The Red Circle

Rupert Everett is the caretaker in the Buffalora Cemetery in Italy (where everyone speaks English). Normally this would be a custodial job. In Buffalora, though, this job consists of keeping the dead dead. You see, everyone that gets buried in Buffalora comes back as a flesh eating zombie. You would think that all of this undead nonsense would raise a stink, but then you would underestimate how good Everett and his mute, hunchback sidekick Gnaghi are at performing second funerals. And if this were an American movie, that is where the plot would end. But, no. This film has a lot more insane twists to throw at you. Everett meets his true love, the widow of a very rich man, at a funeral. They get it on on a gravestone. Her undead husband bites her. Rupert Everett never gets over the loss of someone who, really, he had a a one night stand with. A whole bunch of kids die in a school bus accident IN THE CEMETERY. Gnaghi falls in love with the mayor’s daughter (easily 20 years his younger.) She gets her head cut off. Gnaghi starts a romance (an actual, puppy love, real romance – this is post-modern REANIMATOR) with the disembodied head. At some point, Rupert Everett is in a hospital asking a surgeon to cut his penis off. At another point, Man and Hunchback are sitting on a cliff, attempting to solve the mysteries of life.

Despite the fact that the plot and characters and premise of this film are TOTALLY insane, the movie has a very strong throughline and a very, very powerful and stirring visual sense. It’s one of the last modern arthouse horror flicks that studies the emotions and responses of its characters as much as it pays attention to all the gory details. This movie can be found for around 6 to 7 dollars at Amazon and Best Buy. You would be doing your DVD collection a great disservice if CEMETERY MAN were omitted from it.

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