Lisa And The Devil

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Summary: Lisa and the Devil
Review: Stunning camera work, beautiful sets and an interesting take on the Devil by Telly Savalas compete with deliberate pacing and a plot sacrificed to style to make LISA AND THE DEVIL a mixed bag. This is considered by some to be cult favorite Mario Bava's masterpiece, although the producers thought it was so non-commercial they insisted Bava shoot new scenes and re-edit it to make it into a more traditional horror flick. Probably a wise choice, because the director's cut is more pretentious and confusing than frightening.
Still, it looks good, Savalas seems to be having a ball playing a butler/Devil, and Elke Sommer is gorgeous. If your taste in horror turns away from slash and gore and towards the visual and contemplative LISA AND THE DEVIL may satisfy.


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Summary: true horror, surreal and bizarre
Review: "lisa and the devil" is, beyond a doubt, mario bava's best film. i was a little apprehensive about even renting anything by bava as his name is often associated with lucio fulci's, an italian director unparalleled in making sick, gorehound excrement of no redeeming value whatsoever (except maybe as an example of what can go wrong in the horror genre), but i'm glad i took the chance and bought "lisa". like some kind of disjointed, mythical dream, "lisa" has of course no coherent plot or point at which we understand the events taking place even slightly, and yet the stunning surreality of it all simply made me gag the inner critic and love it on its own terms, as what it is, art. telly savalas gives a convincing and amusing performance as satan, ie 'the castle' servant and host, constantly dropping remarks like ("that woman looks like she's seen the devil!") and giving everyone that smartass kojak lollipop suave-pimp look of the man who knows what's up. there are some truly perverse scenes in this otherwise tongue in cheek film however, such as when a mysterious young man tries to make love to a guest while the skeleton of his former wife lies on the bed and mocks him silently, rendering him impotent. there may even be a philosophical element to this movie, in that bava is demonstrating through the absurd superficiality of the relationships in the film how ridiculously false our surface identities are, how social life is like a collection of flesh and blood mannequins akin to the ones kojak is running around creepily with the whole film. a piece of decadent art!

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Summary: BAVA THE MAGNIFICENT
Review: Can't add more, really, than the previous contributor. I first saw a Bava movie as a kid, with my Dad ("Hercules in the Haunted World") and the gorgeous imagery never left me - it's part of the landscape of my brain, embedded in the whirls and folds and deeper valleys. "Black Sunday", a genuine masterpiece, was banned in my country of birth (UK) for some years, and never, to the best of my knowledge, shown uncut (to this day). For my feelings about this, I refer you to my review of Bava's delirious fantasia-on-greed, "Twitch of the Death Nerve" elsewhere on amazon.com. "Lisa and the Devil" which I watched again this past weekend, is everything the previous reviewer has said. And more (don't you agree, Jason?) It gets into the mind and nestles in there working on the deeper recesses - it is indeed a non-narrative visual poem that anticipated structural experiments WAY before today's Kinema Kiddies were even a glint in the Film Schools' accountants' eyes. File Bava with Fellini, yes (Bava was occasionally Fellini's cinematographer), then file him again with Kenneth Anger and Derek Jarman and Edgar Ulmer .... you can't go wrong with the obsessive cinema landscape of "Lisa & the Devil". Yes, really.

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Summary: Extra scenes
Review: Can't really add much to the review above. Only to say that the extra scenes (ie the sex scene between Alessio Orano & Elke Sommer, and Sylva Koscina's protracted demise) are there. They are not included as extra footage as in the original LD, but Alfredo Leone (producer) included them in the "bastardized" House of Exorcism. This film is not the best film to start an interest in Euro-art house/trash, or in Mario Bava, but it is fantastic none the less. Please make sure if you are not aware, that you watch Lisa and the Devil first, and not House of Exorcism as it might jaundice your opinions of the maestro at work. A masterpiece of off-beat cinema.

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Summary: exellent piece of macabre
Review: Elke Sommer and Telly Savalas star in the horror-thriller LISA AND THE DEVIL, a wonderfully gothic movie.

Directed by Italian maestro of horror Mario Bava, LISA AND THE DEVIL tells of Lisa (Elke Sommer), a beautiful young tourist who gets caught up in horror when she gets a ride in another couple's car.

The car breaks down near an Italian villa, and the travellers are invited to stay the night. The mansion's strange occupants seem to be living in the past, and, one by one, they succumb to the villa's strange spell.

Richly atmospheric and very enjoyable, LISA AND THE DEVIL is a real cult classic.

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Summary: Mario Bava's masterpiece, set in Spain.
Review: From the information that producer Alfredo Leone provides in this dual presentation, we learn that all that is wrong with the film is his fault, and all that is good is Bava's merit. After all, Leone is a producer, a bussinessman, not an artist. I don't say anything of "House of Exorcism", this exploitative hokum concocted by Leone against Bava's wishes. But even the grotesque finale of "Lisa and the Devil" is an imposition of Leone. Too bad.

"Lisa and the Devil" is excellent, first rate, highly atmospheric, beautifully shot, marvellous score.

I must make it clear that the setting is not Italy, but Spain. The town where Elke Sommer gets lost is Toledo, and we hear how she asks in Spanish for indications! The score is based in Maestro Rodrigo's "Aranjuez Concerto", with its fine guitar and string sounds!

The structure of the film is clearly that of a nightmare. Limits between reality and fantasy are always trespassed naturally enough along its footage, as in a dream. We are encouraged to idenfity with Elke Sommer, who finds herself lost in this strange world of unreality that is a metaphor for the real world and its enigmas. And a wonderful person to identify with, she is extremely beautiful and charismatic. There is some mild nudity, very tastefully conducted.

I find that it is a masterpiece. Real mastery of the cinematic art has been recognised in favor of trendy o politically fashionable people by biased critics. Bava was an excellent technician: he knew how to use the camera, how to illumine a scene, how compose a pictorially brilliant setting... and he had a world of his own, one that he was capable of bringing forth... horror was his choice, the part of the mind he wanted to explore.
If we speak of Italian directors I find that too much credit is given to boring and supposedly high-brown "authors". The best professionals wanted only to entertain and make profitable their productions through the identification of the public with their most beloved subjects.

This Bava film, however, is one of his least successful ones if we speak in commercial terms. Not unlike Hitchcok's "Vertigo", deep feelings are involved which touch on the director's most personal concerns. In both cases the subject is the puzzle of death, and the slippery field where reality mixes with fantasy.

All you have to do to enjoy this film is to sit down, relax and let yourself be carried away into a world of reverie, evocative of something half fogotten within yourself. If this prospect sound alluring you mustn't miss "Lisa and the Devil".

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Summary: Questionable Classic.
Review: Gaudiness, soft focus photography, an overemphasis on zoom shots (especially as far as shocked faces are concerned), awful (stilted) dialogue and a lot of old mansion baroque (seventies style). Reading that you might have mistaken this strange film for a hybrid of "Love Boat", "Murder she Wrote" (minus an iota of coherence) and, perhaps, a snuff film (well, the sensibility thereof at least). The film does have some merits as an unintentional comedy, and the opening minutes are eerie (before that damned zoom function starts taking a front seat). The constant and consistent zooming in and out and in and out, peripeteia, is more than a little annoying after a while, it spoils the film somewhat. Overall, a decent venture, worth a look if you're into seventies kitsch or want to see what all the fuss was about. The DVD quality is awful (soft image, a lot of colour bleed, with no acceptible black levels, evidence of minor print damage and mono-sound): if only those folks at Anchor Bay had got a hold of it first, natch.

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Summary: What is the deal?
Review: I saw House of exorcism and I think it's pretty bad... But what is the deal to order the 2 movies Pack at 36$ when each of them are 13.50$ if you buy them separatly????

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Summary: Mario Bava's Lisa And The Devil/ Leone's House Of Exorcism
Review: In the liner notes of Lisa And The Devil/The House Of Exorcism Alfredo Leone ask Mario Bava that if Mario had carte blanche (a blank check), what movie would he make? His answer was this movie, Lisa And The Devil, which is Bava's most personal film.

Lisa (Elke Sommer) is a foreigner in a tourist group (it's never explained what country she's from, or what country they're visiting). While admiring a fresco of the devil (which looks amazingly like Telly Savalas), she hears music and is drawn to it, abandoning the tourist group in the process. This leads her to a man(Telly Savalas) carrying a life-sized dummy. Lisa recognizes him as the devil from the painting and from this moment on the viewer is taken for a nightmarish journey that's hard to tell which is actually real or a hallucination. Not that the end result is a mess, far from it; it is remarkable how Bava holds such a non-linear plot together so well where other filmakers before and since failed and it's easy to see why this is Bava's favorite film. The cast ensemble is excellent and so is the direction. It's definitely one of his best.

Unfortunately Leone couldn't find a distributor for this film. Seeing the success of The Exorcist, Leone had Bava reshoot some scenes that had Lisa "posessed" (spouting profanities, spewing pea soup, and so on). Bava balked at filming material he felt was blasphemous, so he walked and Leone finished filming the scenes, edited them into Lisa And The Devil, and called it The House Of Exorcism. The end result is really pathetic and an insult to Mario Bava's movie. There is an audio commentary with Leone and Elke Sommer which is enjoyable and provides some of the information in making Lisa And The Devil but mostly tries to justify the filming of The House Of Exorcism. In my opinion he fails.

The DVD special features include beside the commentary, a Mario Bava biography, Bava's and the cast filmographies, a theatrical trailer for Lisa and the Devil, two theatrical trailers for House Of Exorcism (whoopee), a deleted softcore sex scene between Silva Koscina and Gabriele Tinti, a photo and poster gallery, and liner notes by Bava scholar Tim Lucas. Too bad there wasn't an audio commentary by Tim Lucas on Lisa And The Devil; his knowledge is incredible and he's always interesting to listen to.

As bad as House Of Exocism is, I still recommend getting this DVD not only for comparison's sake but for the Leone/Sommer commentary. Otherwise, get the Lisa And The Devil DVD which is available seperately.

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Summary: Wacky adventure through the Land of Bava
Review: Italian director Mario Bava (1914-1980) is one of the giants of the horror film genre. His films, no matter what the plot, always promised great style mixed with scenes of murder and mayhem. Bava's big break into the industry came with his 1960 black and white classic "Black Sunday" starring fan favorite Barbara Steele. This was only the beginning, as Bava churned out a series of gruesome shockers over the next seventeen years. Perhaps Mario's biggest contribution to the horror field was his 1972 picture "Twitch of the Death Nerve," also known as "Bay of Blood." It doesn't take too long to realize "Friday the 13th" shamelessly cribbed from Bava's bloodbath. The director's inventiveness goes far beyond hacking up a few unfortunate souls, however, as "Lisa and the Devil," a movie which first appeared on our shores in a radically altered form called "The House of Exorcism," shows. This movie is a wildly inventive jaunt into the inner recesses of the mind of a tortured woman. The Bava legacy continued with son Lamberto, one of the guiding lights behind "Demons," an instant cult favorite with gorehounds worldwide.

Tourist Lisa (Elke Sommer) finds herself in an increasing series of ultra horrific and bizarre circumstances after viewing a huge mural on the side of a building in an Italian town. After looking at the picture, she wonders off into the heart of the old city where she soon encounters a man (Telly Savalas) wearing a beret who exactly resembles the figure in the painting. Horrified at the similarities between this man and the painting, Lisa flees and wanders aimlessly until a husband and wife pick her up in their ancient automobile. The car breaks down near a dark, creepy looking estate where none other than the man Lisa saw earlier works as the butler/head servant. The family living at the home agrees to allow the stranded travelers access to the house in order to phone for assistance. It quickly becomes apparent that things are not what they seem inside the walls of this sprawling estate. Over a socially awkward dinner served on a table the size of a football field, weird activities take place. The family doesn't seem to get along all that well and there is some peculiar importance attached to a chocolate cake with sprinkles (!). Lisa eventually discovers that a family member delivers the cake to a locked bedroom upstairs, supposedly to a member of the family who permanently lives in this room.

Meanwhile, the man and wife who helped Lisa clash over the wife's infidelity, a behavior that will soon have ghastly consequences in this house of horrors. As for Savalas, he acts the part of butler but also seems a more important figure than his position merits. He spends most of his time wandering around the house startling Lisa, or fiddling around with his human figures made out of wax. Even worse, our hapless heroine witnesses Savalas stuffing a corpse in a coffin in one of the rooms on the estate. This corpse just happens to be a mysterious man Lisa encountered in the town shortly after seeing the painting. He continues to reappear to her in the house and on the grounds of the estate, often seeming to change in age between each encounter. The horrors of the family eventually rise to the surface with the result that Lisa emerges from her dream state and decides to fly back home. But wait! Bava played with your mind for over an hour and he isn't about to let you go this easily. Is Lisa truly free of her nightmare or is she about to enter an even deeper dimension of terror?

On the surface, the film makes little sense. But what appears to be a random mish mash of bizarre scenes actually does assume somewhat of a structure if you pay attention to the first five minutes of the movie. It is my opinion that the bizarre painting Lisa sees on a trip to Italy provides the viewer with a possible key to deciphering this weird movie. I propose that Sommer's character undergoes a sort of hypnotic interaction with this painting that somehow transports her back in time, a process which then helps explain the following sequences. The movie is a dream or break with reality in the mind of Sommer's character, nothing more or nothing less, and therefore must assume a fractured, nonsensical tone. Isn't it slightly odd that Lisa doesn't have a boyfriend or husband, or if she does he is not with her on this trip? That might explain the mysterious male that seems to have some bizarre link with her character. Perhaps everything we see is part of Lisa's unconscious taking on corporeal form. Whatever is going on, I think it is important we remember that we are seeing events from the perspective of this confused woman and are thus dependent on her cracked perceptions. How can we know what is going on when Lisa herself has little idea of the weirdness swirling about her? I truly enjoyed the film and appreciated Bava's attempts to do something different.

I also liked the performances. Savalas intrigues as the butler/devil, an ominous figure always looming in the background happily tormenting Lisa. Sommer is also a lot of fun to watch as she bumbles from one grim situation to another, even going so far as to shed her clothes in one scene (bless her soul!). The other performers are lesser talents, something we should expect and accept with Italian horror. The DVD recognizes the utter wackiness of this film with a plethora of extras well worth watching. I usually turn up my nose at movies that seek to confuse the audience, but I really enjoyed this one. I can't wait to see the hacked up "House of Exorcism" so I can compare the two. Enjoy.