15 Great Italian Horror Films You Must See Before You Die

5. City Of The Living Dead (Lucio Fulci, 1980)

“The night of the dead begins […] The dead will rise up all over the world and take over the Earth!”

Along with Mario Bava and Dario Argento, Lucio Fulci is considered one of the [un]holy trinity of Italian horror filmmakers. Bava is the class, Argento is the style, and Fulci is the sleaze. He is quite harshly regarded as the lesser of the three directors, a reputation which, in all honesty, is probably justified. However, even his harshest critics cannot rightly claim that his films are not bloody well entertaining. City of the Living Dead is the first installment of Fulci’s Gates of Hell trilogy of zombie films, preceding the often more highly regarded The Beyond and The House by the Cemetery. While I highly recommend all three of these films as worthy introductions to Italian horror, City of the Living Dead best exemplifies what is so great about Fulci’s work.

Fulci could almost rival Argento in the death department. Although he doesn’t come close to matching his contemporary’s style and visual flair, Fulci packs City of the Living Dead with plenty of memorable and gut-wrenchingly satisfying death scenes: from the pervert getting his head drilled open in graphic close-up, to that now iconic intestine puking scene. Have I put you off yet?