FRANCESCO DELLAMORTE (CEMETERY MAN)

Dellamorte Dellamore (released as Cemetery Man in the USA and Of Love and Death in Australia) is a 1994 Italian horror film directed by Michele Soavi. The screenplay by Gianni Romoli was based on the 1991 novel by Tiziano Sclavi. The film stars Rupert Everett, François Hadji-Lazaro and Anna Falchi. After directing a particularly stylish giallo, Deliria (1987), and a pair of atmospheric supernatural thrillers, La Chiesa (1989) and La Setta (1991), Dario Argento protégé Soavi's fourth feature film would not fit genre categorization so easily. Part supernatural romance, part satire of Italian politics, and part zombie splatter comedy, Dellamorte Dellamore's story concerns the beleaguered caretaker of a small Italian cemetery, who searches for love while defending the town from zombies.

The film was released in Italy to some acclaim, but United States distributor October Films changed its title to Cemetery Man and saddled the film with a campy ad campaign, finally unleasing it on April 26, 1996. In the US, Cemetery Man received mostly negative critical reaction, small theatrical distribution (opening on six screens), and a frequently delayed Region 1 DVD release. The film missed popular success, grossing only $253,969 in the US, but found a stateside cult following over time, via home video. Renowned director Martin Scorsese called Dellamorte Dellamore one of the best films of the 1990s.

Plot of Cemetary Man

"The living dead and the dying living are all the same. Cut from the same cloth." -Dellamorte Dellamore

Francesco Dellamorte (Rupert Everett) is the cemetery caretaker in the small town of Buffalora, Italy. He lives in a ramshackle house on the premises, constantly surrounded by death, with only his mentally handicapped assistant Gnaghi (François Hadji-Lazaro) for company. Young punks in town spread gossip that Francesco is impotent. He can open up to his only friend, Franco, by telephone, but when they meet in person, have little to say. Francesco's only hobbies are reading outdated telephone directories, in which he crosses out the names of the deceased, and trying to assemble a puzzle shaped like a human skull.

The inscription over the Buffalora Cemetery gate reads "RESVRRECTVRIS", and indeed, Francesco has had his hands full of late. The dead interred in the cemetery rise from their graves on the seventh day, reanimated and ready to assault the living. Francesco, as if trapped in a Sisyphean cycle, is duty-bound as cemetery caretaker, to destroy the "Returners" before they overrun the town.

Buffalora's mayor (Stefano Masciarelli) doesn't just disbelieve the cemetery caretaker's reports, but is so fixated on his campaigning that he seems unable even to hear Francesco's pleas for an investigation. Nor can Francesco surmount the complicated bureaucracy or mountain of paperwork to get assistance. Accepting his fate, Francesco and Gnaghi spend their days tending the cemetery grounds, doing their best to counteract the decay of ages, and their nights planting bullets and shovels into the brains of the walking dead. "This is my business," he says before wearily dispatching a zombie motorcyclist. "They pay me for it."

At a funeral, Francesco falls hard and fast in love, with the beautiful young widow (Anna Falchi) of a rich, elderly man. While consummating their relationship atop the grave, her husband returns, attacks, and mortally wounds the unnamed woman. Francesco having lost his only love and destroying her reanimated body, begins plummeting into a deeper and deeper depression. Furthermore he is visited by the leering figure of death, who tries to recruit Francesco as a fellow reaper.

Francesco repeatedly encounters women, all played by Falchi and listed in the credits only as "She", who resemble his lost love. He goes to outrageous ends to be with them - when the object of his affection confesses to being terrified of penises, Dellamorte visits the doctor to demand his penis be cut off - but circumstance or fate always steals away Dellamorte's lovers. This is mirrored as Gnaghi becomes sweetly obsessed with the Mayor's capricious daughter Valentina (Fabiana Formica). This fixation would seem to end tragically when she is decapitated in a motorcycle accident. Instead, Gnaghi digs up her reanimated head, and an innocent romance begins.

Prodded by the twin specters of Love and Death, Francesco begins to wonder if the easiest way to stop the dead from returning might be to shoot them in the head before burying them the first time. His grip on reality slipping, and despair mounting, Francesco destroys the final manifestation of "She" himself, and heads into town square at night with his pistol. When even these desperately demonstrative acts fail to change Dellamorte's situation - he cannot even get himself arrested when bluntly confessing his crimes to the police - he and Gnaghi pack up the car, and head for the Buffalora city limits. "Past this town is the rest of the world," Dellamorte muses, "What do you think the rest of the world looks like?"

Title: of Love and Death

The title Dellamorte Dellamore is a bit of word play in Italian, della morte (spelled as two separate words) meaning "of death" and dell'amore (again spelled separately) meaning "of love". The protagonist's last name is also Dellamorte and towards the end of the movie we learn that his mother's maiden name was Dellamore. Possible translations of the title are "of/about the death of love" or "about death, about love."

Trivia

American Industrial band genCAB wrote a song about the movie entitled "Of Love & Death". It also contains samples of Dellamorte repeating, "I'd give my life to be dead".

Region 1 DVD Release

Anchor Bay Entertainment released the film on R1 DVD on June 13, 2006 under the US title Cemetery Man. The release features an anamorphic widescreen transfer, a making-of featurette entitled Death Is Beautiful, a theatrical trailer, and an 8-page collector's booklet.

The artwork used on this page was done by David Hartman. For more information on this artist view our "DARK ARTIST OF THE MONTH " section of this website.

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