Re-animator

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Movie
German title Re-animator
Original title Re-animator
Country of production United States
original language English , German
Publishing year 1985
length Unrated version: 86 minutes
Integral version: 104 minutes
Age rating FSK 18
Rod
Director Stuart Gordon
script Dennis Paoli
William J. Norris
Stuart Gordon
production Brian Yuzna
music Richard Band
camera Mac Ahlberg
cut Lee Percy
occupation

Re-Animator is a 1985 in the United States produced horror film after published in 1922 short story Herbert West - The revivalist of HP Lovecraft . Directed by Stuart Gordon and produced by Brian Yuzna , who also directed and funded the sequels Bride of Re-Animator (1990) and Beyond Re-Animator (2003). The film did not appear in German cinemas and was marketed on VHS from October 31, 1988 .

action

The young, very closed medical student Herbert West has created a new type of serum in Switzerland that can bring dead tissue back to life. After an incident, West, who is well versed in brain medicine, fled to the United States on a scholarship to the Miskatonic University Hospital. There he nests as a lodger with the medical student Dan Cain, who has a secret love affair with Megan, the dean's daughter . In the basement of Cain's apartment, the fellow student who moved in sets up a makeshift laboratory in order to be able to continue his research in secret.

West, who studied with a respected surgeon in Switzerland and is regarded as a hopeful talent, starts working with the long-established brain specialist Dr. Hill unpopular for challenging his outdated methods and accusing him of stealing research. The lonely lodger is also immediately disagreeable to Cain's friend Megan, who feels strengthened in her opinion after a few days when she finds her missing house cat in West's refrigerator.

That same night, Cain witnessed how West, who had previously injected the dead animal with a bright green liquid into the brain, brought the cat back to life. Unfortunately, however, the subject is extremely aggressive and aggressive, so that the two men are forced to kill the animal again. West then tells his astonished roommate about his secret research and asks him to support him in his triumphant "victory over brain death". But Cain remains skeptical, so West reanimates the battered cat again with the help of his serum. At that moment, the shocked Megan enters the room, she involuntarily becomes an eyewitness to the resuscitation of animal cells.

The resentful and jealous Professor Dr. Hill, who has secret feelings for the dean's daughter, uses his hypnotic skills to manipulate the dean so that West and Cain are expelled from faculty. Offended in their sense of honor, the two men decide to expand West's experiments on their own to include deceased people, but the two men are increasingly ruthless. They even revive Dean Halsey, who had previously been brutally killed. Contrary to their belief, however, their resuscitated, clinically dead test subjects are murderous beasts that become more instinctive the longer they stay among the dead.

Professor Dr. Hill soon learns of the existence of the mysterious serum, which he wants to secure himself with the help of his skills, but West is not ready to give up his invention. He decapitates the professor in cold blood and tests his serum separately on the skull and torso of the previously killed teacher. The two separated body parts then develop a strange life of their own, in turn awaken other dead bodies and thus gather a group of strong and weak-willed undead around them, all of which are directed by Hill. At the end of the film, Hill tries to kidnap his adored Megan. The situation between the kidnapper and his undead henchmen and the group around West, Cain, Megan and the clinically dead dean Halsey escalates and becomes difficult to understand. Megan is killed in the scuffle, but in the last scene of the film she is apparently reanimated by the lovemaking Cain with an injection of the substance.

information

  • Indexed November 30, 1989 to July 2013 (Lightning Video)
  • German DVD by Laser Paradise (Release: unchecked)

Frames

  • Of Re-Animator two versions exist. Once the longer R-rated version (103: 46 min.) And the shorter Director's Cut (86:03 min.). The German version is based on the R-rated version, but was again heavily shortened for the German video release.
  • The R-rated version was never intended by the director. Since the director's cut seemed too short to the studio at 86:03 minutes and had to be defused for a theatrical release, the studio had the cut scenes reintegrated into the film. This is how the runtime of 103: 46 minutes comes about.
  • The indexing of the film in Germany was withdrawn in the summer of 2013 - the new release took place on September 27 of that year. The FSK re-rated the entire film as “no youth approval”.

Awards

The film received two nominations for best horror film and for best make-up at the 1986 Saturn Award ceremony .

musical

In 2011, Stuart Gordon staged the musical version together with the authors Dennis Paoli and William J. Norris, as well as the composer and poet Mark Nutter. The six-month musical tour sold out and won the LA Drama Critics Circle Award . So that from May 3, 2012 in The Hayworth Theater in Los Angeles, another 10-week performance was put on. The cast made up of Mark Beltzman, Cynthia Carle, Brian Gillespie, Marlon Grace, Liesel Hanson, Rachel Avery as Megan Halsey, Jesse Merlin as Dr. Hill, Chris McKenna as Dan Cain and George Wendt .

Reviews

"Stuart Gordon's re-animator is a pleasure, a bloody horror film that finds a rhythm and style that make it work in a crazy and refreshing way ..."

- Roger Ebert

“Stuart Gordon's debut film is so over the top it's funny again. The faint-hearted are warned: Because the bone saw screeches during the grotesque slaughter (despite all the cuts!), This splatter shocker, which was awarded in Cannes, is not recommended to everyone. The script for Ferrara's iconic horror Body Snatchers ('92) was also written by Gordon. Conclusion: A bloody classic of black humor. "

- Cinema

“With 'Re-Animator' (later also with 'From Beyond - Aliens of Horror'), Stuart Gordon succeeds in making a successful film adaptation of a subject by HP Lovecraft. The gloomy, morbid and claustrophobic atmosphere of the film contrasts on the one hand with tough splatter effects that make the heart of the fan beat faster, and on the other hand with a dash of black humor that cannot be overlooked in the parodying representation of the figure of the scientist. The viewer experiences a variant of the 'Frankenstein' motif, which is enriched with Lovecraft's bitterly angry features. Director Gordon, who on closer inspection turns out to be an intimate connoisseur of the genre - many cross-references to classics can be discovered on repeated viewing - has achieved a revival of the deadlocked genre with 'Re-Animator' and created a cult film. "

- Frank Trebbin: Fear sits next to you . ISBN 3-929234-03-3 .

"Developed with routine staging, the horror story about the dissolution of the boundaries between life and death relies on increasingly drastic and repulsive effects and thus takes away any seriousness."

- Lexicon of international film

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Release certificate for Re-Animator . Voluntary self-regulation of the film industry , July 2013 (PDF; accessed on February 2, 2018, revised version, test no. 56686-a / V).
  2. ↑ Report on schnittberichte.com, accessed on July 25, 2013
  3. ↑ Re-Animator the Musical on reanimatorthemusical.com
  4. ↑ Give Mom a Little Head for Mother's Day - $ 10 Re-Animator the Musical Tickets on Sale Monday, May 7th for ONE DAY ONLY! on dreadcentral.com
  5. ^ Re-Animator the Musical Returning to LA; Get Opening Weekend Discounted Tickets Here! on dreadcentral.com
  6. ↑ Amanda Story: Heads up! "RE-ANIMATOR THE MUSICAL" is back, May 3, 2012, fangoria.com ( Memento from May 4, 2012 in the Internet Archive )
  7. ^ Criticism on filmtipps.at
  8. ↑ film review on cinema.de
  9. ↑ Re-Animator. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed March 2, 2017 .Template: LdiF / Maintenance / Access used