[Demdike@Cult Labs]

Beyond the Door (1974)

An Exorcist rip off from Ovidio G. Assonitis, starring Juliet Mills, Gabriele Lavia, and Richard Johnson. Mills stars as a San Francisco housewife who becomes possessed by a demon during pregnancy.

Despite being laughable at times Beyond the Door is okay. Juliet Mills is a lot of fun, seemingly knowing the film is dross but none the less she gives it her all and revels in her exploitative pea vomiting role, whilst Richard Johnson lurks mysteriously in the background during the first hour looking scarily cool.

Mills and Lavia's daughter, Gail, must be about nine but has the dialogue of an eighteen year old hipster whilst her curly blonde haired younger brother Ken, comes direct from the Frezza / Bob school of acting.

The film has some good San Francisco location work including a drive down the eight hairpin turns of the famed Lombard Street. The sound design is weird. It feels like it's from another film half the time, namely City of the Living Dead, with it's constant zombie moaning and groaning and eerie musical motifs. Assonitis obviously didn't rip off said Fulci classic as Beyond the Door arrived a full six years before Lucio's masterpiece.

In a way there's too much going on here for it to be described purely as an Exorcist rip off, much of the stuff doesn't work but other parts do work very well as does it's all round general oddness and whilst it may be a poor man's Exorcist it entertains with it.