La Notte dei Diavoli
1972 / 91m - Italy
Horror, Thriller
1.5*/5.0*
Night of the Devils poster

Watches

July 14, 2021

1.5*/5.0*

This film starts out rather well, but once it gets to the meat of the story, Night of the Devils begins to slip away from director Ferroni. It's a little surprising, since he basically screws up the easy part (weird people in mysterious woods), whilst acing an intro that is quite a bit trickier to pull off.

After he faces car trouble, Nicolas wanders around the woods until he hits a cabin. There, he finds a family who lives in fear of what's lurking out there. Nicolas assumes it's merely local superstition and folklore, but when he stays the night, the woods get under his skin and his fears take a hold of him.

Performances are quite poor, the soundtrack is cheesy instead of atmospheric, the cinematography is pretty dull and the horror looks incredibly cheap. I'm not a big fan of classic Italian horror cinema, so your mileage may definitely vary, but even the often lauded ending failed to impress. A poor showing.