Cliff Buck's Nocturnal Horror was released in 1990, but unfortunately failed at the box office, earning only a few million dollars. But since then, the film has been enshrined as a cult and has been enthusiastically sought after by hardcore fans.
The story of the film revolves around Bonn, who frequently dreams of various monsters and monster habitats in Midian, so he consults with the psychiatrist Dirk. Unexpectedly, Dirk turned out to be a serial killer who framed Bonn as the murderer of a series of murders. A panicked Bonn flees to Midian in search of answers, only to find that his dreams are real, and that the monsters do exist.
Who knows, the vicious Dirk leads the police to Midian and shoots Bonn to death. But Bonn, who had become a member of the Nocturnals, was soon resurrected and returned to life in Midian. Bonn's girlfriend Lori, who does not believe the story told to her by the police, begins to investigate the cause of her boyfriend's death and also arrives in Midian, where she discovers Bonn and his new home.
The haunted Decker follows Lori to Midian, intending to wipe out Bonn and the Nightcrawlers once and for all. Eventually, together with the local police and gunmen, an all-out attack was launched on Midian, and various firearms, flamethrowers, bazookas and explosives raged in the Midian forbidden area. The Nightcrawlers finally fought back, but their homeland was destroyed.
The film is based on the novella Cabal, published in 1988. Cliff Barker is both the author of the original book and the director of the film, and he has previously made his novel "Heart of Hell" into the classic horror film "Ghost Chasing Ghosts".
Cliff Barker is very good at creating bizarre alternate worlds and exotic spaces. You only need to see some of his written works to understand this. These artistic inspirations are also pervasive in his film works, and you can fully see his vivid dark imagination in the Midian world of "Nocturnal Horror".
One of the most striking is the display of the sheer number and variety of nocturnals. Those scenes are similar to almost every monster you know in Drew Gundam's Cabin in the Woods appears on the screen, and while some of the monsters that live under Midian only show their faces for a few seconds, you'll remember them and hopefully see them a few more times. Each monster is very distinctive, and those monster characters with relatively many scenes have their own unique personalities.
The audience, like Lori in the movie, travels from room to room and wanders around, visiting a variety of nocturnals. There may be hundreds of monsters in the movie, and the amount of work to make monsters is certainly quite large, and the final scene in the movie may only be a few seconds, but you will feel that Midian is indeed a vibrant and vibrant place.
It's also worth mentioning Danny Eifman's soundtrack, which complements the tribal themes that run through the film. Known as the "Tribe of the Moon", the survivors of the Nightcrawler were almost extinct by humans. Eifman's brilliant soundtrack fits perfectly with the anarchist atmosphere of the film.
For various reasons, the film did not receive much attention. First, and perhaps most importantly, because the studio didn't understand the film.
"Nocturnal Horror" is not a genre film that can be simply classified. It may be best classified as a fantasy horror film, but even so, it is still biased. The horror is not caused by monsters. The real monster in the film is us humans, who destroy and persecute anything we don't understand or are different from us. The Nocturnals are actually good people, and they just want to live in peace and seclusion.
Due to the intervention of the production company, the film was drastically cut, Cliff Barker's original idea was tampered with, and about 40 minutes of footage were deleted, leaving only 102 minutes. This led to the editing being so incoherent that many stories were deleted, so much so that the narrative sometimes felt rushed or even inexplicable.
And in promoting the film, the studio made another mistake. They promoted the film as a horror film, which was simply false propaganda! The poster above shows only the expression of a woman's wide-eyed eyes, coupled with the clichéd slogan of "Lori thought she knew everything about her boyfriend... But Lori was wrong! ”
Another example is the British poster, featuring a serial killer played by David Cronenberg. Unfortunately, this is not a serial killer movie, and obviously there must be many viewers who have seen this movie based on posters who will be greatly confused and even disappointed.
In fact, "Nocturnal Horror" is only the first part of the original planned trilogy, and the story in the original book and the movie is not finished, leaving a huge suspense at the end of the movie. Unfortunately, due to poor market response, the sequel plan was shelved, and many fans have been worried about it for 30 years. Fortunately, last year, it was reported that the sequel to "Nocturnal Horror" would be made into a TV series, and Cliff Barker revealed that there was already a director candidate.
Eventually, at the urging of fans, the deleted footage was rediscovered and put back into the film, restoring the film to the version that Cliff Barker had originally envisioned, releasing a two-hour director's cut in 2014 and a 145-minute version of "The Cabal Cut" in 2017. After the test of time, this overlooked movie definitely deserves more people's attention.