terence Fisher. In the eighties, horror went into a mayor decline and most independent companies went into the exploitation gore/horror genre, borrowing from American models. This includes trash like El Violador Infernal. This movie is probably the best example of the way genre cinema went in the 80’s, as it’s a mish-mash of more successful, and better, horror films of the decade.

The story involves a group of college students who rent a cabin in the woods. There, they try to have sex, but they read a satanic-looking book which brings about the powers of darkness. Sound familiar? Wait, it gets better. The body of a killer psychopath disappears and is possessed by the powers of this evil book, and his psychiatrist insanely tries to capture him again. Sound even more familiar? Well, a group of children get involved and now these young children have to fight, not only the undead psycho killer, but a horde of bloodthirsty zombies that rise from their graves.

As you can see, the movie borrows heavily from Evil Dead, Halloween and Night of the Living Dead. Because of this, there is high camp value to be had, but don’t kid yourself, this isn’t exactly high art. The acting is atrocious and it doesn’t get better when the main characters go from bad teen stereotypes to bad children stereotypes. One of the kids in particular seems to scream instead of talk. In the movie’s defense, however, there is a lot of cool gore and makeup effects that are very appropiate for the time. I especially like the sequence where the zombies rise up from the grave, since it’s very foggy and gothic and it kind of reminds me of Thriller, the music video, only with less dancing. So if you want a brainless horror movie that will entertain you and nothing more, go check it out.