The House by the Cemetery (Italian: Quella villa accanto al cimitero) is a 1981 Italian supernatural horror film directed by Lucio Fulci, co-written with Dardano Sacchetti and Giorgio Mariuzzo, and starring Katherine MacColl, Paolo Malco, Ania Pieroni, Giovanni Frezza, Silvia Collatina, and Dagmar Lassander. The third and final installment in Fulci's Gates of Hell trilogy, preceded by City of the Living Dead and The Beyond, the plot revolves around a series of murders committed by a ghoulish and demonic serial killer taking place in a Massachusetts home that happens to be hiding a gruesome secret within its basement walls. Fulci developed the screenplay for The House by the Cemetery with inspiration from the works of H. P. Lovecraft, while co-writer Sacchetti was influenced by the novella The Turn of the Screw by Henry James. Principal photography took place in the spring of 1980 in New York City and the Greater Boston area, with additional photography occurring in Rome at the De Paolis In.Co.R. Studios. Upon its premiere in Italy in August 1981, The House by the Cemetery became a domestic box-office success, grossing 462 million Italian lire, making it Fulci's most profitable horror film released in the 1980s.
Plot A woman looks for her boyfriend in an abandoned house. After discovering his body stabbed with scissors, she is killed with a French knife and dragged through a cellar door by a monstrous figure. Meanwhile, Bob Boyle and his parents, Norman and Lucy, move into a house in New Whitby, Massachusetts. Norman's ex-colleague, Dr. Peterson, who murdered his mistress before committing suicide, was the previous owner. The Boyles are to stay there while Norman researches old houses. As his mother packs, Bob notices a photograph of a house in which a girl is standing at the window with a fearful expression. In New Whitby, Boston, Bob waits in his parents' car while they collect the house keys. The girl from the photograph, Mae Freudstein, appears across the street and warns him to stay away. Only Bob can see her. In the real estate office, Mrs. Laura Gittleson is annoyed when her colleague hands the couple "the Freudstein keys." She insists that it is called "Oak Mansion" and promises to find the Boyles a babysitter. Oak Mansion is in poor condition. The cellar door is locked and nailed shut. A woman arrives and introduces herself as Ann, the babysitter. That night, Norman hears noises and finds Ann unblocking the cellar door. The next day, Norman goes to the library to peruse Peterson's materials. The chief librarian, Mr. Wheatley, appears to recognize him, but Norman claims that he is mistaken. The assistant librarian then informs Norman that Peterson conducted private research at the house. He studied records of area disappearances and other demographic data. Mae shows Bob a tombstone on the grounds marked "Mary Freudstein" and says she is not buried there. Indoors, Lucy finds the tombstone of "Jacob Tess Freudstein" while sweeping the hallway. Norman later reassures her that it is normal for some older houses to have indoor tombs. He opens the cellar door and walks down the stairs, only to be attacked by a bat, which will not let go until he stabs it repeatedly. Spooked, the family drives to the real estate office and demands to be re-housed, but are told it will be days before they can move. While the Boyles are at the hospital to treat Norman's injuries from the bat, Mrs. Gittleson arrives at the house to tell them of a new property. Letting herself in, she stands over the Freudstein tombstone, which cracks apart, pinning her ankle. The killer then stabs Gittleson to death with a fireplace poker and drags her into the cellar. Lucy finds Ann cleaning a bloodstain on the kitchen floor the next morning. Ann avoids Lucy's questions about the stain. Meanwhile, Norman discovers that Freudstein was a Victorian surgeon who conducted illegal experiments. Norman must travel to New York to research Freudstein. On the way, he stops by the library and finds an audio cassette by Peterson. It documents Peterson's madness. Norman destroys the cassette by dropping it into a furnace pipe. Ann goes to the cellar looking for Bob and hears childlike sobbing. Freudstein then decapitates her. Bob sees Ann's head and runs from the cellar, screaming. Lucy returns to find Bob crying in his room, but refuses to believe his account about Ann. That evening, Bob returns to the cellar looking for Ann but gets locked in. Lucy hears Bob's cries and tries to open the cellar door. Norman returns and hacks the door with a hatchet when she cannot open it. The rotting hand of Dr. Freudstein appears and restrains Bob against the door as the hatchet chops through it. The axe eventually breaks through the door and severs the ghoul's hand. He staggers back down the stairs. Norman and Lucy get into the cellar, which contains several mutilated bodies, surgical equipment, and a slab. Freudstein is a living corpse with rotting flesh. The 150-year-old Freudstein lives by using his victims' parts to regenerate blood cells. Norman attacks the ghoul, who twists the hatchet away. Grabbing a knife from the slab, Norman stabs Freudstein, causing flesh and maggots to ooze out of the latter's old lab coat. Freudstein grabs Norman and rips open his throat. Lucy and Bob climb a ladder leading to the underside of the cracked tombstone. Lucy strains to shift the stone. Freudstein grabs Lucy and drags her down the stairs. Her head bangs on each step on the way down, killing her. As Freudstein advances up the ladder, Bob strains to escape. As Freudstein grabs Bob's leg, he is pulled up by Mae, who is with her mother, Mary Freudstein. She leads Mae and Bob down the grove into what appears to be a ghost world.
Cast
Production
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