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The Sweet House of Horrors
[Blu-ray]
Blu-ray ALL - America - Cauldron Films Review written by and copyright: Eric Cotenas (2nd August 2025). |
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The Film
 Returning from an evening out to their villa in the countryside, Roberto (Demons 2's Pascal Persiano) and Mary (Massacre's Lubka Lensi) surprise a prowler but he gets the better of them and brutally bludgeons both of them to death, placing their bodies in their car and pushing it down a steep hillside. Mary's sister Marcia (The Beyond's Cinzia Monreale) and her husband Carlo (Rats: Night of Terror's Jean-Christophe Brétignière) arrive to assume guardianship over the dead couple's children Sarah (Ilary Blasi) and Marco (Giuliano Gensini) who had been away at a private school in the mountains. With Carlo away during the day in the city at work, he becomes worried for his wife's well-being when she claims to hear strange noises in the house, but even he witnesses odd behavior of the children who still talk about their parents in the present tense and gleefully enjoy the strange accidents the befall those that enter the house with ill intent including realtor Mr. Coby (Trhauma's Franco Diogene) who wants to buy the house for the pleasure of knocking it down and gardener Guido (Demons' Lino Salemme) who experiences bloody hallucinations. When even Carlo cannot explain the telekinetic outbursts of terror, he brings in a possibly sham medium (Catacombs' Vernon Dobtcheff) to exorcise the house he might wake up even more of the house's ghostly inhabitants with their own grievances. The Sweet House of Horrors was helmed by Lucio Fulci for the Italian "Houses of Doom" series commissioned by Reteitalia from Luciano Martino's Dania Film and initially consisting of six films directed by Fulci, Umberto Lenzi (Cannibal Ferox), and Marcello Avallone (Specters), the series was eventually paired down to the two Fulci entries – this one and The House of Clocks – and the Lenzi entries House of Witchcraft and The House of Lost Souls, all of which were deemed too gory for the small screen (on one of the audio commentaries for Lenzi films, film historian Eugenio Ercolani discusses the "wild west" days of early private television networks including uncertainty overs standards as well as little oversight in commissioning products that either started out as television and went to theatrical, vice versa, or would find a place in foreign video markets – and the films as a series never aired, turning up on video as well as airing years later as unconnected films. While The House of Clocks might be the high point of the series with Lenzi's atmospheric House of Witchcraft a runner up and The House of Lost Souls merely dumb fun – The Sweet House of Horrors is certainly its low point and a frustrating viewing experience given the potentials of its setup and exploitation of threadbare production values. After the delightfully gory opening, the film's tone shifts radically to something somewhat Poltergeist-y first third as Monreale's Marcia experiences strange things and then to a middle section that feels like a children's film that is more childish than child-like (House by the Cemetery's Bob is considerably less annoying than these two kids, particularly in the English version). The structure of the story by Vincenzo Mannino (The New York Ripper) and Gigliola Battaglini (The Phantom of Death) is just bizarre with the identity of the masked prowler quite obvious and revealed halfway through with the character no longer a source of threat to the children or their guardians and no real sense of menace from the ghosts of the parents who have no sinister ulterior motives. What we are left with is comic relief from Diogene whose weight and girth was always used s a source of grotesque amusement in Italian genre films from this period and Doebtecheff's pompously theatrical medium who be Fulci's unfavorable response to the the Spielberg film's quirky medium who here instead of guiding spirits to the light wants to consign them to "the pit." The cynical Fulci always had a soft spot for children as the victims and witnesses of adult corruption, and here they are largely shielded from truly evil adults while recognizing the others as "just idiots" and the most malicious of all gets his just desserts in the punchline of an ending that might have Fulci fans wishing that he stopped a few films earlier even if his last few efforts showed flashes of inspiration under even more budgetary constraints. 
Video
Unrelesased in the United States during the rental days, The Sweet House of Horrors could be found on bootlegs of a Japanese-subtitled cassette in the gray market before making its debut stateside in 2002 in an anamorphic transfer on DVD as part of Media Blasters' Shriek Show "Lucio Fulci Collection" line picking up the dregs of his titles that Anchor Bay and Blue Underground did not touch, and in the U.K. from Vipco in an non-anamorphic letterboxed transfer. Cauldron Films' 1080p24 MPEG-4 AVC 1.66:1 widescreen Blu-ray – previously released last year in a six disc (four Blu-ray/two soundtrack CD) "House of Doom" limited edition box set exclusively available from Cauldron Films and DiabolikDVD and now sold out – is an improvement over the DVD transfer in which the standard definition resolution and Media Blasters' early authoring efforts could not contend with the deliberate haziness of the 16mm photography of Nino Celeste (The Spider Labyrinth) who revealed in an interview that Fulci had him stack multiple glass filters on top of one another in front of the lens to achieve a dreamy look. The film's mostly in-camera opticals are note helped by the additional resolution and in no way could this film be called pretty but the look is in keeping with Fulci's other films of the period. 
Audio
Audio options include both English and Italian DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 mono tracks. Both are post-dubbed with none of the actors dubbing themselves – even French/British actor Dobtcheff who seems to be less picking up a paycheck than picking up the cost of dinner. The foley track is full of the usual Fulcian unnatural noises while the synth scoring of Vince Tempera (The Psychic) is just slathered over the action. Optional English SDH subtitles are provided for the English track and English for the Italian but they cannot be toggled back and forth via remote. 
Extras
The film is accompanied by an audio commentary by film historians Eugenio Ercolani and Troy Howarth in which they concede the criticisms by Fulci fans about the film's jarring shifts in tone and the false expectations of a typical Fulci gorefest from the opening but also reflect on the ways it embodies the director's "old man films" in terms of his emotional and physical state at the time and his lifelong feelings of loss, loneliness, and alienation. They also look at the film in the context of the Fulci/Lenzi series and their other films from this period and how they may have been inappropriate for television but more likely "fell through the cracks" as write-offs for Reteitalia rather than being suppressed. They provide background on the cast – Blasi made few films but is very well-known in Italy as a television presenter and for her messy marriage to footballer Francesco Totti (which was recently the subject of an Italian Netflix series) – the dubbing cast, and the odd casting of Doebtecheff who it turns out was replacing the intended Cosimo Cinieri (Manhattan Baby), and the contribution of cinematographer Celeste given production designer Antonello Geleng's interview in which he reveals that the budget was such that the art direction consisted mostly of redressing and rearranging lived-in locations (including the villa here which is now a restaurant). In "Sweet Muse of Horrors" (28:55), Monreale recalls being spotted at age sixteen by the assistant director of Romolo Guerrieri's City Under Siege who asked her to appear in the film and co-star Luciano Salce introduced her to his agents. She discusses her subsequent works, distinguishing her sex comedies from the more popular ones of the period and believes that Steno recommended her to Fulci since Fulci had once served as his assistant director. She recalls Silver Saddle and getting to live out the fantasy of riding horses and playing cowboy and the difficulties with the special effects of The Beyond. She also recalls how Fulci's health had changed by the time of The Sweet House of Horrors and how much more difficult it was to get the project underway at that time in the industry. "Fulci House of Horrors" (16:43) is an interview with set designer Geleng who recalls his early credits with Dania Film starting with Island of the Fishmen and that he was imposed on City of the Living Dead and felt that Fulci hated his guts even if he did approve of his work (Geleng is interrupted by a phone call and is more brusque in the aftermath). "Editing for the Masters" (18:05) is an interview with editor Alberto Moriani (Zombi Holocaust) who recalls how having to synchronize audio to the picture taught him about editing rhythms and that he first worked with Fulci on television ads along with his brother Amedeo Moriani (Syndicate Sadists), and his surprise when Fulci requested him for a film and then kicked him off the set (realizing that he actually wanted his brother). He then recalls working with Fulci on his later films including Zombi 3 and being shocked how different he looked due to his declining health. He also compared working with Fulci to Lenzi and Antonio Margheriti (Alien from the Deep).  Carried over from the 2000 documentary "Voices from Beyond" is an interview with actress Cinzea Monreale (6:48) in which she discusses her personal experiences with Fulci and the perception of his rudeness. Carried over from the Shriek Show release are a series of archival pieces starting with an introduction by actress Cinzia Monreale (0:40) that played before the feature, and interviews with co-writer Gigliola Battaglini (3:05) who offers vague responses to questions about the script she and her husband Mannino adapted from Fulci's treatment but does reveal it was always intended as a television project rather than repurposed and that the tone was always intended to be lighter, actor Jean-Christophe Bretigniere (3:48) show interest in meeting Monreale again but explains that he only remembers the child actors in projects where things went wrong, actor Lino Salemme (10:55) recalls Fulci treating him and Persiano terribly, working out the fight scene without a stunt coordinator and getting hurt, and his tendency to be cast in villainous roles, while actor Pascal Persiano (3:45) is more diplomatic about Fulci, recalls that Salemme really punched him in their fights and he got a third degree burn from a make-up appliance, as well as meeting Blasi years later and not recognizing her. An Easter Egg includes some a rare selection of videotaped screen tests (71:25) ostensibly just for The Sweet House of Horrors but possibly also for The House of Clocks since some of the actors are aged between the children and the adult characters in their early twenties to thirties. Besides screen tests for the cast members Gensini, Lensi, Salemme, and Persiano, other familiar faces from Italian exploitation from the period include Virginia Bryant (The Ogre), Lars Jorgensen (The Church), Francesco Casale (The Voyeur), Lorenzo Majnoni (Lenzi's Hell's Gate), Persiano's Paganini Horror co-star Luana Ravegnini, and Saverio Vallone (Anthropophagus), along with Patrizia Aste who had appeared in Lamberto Bava's yet-to-be-released The Man Who Didn't Want to Die as part of his Alta tensione series also commissioned from Dania Film by Reteitalia, and Perla Agostini who had just appeared in one of the shorts for Gli incubi di Dario Argento (available on Severin Films' Dario Argento's Deep Cuts. The disc also includes the video promotional trailer (4:40) which seems less like a coming attraction than something for film market sales. 
Overall
The Sweet House of Horrors' failure to live up to the expectations of Lucio Fulci gorehound fans and its jarring tonal shifts may overshadow its more somber themes of loss and alienation common to Fulci's later period films and his tragic personal life.
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