Between dreams & nightmares… between reality & fantasy… lies the terror of
Directed by Luigi Cozzi
Reviewed by Deep Red
The Black Cat (1989) aka Demons 6: De Profundis isn’t an official sequel to Demons (1985) directed by Lamberto Bava, the name was just used for the sake of popularity and the only official sequel is Demons 2 (1986), also directed by Lamberto Bava. It was actually made two years before the film Black Demons (1991) aka Dèmoni 3 directed by Umberto Lenzi, one of three films, again unofficially, called Demons 3, the other two being The Ogre (1988) aka Demons 3: The Ogre directed by Lamberto Bava himself and The Church (1989) aka Demons 3 directed by Michele Soavi.
The Black Cat was originally proposed as an unofficial final part of Dario Argento’s then-incomplete trilogy Le Tre madri (The Three Mothers) making it Suspiria 3, unofficially of course.
Another alternate title of The Black Cat is Edgar Allan Poe’s The Black Cat.
Lucio Fulci expressed an interest in directing it, he had already directed The Black Cat (1981) and Dario Argento went on to direct the segment of Two Evil Eyes (1990) called The Black Cat; both films are based on Edgar Allan Poe’s short story The Black Cat.
Apparently the original print no longer exists, I caught it on YouTube luckily, there are only VHS tapes and a Syfy channel edit left according to the uploader.
It’s an interesting film to watch, I had to put up with some Asian subtitles (not sure exactly which country) but that didn’t spoil it really, it is an obscure film, and also the quality, video and audio, were pretty bad, but again, at least I got to see it. I would buy it, absolutely, I can only hope for some kind of release on DVD if that’s even possible.
The story isn’t easy to follow, something about some people making a film called De Profundis and a witch called Levana. It really isn’t easy to follow and I’ll probably have to watch it several times. I’ll try and add to this review when I rewatch it. It does have a nice atmosphere and some OK special effects, bit of nice gore. The heavy metal on the soundtrack is pretty good too and they use the soundtrack of Suspiria (1977) in a couple of places which is kinda cool. They even mention Dario Argento at one point. Kept me watching, I love Italian horror and I feel fortunate to have seen it.
I recommend it to any fans of obscure Italian horror, obscure horror in general. I raise my glass to The Black Cat aka Demons 6: De Profundis, I liked it.
