I don't speak French,so the plot of "Maleficia" wasn't fully understandable to me,but here is general gist.The action of "Maleficia" takes place in 1860.Seven passengers of a black coach are heading to a castle that they have inherited from a relative who died from a strange disease.When the horse refuses to move on Karl decides to get help in a nearby chapel.Unfortunately the chapel is filled with hooded Satan worshipers who begin to torture and sacrifice screaming young women.The blood from murdered females causes flesh-eating rise.There are also vampires hidden in coffins in the basement of nearby castle."Maleficia" is easily one of the goriest horror movies I have ever seen.Still it's also quite dull.There is no plot and the acting is supremely amateurish.Still if you like extreme low-budget gore you may want to check out this French splatter flick.6 cannibal monks out of 10.
3 Reviews
Totally Bonkers Splatter Film
samxxxul18 July 2020
The opening credits proudly state that it is not for the squeamish. Yup! That it most certainly is. The story definitely comes second to splattery excess in what is one seriously strange journey into the macabre. And it's directed by French Splatter icon Antoine Pellissier (AKA Doctor Gore).
The story begins with a well to do family of nobles who are on their way to inherit an estate, in the middle they encounter a cannibalistic satanic cult including vampires and zombies. Things get nastier from this point as every frame immerses in violence and degradation without any possibility of redemption.
Utterly nihilistic and disturbing piece of horror that blends Jim van Bebber with Jean Rollins. The gore is over-the-top, explicit, and brutal. The acting is not very good but it´s not terrible either and keep in mind that this flick main objective is to showcase gore as suggested in the opening credit and in that it is successful. It is an absolutely underground film that focuses strongly on the splatter extreme crafted to shock the public. Assuming that we are talking about a 1998 work shot. Level of detail and sharpness are barely acceptable, and the graininess is felt. But the indie horror charm is guaranteed. I didn't find it pretentious or headache-inducing unlike the others which in the name of arthouse just throw some effects and bucket of blood, feels like a real chore to sit through.
I highly recommend it to the fans of Phil Stevens, Svetlana Baskova, Norbert Moutier, Scooter McCrae, Jason Impey, German Magarinos, Marcus Koch, Matt Jaissle, Eric Brummer, Carl Andersen, Andreas Schnaas, Yan Kaos, Teco Benson, Chester Novell Turner, Tamakichi Anaru, Ron DeCaro, Rolfe Kanefsky, Andrey Iskanov, Marian Dora, Fabrice du Welz, Karim Hussain, Tim Ritter, Alex Chandon, Lucifer Valentine, Timo Rose, Johan Vandewoestijne, Marc Fehse, Koji Shiraishi, Andrey Iskanov, Brian Paulin, Robert A. Masciantonio, Fred Voghel, Amando de Ossorio, Nacho Cerdà, Jesus Franco, Olaf Ittenbach, James Bell, Sady Baby, Sade Satô, Otto Muehl and Gunter Brus. A splatter flick with aspirations both to shock and experiment. It Is satisfactory on both counts. Not for everyone, but certainly worth a look for Gorehounds and extreme fanatics!
The story begins with a well to do family of nobles who are on their way to inherit an estate, in the middle they encounter a cannibalistic satanic cult including vampires and zombies. Things get nastier from this point as every frame immerses in violence and degradation without any possibility of redemption.
Utterly nihilistic and disturbing piece of horror that blends Jim van Bebber with Jean Rollins. The gore is over-the-top, explicit, and brutal. The acting is not very good but it´s not terrible either and keep in mind that this flick main objective is to showcase gore as suggested in the opening credit and in that it is successful. It is an absolutely underground film that focuses strongly on the splatter extreme crafted to shock the public. Assuming that we are talking about a 1998 work shot. Level of detail and sharpness are barely acceptable, and the graininess is felt. But the indie horror charm is guaranteed. I didn't find it pretentious or headache-inducing unlike the others which in the name of arthouse just throw some effects and bucket of blood, feels like a real chore to sit through.
I highly recommend it to the fans of Phil Stevens, Svetlana Baskova, Norbert Moutier, Scooter McCrae, Jason Impey, German Magarinos, Marcus Koch, Matt Jaissle, Eric Brummer, Carl Andersen, Andreas Schnaas, Yan Kaos, Teco Benson, Chester Novell Turner, Tamakichi Anaru, Ron DeCaro, Rolfe Kanefsky, Andrey Iskanov, Marian Dora, Fabrice du Welz, Karim Hussain, Tim Ritter, Alex Chandon, Lucifer Valentine, Timo Rose, Johan Vandewoestijne, Marc Fehse, Koji Shiraishi, Andrey Iskanov, Brian Paulin, Robert A. Masciantonio, Fred Voghel, Amando de Ossorio, Nacho Cerdà, Jesus Franco, Olaf Ittenbach, James Bell, Sady Baby, Sade Satô, Otto Muehl and Gunter Brus. A splatter flick with aspirations both to shock and experiment. It Is satisfactory on both counts. Not for everyone, but certainly worth a look for Gorehounds and extreme fanatics!
An enjoyable over-the-top zombie gorefest
kannibalcorpsegrinder30 August 2021
After learning of an inheritance nearby, a family travels through the woods to accomplish it only to stumble upon a Satanic cult offering a series of sacrifices that result in a ravenous horde of undead zombies emerging out of the forest and chasing after the family, forcing them to find a way to safety out of the area.
This was quite an impressive and enjoyable splatter effort. Among the films' great points is the maddeningly bonkers storyline that serves as an excuse for the gore effects to come forward. The initial idea of the family traveling through the woods looking to inherit a piece of land nearby and stopping at the site of a Satanic ritual being conducted on various victims who are being mutilated and sacrificed to prepare for the arrival of Satan on Earth through a zombie apocalypse is a fantastic way to go about setting things in motion. The various rituals being performed by the cult in the woods, tying victims up to huge stone slabs and then gruesomely killing them one-by-one, which after each successful ritual allows a new swarm of zombies to be revived and swarm the forest and eventually bringing everyone into contact with each other, bring a lot to like here with some creepy concepts and visuals. Even with that, though, the film serves itself incredibly well as an onslaught of over-the-top gore. The mutilations that occur at the ritualistic ceremony, from being nailed through the hands and feet to having red-hot pokers shoved through their eyes, slit throats, and stabbings set the stage for the big zombie feast that occurs as the creatures hungrily and messily devour the remains once the sacrifices are finished. That carries over into the later scenes of the undead roaming the forest looking for the family, with the genuinely terrifying and rotting zombies that ooze slime and dirt rather effectively which becomes all the more effective when mixed alongside the graphic gore found in the group being massacred and ripped to pieces before being devoured. That carries on nicely with the escape into the castle and the encounters there, from the underground tunnel escape, the battle in the vampires' lair, and the finale featuring the return of the cult for another sacrifice provide this with even more action and some indie thrills, making for a genuinely enjoyable effort to hold up over its flaws. There are some slight problems featured with this one. The main issue here is a wholly simplistic and somewhat scatterbrained story that keeps everything rather ambiguous and undefined for the most part. Since we're dropped immediately into the family traveling through the woods with narration providing us with a clue of who they are and where they're going, the whole concept of their journey is a mystery much like what the cult is attempting to do with unleashing the zombie plague on mankind. While unleashing them is clearly established, why the zombies are revived in the first place, what they're doing by unleashing them, or whether they'll be safe from the creatures with the way they continually stay around the outskirts of the action isn't explained since this just goes through these scenes without explaining anything. There's also the low-budget limitations on display, from the presentation and effects to the padding and much more, which stand out but don't lower this that much.
Rated Unrated/R: Extreme Graphic Violence and Language.
This was quite an impressive and enjoyable splatter effort. Among the films' great points is the maddeningly bonkers storyline that serves as an excuse for the gore effects to come forward. The initial idea of the family traveling through the woods looking to inherit a piece of land nearby and stopping at the site of a Satanic ritual being conducted on various victims who are being mutilated and sacrificed to prepare for the arrival of Satan on Earth through a zombie apocalypse is a fantastic way to go about setting things in motion. The various rituals being performed by the cult in the woods, tying victims up to huge stone slabs and then gruesomely killing them one-by-one, which after each successful ritual allows a new swarm of zombies to be revived and swarm the forest and eventually bringing everyone into contact with each other, bring a lot to like here with some creepy concepts and visuals. Even with that, though, the film serves itself incredibly well as an onslaught of over-the-top gore. The mutilations that occur at the ritualistic ceremony, from being nailed through the hands and feet to having red-hot pokers shoved through their eyes, slit throats, and stabbings set the stage for the big zombie feast that occurs as the creatures hungrily and messily devour the remains once the sacrifices are finished. That carries over into the later scenes of the undead roaming the forest looking for the family, with the genuinely terrifying and rotting zombies that ooze slime and dirt rather effectively which becomes all the more effective when mixed alongside the graphic gore found in the group being massacred and ripped to pieces before being devoured. That carries on nicely with the escape into the castle and the encounters there, from the underground tunnel escape, the battle in the vampires' lair, and the finale featuring the return of the cult for another sacrifice provide this with even more action and some indie thrills, making for a genuinely enjoyable effort to hold up over its flaws. There are some slight problems featured with this one. The main issue here is a wholly simplistic and somewhat scatterbrained story that keeps everything rather ambiguous and undefined for the most part. Since we're dropped immediately into the family traveling through the woods with narration providing us with a clue of who they are and where they're going, the whole concept of their journey is a mystery much like what the cult is attempting to do with unleashing the zombie plague on mankind. While unleashing them is clearly established, why the zombies are revived in the first place, what they're doing by unleashing them, or whether they'll be safe from the creatures with the way they continually stay around the outskirts of the action isn't explained since this just goes through these scenes without explaining anything. There's also the low-budget limitations on display, from the presentation and effects to the padding and much more, which stand out but don't lower this that much.
Rated Unrated/R: Extreme Graphic Violence and Language.
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